What makes you think this is self-congratulation? This is a response to Marco Arment, Ben Thompson, and other pundits (largely spurred by the PR efforts of Google and to a lesser extent Facebook and Microsoft) who claim that Apple is "behind" in this field or that it somehow poses an existential threat to Apple. This is Apple saying "uh no".
They'd be perfectly fine with not talking about it as they've done until now if they weren't trying to counter these media narratives.
As to your point about Apple not engaging with the research community, how is this a surprise at all? Their M.O has been secrecy ever since Jobs returned to Apple.
They'd be perfectly fine with not talking about it as they've done until now if they weren't trying to counter these media narratives.
As to your point about Apple not engaging with the research community, how is this a surprise at all? Their M.O has been secrecy ever since Jobs returned to Apple.