The Intel guy is right, at least for the relatively near future. 8 cores on a desktop aren't really going to benefit much of anything until code is written to be MUCH more effectively multithreaded. Most desktop applications now have a tough time making effective use of 2 cores, let alone 4.

On the other hand, the resources that would be spent on an 8-core chip could be much better spent elsewhere, improving the performance (or performance/watt) of each of the 2 or 4 cores in a chip instead. Doubling your transistor count for only a minimal improvement in performance for the software most people use isn't generally a good idea.