It's interesting to see the philosophical difference between how Apple approaches backward compatibility and how the USB people have done the same. USB reused the old full-size connector but doubled up the pins, and for the micro connector, they doubled the size to add the new pins.

Apple's philosophy is clearly all about dongles. Let the new thing be designed in an elegant fashion, and support the older things with dongles. Dongles for VGA. Dongles for wired Ethernet. Dongles for their old 30-pin connector. Dongles for their new MagSafe power connector. Dongles everywhere! Unless you've got the newest and latest of everything, then you'll be free of dongles.