"Afterall, the MacBook Air wasn't a competitor to the netbooks - it was a competitor to the ultrabooks being touted by Intel et al."
This is backwards: the original MBA was introduced in 2008, and Intel only introduced the "Ultrabook" branding several years later. The MBA was largely panned as a far-too-expensive Apple attempt to cover their flank from the inexorable advance of the netbook. It was only when the iPad and competitive Android tablets put paid to netbooks that Intel came around to the design.
This is backwards: the original MBA was introduced in 2008, and Intel only introduced the "Ultrabook" branding several years later. The MBA was largely panned as a far-too-expensive Apple attempt to cover their flank from the inexorable advance of the netbook. It was only when the iPad and competitive Android tablets put paid to netbooks that Intel came around to the design.