Apple "Blocking" Old Airport Express Stations

For about an hour today I was trying to set up an old (802.11g) Airport Express. It wasn't detecting: on my iPhone, on my Mac, etc. I changed cables, performed hard resets, etc.

As I came to find out, Apple decided to drop "support" for this in Mountain Lion. Mind you that the hardware, while not optimal, is still compatible.

After a quick Google search, I discovered that you can still download and install the previous version software through a few hacks. See http://frank.is/mountain-lion-and-the-old-airport-utility/ for details.

Why is it that we are being pragmatically locked out of our own hardware? While I took the time to find the workaround, the large majority of users are simply forced to upgrade their hardware.