Everyone seems to be missing the obvious. The reason its a day-one update is due to manufacturing, as the Wii U you buy on launch day may have been manufactured months ago.
Even if the stock firmware already has this functionality included, its going to have been improved in the meantime and thus you get a day-one firmware update.
Would you rather them increase the price of the console so that they can set up a production line JUST to update to the latest firmware before shipping? Something which would also cause stock shortages for no good reason? That would make no sense at all.
Edited by Alex Atkin UK, 07 November 2012 - 12:47 AM.