Or maybe, Apple has noticed, like a LOT of the rest of us....raw sequential speed numbers do not matter as much
As mentioned in the article, it affects swapping. Some users have hit swapping so hard, on their M1-based macs, that they've prematurely worn out their storage. So, it sounds like it
could be noticeable to some. And with it being soldered down, I guess you toss out the whole machine and buy a new one, when that happens.
Also, with the number of NANDs chips halved, you'd expect the number of channels to be halved, and therefore random performance to be significantly affected.
Memory mgmt is mindbogglingly good. 8GB works more like 16GB of memory sticks. The M2 Mini sits roughly at around 4-5GB and it quickly starts to compress memory. Memory pressure roughly stays around 40% with multiple apps and browsers open.
Memory compression only helps if most of your memory contents are static. Browsing sessions is a good example.
For people doing software builds, doing rendering jobs, or even many games, memory compression will be an unacceptable compromise and swapping is similarly going to disappoint. So, please don't act like it's going to satisfy all users as well as it does for you.