It is a different target audience. Anyone who seriously wants to mine knows all of what you said and probably has a place with a decent amount of ASICs running.
Immediately my thought wasn't "This is dumb because the hardware sucks at mining" it was "This is to introduce the idea into people's heads." A fraction may go on mining more seriously, or more likely buying and using BTC.
The goal isn't to get people mining, this is not some kind of educational scheme or promotion for bitcoin. The goal for uTorrent is to make money off of its users mining, and this isn't doing it. (what it is doing is screwing with its users)
If users get introduced to mining and then go and buy an ASIC that does absolutely nothing, 0, for uTorrent. That's not a business model.
Immediately my thought wasn't "This is dumb because the hardware sucks at mining" it was "This is to introduce the idea into people's heads." A fraction may go on mining more seriously, or more likely buying and using BTC.