You Say "Potato," The Court Says "Not So Much"

I just saw on the BBC that a court in the UK has declared that Pringles are not potato chips (crisps) because less than 50% of the product is potato. There's so much to consider on this story, I hardly know where to begin:

1. Pringles have been around how long? And the courts are just now making this decision? How backlogged can the English legal system be?

2. Pringles have been around how long? And the courts are just now making this decision? How much time is the English legal system willing to waste on an issue?

3. Pringles have been around how long? And the courts are just now making this decision? How long does it take English scientists to analyze (or analyse, for our friends across the pond) the chemical make up of a product that vaguely resembles but is not actually a food substance?

4. Pringles have been around how long? And the courts are just now making this decision? How hard up is the English government for tax dollars (or, more precisely, tax £s) that they've been willing to keep fighting this particular battle?

Incidentally, the answer to the first part of questions 1-4 is: Pringles were first introduced in 1968. Happy 40th birthday, Pringles!

Wait a minute: Pringles has a wikipedia page?

You Call That Value?

I've paid it in Europe, I've looked it up on Wikipedia, I even read this BBC article about it: I still don't understand the Value Added Tax. And frankly, I'm not sure which of the illustrations is more difficult for me to decipher: the table at the bottom of the BBC article that shows which cookies (that's right, I said it: cookies!) get a VAT and what don't, or the Wikipedia chart that shows how the VAT affects supply, demand and tax revenue. I guess the VAT makes sense in that if Company X makes 300,000 widgets and sells them to Retailer Y, which then sells only 1 widget, the government still gets some of the tax revenue. But the amount of paperwork the system would seem to require puts me in mind of DeNiro's demise in Terry Gilliam's Brazil!