They truly deserve one another.

If the problem has been the disconnect between sales and operations, then making the sales even more shiny and glossy is not going to change anything for the consumer.

Now they are going to be even more disjointed between an apple-like retail experience but then a mobile phone contract to reward them... its kind of like waking up having signed a marriage contract with a wildebeast .... "but the shop was really nice and hi-tech, yet now i am left with a sh**y orange contract and restricted phone*"

*cos orange ALWAYS restrict their phones.

With the news about Orange's ownes, France Telecom. expect Milton Keynes residents to suicide. Having been there though can't blame Orange

Every brand needs a geographical location that matches its character.

Apple = San Francisco

Linux = Glastonbury

Microsoft = ... Drat! Orange has already taken Milton Keynes.

I think that the best summing up ever was in Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman's "Good Omens", where both the Angelic and Demonic protagonists claimed responsibility for it although neither had actually been involved and this revelation came with a footnote: "Note for Americans and other foreigners. Milton Keynes is a town slightly north of London which is designed to be the perfect place to live. Enough said."

Something like that anyway. I've just found that my sixth bloody copy has failed to return from whoever I leant it to.