That's really weird, because anecdotally, that's exactly the opposite of my experience. I've gone through a bunch of microUSB cables that got loose and wouldn'

That's really weird, because anecdotally, that's exactly the opposite of my experience. I've gone through a bunch of microUSB cables that got loose and wouldn't stay plugged in, and I've never had any problems with miniUSB cables and connectors at all, ever. I've never seen a miniUSB plug that wiggled in the socket, but this has been par for the course with microUSB. Besides older devices like cameras (which I no longer use), I still use miniUSB on my Microchip PIC programmer and my Fender guitar amp. It's a bigger, bulkier connector than microUSB, with a much thicker and more robust metal shield. I really don't see how wiggling would be more of a problem on miniUSB than microUSB because of this factor. As for force, again my experience is exactly the opposite: the miniUSB connectors require a lot of force to both engage and disengage. Not as much as full-size USB of course, but a lot more than the wimpy little microUSB connectors.