I don't know what TFT LCDs you've used before, but this is hardly a made-up issue. Just check reviews and discussions of AMOLED screens, and you'll find similar observations being made over and over again.
Granted, virtually every kind of display will suffer significant degradation in readability under direct sunlight--but at least with most LCDs you can still vaguely make out what's being shown. With most OLED and AMOLED screens, the display often becomes little more than a reflective mirror, i.e. nearly completely unusable. I've seen this difference myself with side-by-side comparisons of many phones; you can undoubtedly do your own tests at a cell phone store.
Progress has been made, of course. With the Incredible, the screen isn't so bad when you turn it up to maximum brightness. And, as mentioned, the new "Super AMOLED" screens are supposed to be a major breakthrough as far as this sunlight issue is concerned. But the point is that it's factually inaccurate to claim that this has not been a well-recognized problem with this display technology.