Those things are rarely (publicly) unambiguously stated, so no, we didn't miss the memo because there wasn't one. Does not mean that over the course of time a target demo can change for a company though. Apple would hardly be the only company who did.
Pity though, Snow Leopard was something to be envious of.
Maybe no statement as such, but at the very least the move to non-user-upgradeable hardware feels like such a move.
For me personally, the ability to upgrade RAM and storage, and graphics card on a desktop are central to a professional workflow, and part of my purchasing decision as a prosumer.
Coupled with a million other issues I've had over the past few years, including reliability and support, I no longer feel the added cost of a Mac versus a Linux machine is justifiable.
I don't think they did.
The comment seems like an emotional nostalgic conclusion they have after watching the WWDC, without any mentions why they think future will be worse than what we have now or what we had in the past.