“You probably have a certain image of someone who would wait in line for an iPhone: mid-20s, scruffy beard, white earbuds playing some gentle indie music,” Daniel Howley reports for Yahoo Tech. “”
“In New York, however, that representation wasn’t quite accurate. Gone were the bustling groups of hipsters and college students, replaced by startup hustlers looking for publicity, Chinese entrepreneurs in the reselling business, and, surprisingly, large families, many with elderly members, playing cards and sitting on small wooden stools,” Howley reports. “The line was predominantly Asian, as many have noted: News that the new iPhone might not arrive in China until 2015 means a lucrative black market for those who are able to resell American-bought iPhones there.”
MacDailyNews Take: It wasn’t just NYC. It’s worldwide:
• iPhone 6 resellers crowd out Apple fans at front of lines
• Debut Marked by Long Lines, Emerging Gray Market for the Bigger-Screen Phones
• Chinese resellers crowd Apple stores in Japan for iPhone 6
“The sea change in the people who line up for the iPhone launch would seem to indicate that many of the younger, more tech-savvy Apple fans out there chose to preorder their devices online and have them delivered to their cozy apartments, rather than waiting outside. Or perhaps they went to their wireless carrier’s store, or to the mall, or to a big-box electronics outlet — somewhere a bit more reliable,” Howley reports. “With such a drastic change in atmosphere from Apple’s first few iPhone launches to this year’s, it seems that, in New York at least, many Apple fans would just rather order their phones online. Plus, as iPhone launches have become commodified, hipsters have been edged out by the economically savvy. The spontaneous show of affection for Apple has been replaced by those looking to advertise their companies or bring in a hefty resalesman’s payday. The iTimes, they are a-changing.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: In an earlier article (“Cupertino, we have a problem: iPhone 6 lines and the Chinese mafia“), it was suggested that Apple might want to consider requiring that all launch day iPhone buyers have to sign a two-year contract or, at least, use Apple Pay or a credit card. Also, perhaps the lottery system that Apple employs in China to discourage scalpers should to be placed in effect worldwide? That latter suggestion might also thwart publicity seekers somewhat, too.
Does anyone have any other ideas?
[Thanks to MacDailyNews readers too numerous to mention individually for the heads up.]
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