And for what it's worth, the contours look like linetype generation is turned on for me in both 2010 and 2011. (Didn't look at anything earlier.)
So I suspect it has something to do with those things coming forward from 2007, as you mentioned.
Now, linetype generation for Survey Figures, that's another story... Autodesk has recently been asking for feedback about improvements to linetypes, though, so hopefully we'll be seeing a fix there soon.