Your logic on that is absolutely abysmal. The hardware is useless without software and the software simply did not justify the previous price point.
I mean sure, I COULD be getting more gaming time for my money, but not if there's not enough games I care to play. If I'd bought a 360 at launch for $400, sure I'd have it for its entire lifespan, but it would've been a glorified paperweight until Dead Rising came out a full nine or ten months into its lifespan. That's a good seventy bucks right down the shitter. Conversely, I could wait until the first price drop, save fifty bucks and play catchup. Better to have too many games and not enough time to play them in than have the console collecting dust while my investment goes wasted. Those games aren't going away on me.
A console doesn't magically stop working when the new generation comes out. I didn't buy my way into the last generation until about a year into the PS2's lifespan and even then, I was buying a Dreamcast, not a PS2. I paid like $99 for it and I still use it. That factor's in to about under twenty bucks a year.
Sure, I could spend $500 for a PS3 right now and I'd have a longer timeframe to enjoy it, but the only game for it I would even bother playing is a game I already played last generation. If I were so desperate to play a prettier version of Ninja Gaiden, I'd buy a used original Xbox and Ninja Gaiden Black for about $90 total and maybe ten bucks worth of beer to make it look better.
The only console I ever bought at launch (Before my Wii) was the Nintendo 64 and it was a huge mistake. I got Super Mario 64 and beat every minute detail inside a few months and then got to sit on my thumbs with a $200 paperweight and wait for Star Fox 64 to come out months later.
Buying a console at launch is just an ill advised move in most instances. The Wii was a calculated decision on my part. At launch, it was a full $150 cheaper than the closest competition meaning a pricedrop is probably a couple years off and there was a list of games coming out in a streamlined enough manner for me to maximize my enjoyment of it across a good timeframe (Legend of Zelda to Super Paper Mario to Resident Evil 4 to Metroid Prime 3 to Super Mario Galaxy with Wii Sports, the Bigs and SSBB thrown in for good measure). I already have more Wii games on my shelf than there are 360 games I could really picture myself diving into.
There's also the factor of diminishing value of games. I waited almost two full years before deciding for sure to buy a 360. At this point, I will be saving fifty dollars and I can get Dead Rising for only $30 brand new now. By the time I finish that, Metroid Prime 3 should be out. By the time I finish that, Guitar Hero 3 will be on the horizon. By the time I get sick of that, Gears of War will likely have dropped in price a bit. If I'd bought the 360 at launch, that's an extra eighty bucks (Fifty for the console, thirty for the game) to spend on something I would've put in maybe 100 hours worth of time total over the last year or so.