What is it about Apple that attracts dumb analysts, like a moth to a stupid lamp? In his article Is Apple’s iPad Worth the Money? for CBS MoneyWatch, Andrew J. Nusca, using some creative (read: batshit-mental) maths, arrives at the conclusion that Apple’s $499 iPad ‘could’ in fact cost you $2441 (or $1600—see below). His reasoning seems to stem from the fact that:

• You could opt to buy the more expensive 32GB version (an extra $100);
• You could opt to add 3G functionality (an extra $130);
• You could splash out $29.99 every month for data;
• You could spend $68 per year (Andrew’s very specific) on TV shows and movies.

Usefully, Andrew’s strange article then helpfully points out some benefits of owning an iPad—savings on moving to digital for magazine and book purchases ($656 for people who buy the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Time and Economist), and not having to buy a Kindle and a netbook ($609—and, no, I’m not making this up). Unfortunately, I got lost at the point where he started arguing with himself regarding whether it was a cost benefit or not to have a Kindle over an iPad.

Towards the end, he bumbles to the conclusion that an iPad’s ‘bottom line’ is $1600, and that “as an investment for your productivity, it’s clear that it’s one on which you may never see a concrete return”. I’m just hoping I never get repeatedly smacked around the head with the stupid lamp, otherwise Revert to Saved will turn into a blog about OUTRAGE regarding the fact a £50 DVD player ‘could’ cost you thousands, since:

• You could opt to buy every DVD you see in the shops (an extra £lots);
• You could decide you want a bigger TV to watch your DVDs on (an extra £even more);
• You could decide that Blu-Ray floats your boat, causing you to start again with your entire collection (an extra £oh my word).

When I was a kid, there were lots of gaming platforms, but several failed due to existing IP. A prime example is the Commodore 128. Commodore touted the computer’s C64 compatibility as a major plus, but it meant no-one created C128 games, because loads of C64 ones already existed. The same, to some extent, went for the Amstrad CPC, which got loads of duff ports from the ZX Spectrum, due to some shared architecture. I wonder how iPad will fare. Apple’s device not only resembles a giant iPod touch—it also runs almost all existing App Store content. You get apps sitting centrally in the screen or ‘pixel doubled’.

With nearly 30 million iPhones and millions of iPod touches in the wild, and many thousands of games available, I wonder how many devs will target iPad, and how many will just continue developing for Apple’s already popular handhelds. If the former happens—and developers take a punt, hoping Apple’s new device will become as successful as iPhone and iPod touch—you end up with another top-quality gaming platform from out of nowhere. If not—which could so easily be the case—iPad will be a pretty device playing games that look OK, but were ultimately designed for another system. Here’s hoping the former’s the case.

Since the 1990s, I’ve written for a lot of internet magazines. Something that constantly crops up is the thorny issue of copyright. Many people make the assumption that if something’s online, they somehow have the right to take it for themselves. Perhaps this is down to the ubiquity of dodgy file-sharing, or the fact that a lot of content online is freely available. Either way, lots of rights are infringed online on a daily basis, and I’ve written many articles that state very clearly how one should always check regarding rights before reusing anything.

If an individual makes a mistake in this area, they can be forgiven (assuming they don’t do so again). Astonishingly, though, it seems the editorial director for digital at one of the UK’s national newspapers doesn’t understand basic rights assignment. This thread from PeteZab’s Flickr account details how The Independent embedded snowy scenes from the UK using the Flickr API, but, presumably, screwed up the rights filter, thereby including images marked ‘all rights reserved’.

What’s shocking here is not that such a mistake was made—oversights happen all the time—but that the editors’s response was as follows:

“We took a stream from Flickr which is, as you know, a photo-sharing website. The legal assumption, therefore, is that you were not asserting your copyright in that arena. We did not take the photo from Flickr, nor present it as anything other than as it is shown there.

I do no consider, therefore, that any copyright has been breached or any payment due. ”

Presumably, then, The Independent will be fine if I start using content from its website (as long as I don’t present it than anything other than how it’s shown on its site), regardless of any assigned rights! Great! Although if The Independent really doesn’t think it did anything wrong, why did it pull the Flickr feed?

Update: The Independent ‘apologises’, and the publication has been invoiced by the photographer.

It’s getting to the point that not a day goes by without some idiot or other trying to undermine the BBC. Usually, it’s the government or the Tories, who in no way use smacking the BBC as a way of engaging with Daily Mail-reading voters. Rupert Murdoch’s another major critic, which is in no way due to him having a massive stake in one of the BBC’s biggest commercial competitors, Sky.

Yesterday, Policy Exchange got in on the act (Policy Exchange think tank calls for BBC overhaul), with the usual slew of garbage opinions. It slags off Jonathan Ross’s ‘salary’ (ignoring the fact this cash paid for the production of his shows, including dozens of Film 200Xs, hundreds of episodes of his chat-show, and his radio show), says the BBC should cut the money it spends on sport (despite the public outcry when the public broadcaster announces it’s been outbid for a popular event by a locked, subscription-only service) and popular entertainment (despite the BBC one minute being told to justify the licence fee by getting higher ratings, and the next being told it’s being too populist, and should therefore be creating niche stuff).

The report also has a go at the BBC’s audacity in reaching out to 16-to-35-year-olds, noting that cash for such programming should be aimed at US import channels Channel 4 and E4. Never mind that BBC Three’s output includes the likes of Being Human. Never mind the fact people under 35 pay the licence fee and therefore should expect at least some programming aimed at them. Never mind the fact the BBC isn’t beholden to advertisers and can therefore take more risks. Nope—shut it down, says Policy Exchange! Shut it all down!

Sadly, this kind of report seems to be the norm these days. I suspect regardless of whatever government the UK ends up with this year, it’ll start dismantling the BBC. And because too many British people are strangely oblivious to the value of the BBC (not only in terms of what you receive on TV, the radio and the web, but also as a public service), considering it a huge rip-off, it’ll end up a shell of its former self. Sooner or later, British television will largely be a thing of the past, with everyone fed on a steady diet of third-rate US television with ad-breaks every sixteen seconds. But, hey, it’ll be free, right? (Aside from the huge subscription fees that people will happily pay because they choose to, obviously.) Of course, the UK will only realise this when it’s too late, and when Murdock is laughing maniacally while sitting atop his solid-gold throne, in the shape of a Sky logo squashing the BBC into a bloody pulp.

The BBC reports that a cartoon pig will now have to wear a seat-belt in future episodes, due to a stupid person. It doesn’t expicitly say this, but that’s the gist of the article. The sequence of events seems to be:

1. Cartoon pig in fictional cartoon world doesn’t wear fictional cartoon seat-belt.
2. Child ‘refuses’ to wear seat-belt because Peppa Pig doesn’t wear one.
3. Stupid person (a.k.a. a parent) complains, rather than, you know, explaining to their kid that Peppa Pig is a cartoon and that everyone has to wear a seat-belt in the real world.
4. Production company caves, and says they’ll also (at presumably great cost) reanimate all old episodes “to reflect the change”.

Let’s hope the stupid parent’s kid never watches Tom and Jerry, or the parent will presumably petition Time Warner, rather than telling their little tyke that repeatedly attempting to kill the cat is wrong, regardless of whether it happened in a fictional cartoon world.