I would think that Li battery use in RC model airplanes is fundamentally different than that in phones. Phones are always on, even when they're asleep (unless you actually power down when you're not using it, which no one does), while RC airplanes are on only intermittently. So the battery usage in phones is much more predictable than that for the planes. I'm not an electrical or chemical engineer, so this is only speculation on my part. If you have actual data showing that Li battery life is unpredictable in phone usage, I'd be interested in seeing it.
One of your earlier posts implied that things were all fine for a phone with a nonremovable battery (like the Maxx) until the battery dies. But the point that bradenfontaine was making is that since the Maxx's total battery life should last at least 2-3 times as long as most other standard batteries, the risk of the battery completely dying in the Maxx's useful lifetime is extremely low, especially, as you point out, if you cycle phones every 2 years or so.
For those of us who are trying to hold on to our unlimited data plans (for however long VZW will keep that going, anyway), we also have to think twice before pulling the trigger every 2 years to get a new phone. It's a lot more expensive now to get the latest and greatest phone, since we'd have to pay full price for the phone in order to keep the unlimited data.