God, why do I take the bait? I've personally never seen any statistics for people sitting at home with old systems reluctant to buy new ones based on limited backward compatability. I can't imagine it's a very large number. It hasn't really stopped the 360 or the DS this generation, nor did it stiffle Super Nintendo sales. The 360 is tromping the PS3 in HD console sales, the DS is outselling the PSP 2 to 1, and the Super Nintendo maintained a similar lead against the formidable Sega Genesis. Most consumers don't really care too much about that sort of thing, if I may generalize. Certainly not the casual crowd.
And hey, some of us are enjoying Phantom Hourglass while keeping a perfectly capable GBA in the closet for that retro fix. Hooray!
Here's a link to an article about the DS passing the 50 million sold mark:
http://www.tech.co.uk/home-entertain...leid=346391286