This whole thread can end now.
Just get apple care + and your covered. You can run your ipad naked and if it gets scuffed, cracked or whatever. Just pay the 50 and get it replaced.
But if you don't care about the looks, why do you care about if it looks scratched? Or do you think scratched plastic/leather or whatever looks better than scratched aluminium?
If I drop my iPad i'll just shell out the $150 my home insurance company wants to replace electronics and get a new one, and if they don't want to pay for some reason i'll justbuy one. It's not like you have to sell an arm to buy an iPad.
You are assuming everyone lives in a 1st world country. In many places ipads cost more than in the US and people earn far less. Over 600.00 for an ipad where minimum wage is about 5.00 a day some would almost have to sell an arm.
Not everywhere is the US.
I care about appearance for personal/OCD reasons as well as for resale. I take great care of all my goodies (OCD) and knowing that, eventually, down the road I'm going to be selling it. The better condition the device is in will always help out on the resale side of things and, personally, I can't stand the appearance of dings/scratches/etc.
I store mine in a case as I don't want to scratch the back, but usually remove it from the case when I'm using it.
If anything the thread should end with "do what works for you". Applecare+ isn't relevant to all the reasons posted. A couple of posts above yours mention a stand, for example. Nothing is one size fits all. If Applecare+ works for you, great. Stop assuming that it meets everyone else's needs/wants/priorities (same for any topic).This whole thread can end now.
Just get apple care + and your covered. You can run your ipad naked and if it gets scuffed, cracked or whatever. Just pay the 50 and get it replaced.
If you don't care about looks you don't have to replace anything if it gets scuffed.