3DS was leaked by Nintendo... so he only leaked Vita but he leaks handheld every month.

Because the sales trackers in Japan only aren't doing sales tracking to make money from selling the data to gaming companies and financial institutions. Famitsu and Dengeki are gamer magazines and they publish sales in order to sell their magazine to gamers. Media Create is a sales tracker which wants to make money from selling its sales data, but there it is in competition with gaming magazines that have somewhat reliable independant sales tracking so if MS or any other gaming company put the screws on Media Create to keep the info confidential it would merely diminish Media Create's influence on the game industry sales narrative in the public domain, so it would have no effect at all on the PR/spin game that gaming companies might want to play. So there's no leverage for gaming companies to be able to apply to force sales data to remain under wraps.

If Edge Magazine employed an independant sales tracker and published monthly hardware and top 20 softare sales for the USA, to say the nearest 1,000 for hardware, and that data was routinely within a couple of % of NPD's data, then you can bet your arse that NPD sales + top 20 software would become public domain information in very short order. Indeed if I was runing a gaming magazine I'd employ a sales tracking company for a year to do exactly this and see how their data compares to NPD over that time, and if they are consistently reliable I would then start publishing the information. Or if I was a little bit dishonest I would set up a sales tracking company, do some rudimentary sales tracking but actually just buy NPD's numbers from Aquamarine and then publish them with random minor alterations to numbers (for instance if there is ~2000 sales difference between 2 games that sold 2-300K I would have them swap places with just ~1000 sales difference) to hide the fact that I am merely re-publishing NPD numbers. But I don't run a gaming magazine and I'm not a little bit dishonest.

Except that's not the case with the New 3DS. There's only one game announced for it. Games like Majora's Mask 3D, MH4U, Codename STEAM, Fire Emblem If, etc. work on a regular 3DS.

And you believe there won't be more? Third parties will wait and see how sales go to see if there will be an install base worth making a game that makes use of the new specs. If N3DS has the sales effect Nintendo are hoping it does then there will be a big enough install base for 3rd parties and Nintendo to make use of those better specs.

At the moment your defence amounts to, "no one will use the new specs for games so Nintendo aren't really being dicks, they are actually just being cynical by releasing new hardware that will get Nintendo fans to re-buy 3DS but that will never be used in any meaningful way." The motivations really aren't any better. Either way you cut it, doing a spec refresh is a dick move.

New 3DS is not a new system.

Neither was the DSi/DSi XL (from DS), even though it had 4x the RAM of the DS, new cameras, new OS, and a new CPU.

Neither was the N64 RAM bundle. Yes, the N64 was bundled with DK64 + RAM Expansion Pak ... that wasn't playable on a regular N64. That doesn't make it a new system. That's just stupid (I'm sorry, no other way to put it).

Never said they're not being dicks. Just correcting your statement of every title not being playable on the old system. The DSi only had 5 exclusives (none of which were high profile), do you really think the New 3DS, a system that will likely sell less LT, will have more exclusives?

I'm actually surprised so many people pay a lot of money to rebuy the same system again with a few upgrades. Nintendo makes a lot of money off their hardcore fans. Makes you wonder if they'll design their next one with revisions in mind. Instead of just putting out the best console they can to begin with.

This isn't really how it works.  No console manufacturer ACTUALLY gives you the best they can to begin with.  Revisions like with the 3DS have more to do with price and feedback.  Nintendo is also not the only one that does redesigns.  Look at the PSP, and the PS Vita even.

Yeah.... but thats not what all the N3DS is about so?

I'd argue the ps4 couldn't have been much better to begin with.  The handheld revisions seem to get way more people rebuying than consoles do when they get a revision.