tundraboy

Get a quarter inch stack of printer paper.  Align all the edges so no odd pieces stick out.  Now fold that stack right down the middle as neatly as you can.  Notice how the edges parallel to the fold fan out?  That is the fundamental problem of any folding screen whether it's made from several laminated layers or a single integrated film.  Because a screen has positive thickness (unavoidable in the real world) there will always be internal stresses when you fold it due to the inner and outer surfaces of the screen being subject to forces that want to break their alignment.  Eventually, repeated folding and unfolding will ruin the screen, perhaps by permanently warping the whole screen, maybe forming a permanent crease on the fold, or delaminating its layers.

(Well maybe someday some boffin will invent a material that reconfigures itself at a molecular level each time it is folded or unfolded.  I've seen them do it in the Terminator movies, so why not, huh?)

I don't believe the allegations because according to the Swiss, they are a very upright, and law-abiding people whose banks would never do business with anyone who gives off even the slightest whiff of corruption.  Except for thieving dictators, nazis, drug-dealers, organized crime, tax evaders, embezzlers, etc.  But those are minor exceptions.

The fast fail strategy not only does not work in health care, it also doesn't work in self-driving cars.  Sadly, a few lives had to be sacrificed before Silicon Valley finally learned that lesson.

The list is still as bogus and meaningless as it was the day their marketing department cooked it up as a publicity stunt.

Apple's solid gold effort with the watch collapsed because it did not design for perpetual upgradeability of the watch case.  Very few people will want to buy a $10K bauble if it's useless after a few years.

What they could have done was fix the design hard points as dictated by the case so that the screen, back cover, and internal components of future versions will fit the gold cases.   Luxury watches need to be shipped to a service center for an overhaul every 3-4 (?) years to stay on tip-top shape.  And it ain't a low cost service.   Apple could have had a similar scheme for the gold Apple Watch and have the overhaul done by the Genius Bar.  (And price it so that it only makes sense for gold watches.)

But the loss of design flexibility resulting from fixing the watch's hard points (location of buttons and crown, shape of screen and back cover, internal component dimensions, etc.) into perpetuity was just not something Apple was willing to commit to.  Which in the high tech business is very understandable.