Yesterday, Apple announced the 128 GB iPad 4. I reckon it’s a good idea, giving those who need it extra storage capacity. In my post, I noted that Apple was (not necessarily intentionally) promoting a culture of discarding digital media, purely on the basis of how little heavy users could keep on a device. Although music, movies and TV are increasingly well catered for by the cloud, other content isn’t. Magazines can often (although not always) be redownloaded, but doing so is slow and could impact on capped broadband allocations; anyway, the advantage of digital is having a collection you can rapidly search, which is no good if most of the items aren’t immediately accessible. Elsewhere, apps and games continue to mushroom in size, due to devs doing increasingly complex things on iOS and also the demands of the Retina display. Years back, I thought iOS games approaching 500 MB were going a bit far; now, it’s relatively commonplace for titles to unpack to well over 1 GB. If you’re a keen gamer, you won’t just have one or two such titles on your device—you’ll have dozens, and you’ll be forced to delete some—including all your progress, unless you’ve manually backed it up.

What’s amazing is how few tech journalists get any of this. Tap! magazine deputy editor noted on Twitter that many of them are now making comparisons between the most expensive iPad option (the 3G 128 GB version) and the cheapest MacBook Air (which, note, lacks 3G):

If I am looking at the top-end iPad, then I’m clearly seriously in the market for an iPad. Switching to an entry-level PC won’t tempt me. “If you’re spending $800 dollars, why not spend $200 more?” …on something twice the weight that runs different apps on a non-Retina screen

It’s also extremely clear from some of those criticising Apple’s decision that they don’t use iOS all that much, presumably having dismissed it as a toy, unfit for any ‘real’ work (countered, of course, by the many companies now using iPads for real work in medicine, design, music, and so on). Bolton continued:

In one article, the author says they can kind of understand if you have loads of music or movies. Apps and games completely ignored. Lots of tech writers seem not to care about how people who actually use devices think, only about how the internet responds to announcements.

A big chunk of the tech journalism (and I use that word loosely) industry has yet to enact a much-demanded New Year’s resolution of thinking before typing, rather than just spewing their own opinion into your eyes as fact. Just because something isn’t for you, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s pointless or stupid, nor does it mean those considering buying it are crazy. To my mind, with the iPad increasingly used by all manner of professionals and consumers alike, it would have been inconceivable had Apple not bowed to the inevitable and offered a larger capacity. But then I actually use iPads rather than just write about them.

Marco Arment has an interesting idea about storage capacities:

[S]torage capacities referenced or implied1 in the names or advertisements for personal computers, tablets, and smartphones should not exceed the amount of space available for end-user installation of third-party2 applications and data, after enough software has been installed to enable all commonly advertised functionality.

With the 64 GB Surface Pro only having 23 GB of free space for anyone to actually use (The Verge), Arment’s bang-on with this. It’s annoying enough when you buy an iPad and realise iOS has ronched about 4 GB of space, but it’s insane that you can now buy a unit and find well over half the storage space taken up by the operating system and some bundled apps. At best, it’s misleading; at worst, it’s outright deception. It’d be interesting to see what would happen if people complained to local advertising standards watchdogs about this.

Apple’s announced the iPad 4 (or, as it calls it, primarily to annoy copy editors the world over, the ‘iPad with Retina Display’) is to now include a 128 GB model. Predictably, there are already people moaning about this for various reasons, not least the inevitable price-hike over the 64 GB model, and that wonderful non-reason “I don’t need it and so I don’t see why anyone else would”, but I’m happy to see Apple acknowledge that at least some iPad owners need more storage space.

A 128 GB model isn’t for everyone, of course, but I’m increasingly seeing games (especially complex ones with Retina assets) clock in at well over 1 GB and individual issues of magazines sized at anything between 250 MB and 1 GB. Although Apple’s making reasonable efforts to provide on-demand access to your media content (iTunes Match enables you to access your music without keeping it all on your device, and TV shows and movies bought in certain iTunes Stores can be streamed rather than downloaded), it’s not enough. Until every piece of content you buy is stored securely in the cloud and internet access is so fast and unrestricted that you wouldn’t think twice about redownloading a 1 GB magazine and data for apps or games isn’t obliterated when you delete one, we’re increasingly going to need more capacity on tablets, not less.

Here’s hoping Apple follows this up with a 128 GB iPhone (despite the eye-watering price-tag that will then command) and a 128 GB iPod touch. As it stands, the new iPad model is a good start. I’d been wondering if Apple was beginning to promote a culture of disposal rather than collection on iOS, forced on users because of the lack of storage. Magazines, apps and games would have to fall by the wayside, simply due to devices filling up so fast. A larger iPad means this won’t be the case—at least not so quickly—for those lucky enough to own one.

My computer went a bit nuts earlier today, and I thought it was Time Machine going screwy. But it turns out my entire Mac briefly turned into a time machine, enabling me to log on to the web and access a news piece about Apple’s Q1—from 2014, next year. It makes for interesting reading…

Apple today announced its financial results for its fiscal 2014 first quarter ended December 28, 2013. The company generated record quarterly revenue of $63.2bn for the period ending 28 December, its highest figure to date, and a marked increase on the $54.5bn generated during the same quarter the previous year.

Apple enjoyed profits of $16.4bn, another record, although this was countered by the company’s average selling prices continuing to fall, and Tim Cook finally losing it and ordering “all the analysts to be shot or maimed in some horrible manner” shortly after the call.

For those paying attention to the figures, there was plenty of good news. iPhone sales rose from 47.8m to 62.2m, largely due to the phenomenally popular iPhone 6, although this fell dramatically short of analysts’ average prediction of 427 billion iPhones sold. iPad sales also rose, from 22.9m units to 36.1m units, spurred on by an across-the-line revamp that saw the iPad mini get a Retina screen and the iPad shed almost half its weight. However, in the wake of Samsung’s recent release of 700 new tablets, covering every possible screen size between one-inch and seventeen feet, Apple’s product line is, according to analysts, looking “very tired”. Additionally, there was disappointment that Apple’s average selling price for the iPad was well done on Q1 2013. “Apple’s just not making enough profit. It’s also pretty clear Apple doesn’t know how to compete—at the very least, Apple should be knocking iPad prices down by 97 per cent across the line,” said Alan Lyst, CEO of Bullish Wealth Management, without a hint of irony, reportedly prompting Cook’s call for the eradication of analysts.

Mostly, though, analysts, pundits and the market alike were spooked by the bad news, which one noted “rolled off of Tim Cook’s tongue a little like rancid butter off of a rusty knife”. Mac sales remained flat, with Apple only managing to sell 4.2m units, and iPod sales continued to fall, with only a single iPod being sold somewhere in Wales. The Apple TV refresh also disappointed the entire world, including members of undiscovered tribes in the rainforest, with the new $99 unit merely doubling in power, adding approximately 300 content partners, and providing the means to install apps, rather than being a massive new standalone television unit. “I’m totally bummed,” said Lyst. “I was hoping to spend all my money on a new TV, but all Apple did was iterate on an existing device. Steve Jobs would never have allowed that.”

Wall Street was unimpressed with the numbers, despite Tim Cook noting Apple had $137 billion in cash reserves, which it was planning to spend on buying “California”. In after-hours trading, AAPL fell to $152.11 per share, and analysts argued Apple was “done” and “doomed” and “failing to innovate”. They argued the company should “be more like Samsung, Microsoft, Google and Amazon,” especially noting Amazon’s “exciting manner of not actually making a profit, which shows they are doing something, rather than rolling around naked on $50 bills all day, which is how we imagine executive meetings at Apple to be”.

In a rare move for Apple, Cook within hours announced and broadcast an impromptu web keynote, unveiling a new product. “You want something new, eh?” snarled Cook, his lip visibly quivering. “Today I’m proud to unleash iNinja, a chip that can be implanted into anyone’s brain, turning them into crack assassins. We’ve already secretly placed these chips inside every Apple Store employee,” he added with a cackle and a “mwahaha”. Analysts were excited to hear Apple had “started innovating again”, shortly before deranged Apple employees in blue T-shirts kicked their faces off.

Largely thanks to the recent WSJ story, the tech press has merrily been reporting that Apple has slashed iPhone 5 component orders, despite having literally no proof and a source known as Mr Familiar With The Matter (strange name, that). Apple’s share price has since tanked, and countless media organisations have copied and pasted bits of previous Apple articles they’ve published that include phrases such as “lost its edge” and “under threat from Android” and “we really don’t know what we’re talking about—man, we sure hope no-one notices”.

Next week, Apple will talk about its financials for the past quarter, which includes the festive season. Even with Apple’s problems during that time (late iMac shipments, relatively limited iPad mini and iPhone availability), you’d have to be an idiot to not predict Apple’s going to have a monster quarter. However, you’d merely need to be an analyst to argue Apple’s going to sell significantly more kit than its guidance went near (which is what’s now happening), and be hugely bullish about the iPhone 5 in the face of the WSJ story (which is also what’s now happening), leading to the tech press to, you’ve guessed it, also be bullish about the iPhone 5.

So the iPhone 5 is Schrödinger’s iPhone. It exists in two states at once: total disaster, failing under the mighty onslaught of Android device sales that no-one really qualifies because sales figures are never released, and massive success story. The first of those tanks Apple’s shares in the present; the latter potentially tanks Apple’s shares next week, when it’ll turn out the company’s massive profits won’t match made-up figures from analysts, and will therefore be called ‘disappointing’.

Because of this, let’s all demand a new rule from the tech press. Before reporting on any stories based on ‘sources’ (unnamed, naturally) or ‘analysts’ (unharmed, unfortunately) or ‘made-up bullshit’ (unacceptable, obviously), the following should be added:

THIS ARTICLE IS PROBABLY BULLSHIT AND YOU SHOULD IGNORE IT. SORRY ABOUT THAT.

That at least would stop people worrying about a problem that doesn’t exist, and free up space for technology stories that actually matter.