Not exactly "upfront honesty" when they didn't say this before they started advertising as a "32 GB tablet" knowing full well that what consumers will think is that they get 32 GB of storage for a $500 price.
They only did this now after others have already debunked their storage claim:
I think you have unrealistic expectations. If you read an advertisement for a computer with a 250GB hard drive, do you really expect it all to be available space? I don't think anyone else does, so why would they think that in this case?
I would expect the vast majority of it to be free space.
If you bought a laptop with a 250GB hard drive, and found when you booted it that ~125GB were used by the OS, would you be okay with that? Especially when the HD storage was a prominently advertised feature?
They only did this now after others have already debunked their storage claim:
http://semiaccurate.com/2012/10/31/microsoft-surface-can-not...
Also shame on most tech reviewers who didn't even notice this in their reviews, or didn't want to say it.