Whats "Totally unexpected" for me is the fact that all of this information about the car is not known already. In todays time, it is extremely rare for something to not be completely known about by "release" by the company.
The frustration evidenced by many over this information not being known already shows that the expectation is "there is no product release, the in formation is leaked when I want it so I can consume it when I want to, not when they want to tell me about it".
So, no matter what they do, getting people talking about this information this long and this close to release is both unexpected and a win for them, regardless of what they actually release.