>> I assume Apple is a rational organization equipped with a better understanding than I have of its products. I know - big assumption - but let's assume it's t

>> I assume Apple is a rational organization equipped with a better understanding than I have of its products. I know - big assumption - but let's assume it's true. What reasons would Apple as a company have for improving the keyboard, and what reasons would Apple have for not improving the keyboard? Your question has already been answered by Apple with the current generation of problematic keyboards. They already had a mature, reliable keyboard that felt pretty good and was not noisy. It was not "broke" and did not need "fixing". They presumably chose to "improve" it with the current one so that their computers could be a little bit thinner and that Jony Ive could brag about the new technology in a video during a keynote.