Counterpoint:
I have fat fingers, I mis-click apps a lot. Sometimes I just graze safari or something when I am scrolling. Current functionality takes me back to the place where I left off. I easily click the app that i actually wanted.
Imagine my frustration when I mis-click an app, and instead of taking me back to the place where I was just a moment ago, it warps me back to the first page of applications. I have to rescroll through a few pages of apps.
After doing this a few times, I curse Steve Jobs' name and hurl the device from the driver's side window... lamenting the day I bought it. I hollar to my driver. He snaps his whip, urging my fine brace of stallions on-wards... to my local Verizon store where I purchase The Jitterbug: a testament to Human Interface Guidelines and ease of use.
I have thin (well, average) fingers and this still happens to me. I agree that dumping the user back on the home screen in cases like this would be a terrible design choice.
I also thought about mis-clicking. This could be solved with a small timeout (say 1 second) before the home button has the new behavior and brings you to the first screen.
Baking in a magic threshold seems to be a worse option. No matter where you set the threshold, it's going to sometimes feel like the 'screen 1' vs 'last home state' choice is random (and wrong).
However, Apple already does this in other cases. If you leave the Settings app and go right back in, you'll find it exactly the way you left it. If you wait (I'm not sure how long, could be hours), you'll start at the top of the app again.
Imagine my frustration when I mis-click an app, and instead of taking me back to the place where I was just a moment ago, it warps me back to the first page of applications. I have to rescroll through a few pages of apps.
After doing this a few times, I curse Steve Jobs' name and hurl the device from the driver's side window... lamenting the day I bought it. I hollar to my driver. He snaps his whip, urging my fine brace of stallions on-wards... to my local Verizon store where I purchase The Jitterbug: a testament to Human Interface Guidelines and ease of use.