Thanks for breaking that down, I wish newspapers or even BBC News did this. They do now have BBC Verify but its never super clear of their findings, certainly not in the format that you’ve just used. Perhaps theirs should be called BBC Balance. The only thing I would say with regard to your first point is that I’m not against the idea that any individual could make a breakthrough. At least with regard to theory.
We already know that throughout the history of cosmology, whole experts have been wrong when a new discovery is made. E.g. Highly likely that not everyone believed that Earth was centre of the Universe (like the earlier science communities claimed). The issue with this guy is he’s using his own biased ideas and data and some people believe whatever is printed in a newspaper must be right.
Only silver lining is at least there clickbaity headlines give the public something more substantial to think about for 60 seconds instead of what the next Kardashian is up to…
For me, its not the console price thats the problem. £395.99 in the UK but if we consider inflation, the switch 1 would be around £360-365 today. An extra £30ish for a bigger screen and more power is not too unreasonable. Plus ending in 95.99 rather than 99.99 suggests Nintendo have tried to trim the headline price down.
The real problem is the accessories and games. £75 for new pro controller, £50 for new microSD Express (only ones compatible) £50 for webcam and £67-75 for physical games, £59-£67 for digital.
Ouch.