Whether AM2 or AM2+ wasn't the point there. The idea was that some will spend on the other hardwares as long as they get into a board cheap that will still run a new model cpu that comes out.
If you were going after an 8800 that was still priced at $300 with the memory and supply seeing $200 and cpu at $250 but only have $800 to work with...? you're going to buy a cheap board just to see the build run. Later when the cash is onhand they'll ask for help picking out a better/newer board to put everything on. I've heard that one enough times.