[quadrige]

Yes but precisely, people are never going to mention their exact laptop name because brands like Dell choose to produce 20 variations of each laptop they create, each one harder to remember than the precedent. Apple has such a little number of portable macs (two actually: air and pro) that everyone remembers it. And they also chose a simple way to tell the difference between each iteration: the production year, as well as the screen size, which are two criterias very understandable to everyone.

It's not about what people choose to say, it's about Apple's clever naming conventions.