- taxes are calculated per ticket, so separate tickets have separate taxes; i.e. you are charged for a stopover when using separate tickets. UK premium cabin taxes are quite high (GBP 40 per stopover, I think), and you have several of these (so circa 200 EUR in just those taxes on the itin). Remember that fuel surcharge is also part of the ticket tax, so expect taxes on your itin to be circa 1000 EUR. Careful route selection could cut those taxes by several hundred EUR, but at the expense of the flights (e.g. the LHR-DXB-LHR loop costs about 200 EUR in taxes). I am approximating the amounts, but you get the idea.

- first OW A380 is by QF and will be used for LAX-SYD-LAX service only. Probably Oct 2008, but we'll see.

- open dates means you assume the risk if schedules change and the flight no longer operates. Dated ticket will be involuntary rerouted (including routing that breaks OWE rules), while open tickets are a voluntary reroute (so you pay the fee and have to find a routing that is valid for the entire ticket -- which might affect subsequent sectors). For scarce routes, like IPC, I consider open dating to be extremely foolish (D is known to sell out for months at a time, periodically).

- miles cannot be used to purchase any kind of ticket, but BA allows using miles for upgrades, so I suppose you could buy D next time and try to use the miles that way.