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Like iPads? Like stuff called AIR? Here's our REVIEW ROUNDUP-squared

Our Media Boildown™ technique rebooted

Apple fans, if you’ve an ounce, make that 6.9 ounces of fanboi credibility, you’ll be reading this from your tired old iPad that you now don't really like any more or shiny new iPhone 5C – yes, the 5C, the one you bought out of loyalty to show everyone that it was cool despite the price.

OK, so maybe the fact that when you queued up to buy a 5s there was only the 5c on the shelves had something to do with it too. But hey, you won’t get fooled again, you’re camped outside an Apple Store ahead of tomorrow’s launch of the iPad Air.

If you’re in any doubt you should be there, we’ve rebooted our Media Boildown™ analysis algorithm to bring you the latest super-Roundup2. As regular readers will know, we developed the Roundup2 paradigm in response to the increasing volume of review roundups: there are now so many roundups that there isn't time to read them, so you need a roundup-roundup - and we're here to help. After all, time's at a premium, given the dubious battery life when iOS 7 gets chatty in the background.

This tried and tested Vulture Publishing formula not only performs a service to the tech savvy, but saves the planet too through somewhat-reduced energy requirements. You should be thanking us. No, really it's OK.

Those familiar with our Media Boildown™ engine will know that it condenses the intricacies and nuances of the rich and varied responses to Apple tech products, delivering a streamlined assessment in one sentence. Read on Mac buff.

Apple iPad Air Review Roundup: What the Critics Say (Mashable)

“overwhelmingly positive reviews from across the web”

Review roundup: Apple's new iPad Air is light, powerful with extended battery life (Apple Insider)

“so far the consensus is incredibly positive, with tech journalists heaping praise on the recently announced tablet.”

iPad Air Review Round-Up: What Do People Think Of Apple's Latest Offering? (Huffington Post)

"The new iPad is billed by Apple as 'screamingly fast', 'a ton of technology' and exhibiting 'the power of lightness(?)' But what do the tech critics have to say?"

So that’s the Apple PR out of the way, good job HuffPo.

iPad Air reviews go live, highlight thinner & lighter form factor, battery life, and speed improvements (9 to 5 Mac)

“The reviews are mostly positive, with much emphasis on the new form factor, battery life, and faster processor.”

As with previous experiments with the super-Roundup2, the actual hands-on reviews needed to be filtered out, as merely touching an iPad Air for a moment doesn’t qualify as robust enough source material for the Media Boildown™ engine to accurately perform its content streamline refinement process. Only the more distilled roundups are sufficiently refined to act as fuel for our incredibly powerful algorithms.

Yet the results were convincing, the indisputable message being that there’s a new iPad out, it’s just like the one before, but thinner, lighter and faster (as is normal for a new iPad). As usual it is lacking a thing that some say it should have - this time 802.11ac Wi-Fi - but, also as usual, Apple says you don’t need it yet. And who cares about storage? You'll just have to live with 128GB for this incarnation too, even if Steve Wozniak won't be buying one.

On the basis of all this data, the Media Boildown™ routine reported:

Press release, product refresh, nothing to see, move along.

Which, quite frankly, isn't what we were hoping for here: the idea was to achieve tons more content out of basically nothing, in the style of liveblogging or other recent journalism innovations. With the News Threshold variable tweaked to zero, Brand Hype to unity and our patented Everyone Excited Means Something mode engaged, the final analysis was surprisingly familiar:

It's just an iPad, FFS.

At least it's consistent, but our dreams of publishing gold spun from brandgasm straw are beginning to recede on this one. ®

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