HN user
I hate how everyone immediately takes every comment as pro or anti apple on the web. Im not trying to defend Apple here. My comment was more about taking responsibilities for your own actions before immediately blaming someone else.
Its possible that oversight here was on Marco's part and not the Apple Store's. If his grandfather had told an Apple Genius that "he wanted to make sure he could transfer his stuff onto a new iPad in case this one ever broke", chances are that the Genius would have known what he was talking about. Instead, Marco doesn't trust his grandfather to explain that coherently and has him write down the cryptic words "ICLOUD BACKUP". To be fair, those words don't mean much by themselves and I could see why the Genius thought he was doing the right thing.