This is clearly a follow up to the marketing push to developers that began at WWDC. An unsurprising addition given the fact that there's really no solution to the iOS 7 UI revamp without making Apps iOS 7 only.
I agree with your sentiment but be factually accurate if you've looked at the iOS 6 App Store on day one it would differ in a plethora of small details then the one we have now.
I agree Apple shouldn't have total exposure control.
That doesn't mean that Top Charts is not intrinsically broken. Third parties game the top charts just as much (Or even more) then Apple does. In fact Apple is working towards a system that doesn't have any third party or first party control, Apps Near Me.
Interesting that Sergey Brin called Glass basically done when something as major as a mirrored version is in the works. That doesn't bode well for the project.