People cling to rumors of product release at this time of year because up until a few years ago... apple was always expected to deliver something in the summer at Macworld NY.
Apple protested the move to Boston, and doesn't support it... and in a roundabout way they relieved themselves of a summer delivery window. Now they tend to hold on and have been rolling out more introductions in the fall at Macworld Paris (i.e. the G5 iMac) or spring at WWDC (the Powermac G5)...
This year the WWDC was a bombshell, but with no new product announcements... people feel a little cheated without MWNY, I know I've become pretty impatient for the so called iphone.