Well,
All I can say is all my light duty ham gear comes with instructions on recycling the NiCads
I have an older HT here that will receive only for about 14 hours.
I recycle that and i'm back close to 24 hours.
I don't have all the fancy recycle gear many of the other RC Guys do but I do use 2 bulbs and a resistor.
You buy a modern cordless today and the instructions tell you about recycling the battery.
I don't want to beat this topic to death but I have salvaged to many DEAD NiCad batteries back to life and put them back in service.
I saw some of the curve charts.
It shows how the voltage will ease down to a certain level then take a steep dive.
Recycle that same pack 2-3 times and that sharp curve is gone.
I'm only going by what I see here, battery recycling items selling for over a $100.00 and my own observations, plus seeing dead packs put back to good use.
Don't sound like an old myth to me
The reality is that Nicads do have memory