back to article iPhone 5 in ICE CREAM SANDWICH photo riddle

An eagle-eyed Reg reader has sent this shocking reveal of the iPhone 5 on a billboard in China, but it's all confused. Is this the iPhone 5? Is this the iPhone 5?! Oh, the humanity! Why is Apple putting Internet Explorer on the next Jesus-mobe? And why is it only 3G? Shouldn't it at least pretend to be 4G for some …

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  1. Silverburn

    They've not trademarked "iPhone 5", but - according to te pic - they have trademark rights to "iPhone".

    Which, of course, they f*ing don't. Not in a million years. Welcome to China, where TM/patents landscapes are distinctly one-sided. They'll happily sue "us", bu you've got a rats chance in hell of getting your litigation to stick, while all and sundry slap your TM all over their often completely unrelated (see: Soup) and often inferior tat. See BMW, Apple, Rayban, Armani etc

    1. Steve Knox
      Boffin

      Nope.

      Technically speaking, TM following a term doesn't mean "we own this trademark", but "this term is a trademark."

    2. Homer 1
      Headmaster

      Whoah there, puppy!

      First, why do you care so passionately about some total stranger's silly trademark being violated? Are you married to Apple?

      Second, it's only a trademark violation if you fraudulently credit the "mark" to someone other than the owner. E.g. the mere fact of me writing iPhone® is not a trademark violation.

      Beats me what this has to do with ice cream, though.

  2. Andy Christ
    Coat

    Ice Cream?! Ice Cream?!

    The iPhone 5, it melts in your hand, not in your mouth.

    Mine's the one with a mess in the pocket.

    1. heyrick Silver badge

      Re: Ice Cream?! Ice Cream?!

      Melt in your hand? Mess in your pocket?

      You do know you're holding it wrong, right?

      1. Michael Hutchinson
        Joke

        Re: Ice Cream?! Ice Cream?!

        "Melt in your hand? Mess in your pocket?"

        That sounds like you're holding it right (or left depending on personal preference)

  3. Gil Grissum
    Pint

    Litigation

    Fire up the LawyerMobile Robin. We're off to Hong Kong to sue the pant of this Chinese Crime Syndicate. :-D

    1. Field Marshal Von Krakenfart
      Coat

      Re: Litigation

      The adventures of Robbing and Bat-boy

      "Holy exorbitant lawyer’s fees Robbing, is there no limits to these criminal’s dastardly deeds, I bet even Shakespeare didn't have words for such villainy!"

      “Bat-boy; hand me the shark repellent bat-spray, we must make sure the litigants don’t get their hands on that, Quick Bat-boy! To the Robbing-mobile”

      In the Robbing-mobile:

      “Atomic batteries to power."

      “Turbines to speed."

      “Bat-shit detector powered up…. Oh hang on, the bat-shit detector has crashed, some sort of overflow error.”

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "Have the last of Steve Jobs' ideas been used up so that all we're left with is the slow, sad demise of a once-great technology firm set to the wailing, moaning and gnashing of teeth of legions of fanbois?"

    YES! if not the iPhone 4S certainly does!

    Give it another 5 year and consumers will have the same contempt they have for Microsoft now.

    1. Shanghai Tom
      Flame

      Another 5 years ?

      Come on, this is already happening! 5 more years.. ha ha.. there won't be any in 5 years.

      So many people complain about the very poor call quality, I even lent my phone to my boss for a day because where he was going he knew the I phone would not work.

      I live and work in China, the look alike Apple kit is FAR superior to the real thing, and very cheap too. You all know that Foxconn makes the I phone, in slave labour conditions here in china, people actually commit suicide by jumping off the factory roof.

      If I won an iphone in a competition I would go on public tv and they can watch me stamp on it...

      All those 4G lies, they are just trying one-up-man-ship in advertising, and losing worldwide creditability while doing it.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Another 5 years ?

        Me thinks thou protest too much.

        But seriously thou, your being a bit harsh. I do agree apple is going the way of Microsoft, but with such a small commercial OS market, it seems like unless we all switch to linux we are going to become annoyed with a new "feature" every now and then.

        What's even funnier is that Microsoft, Apple, and Ubuntu are all touch-screening their OS's, but Chrome OS is going from touch screen to mouse/keyboard friendly design.

  5. Winkypop Silver badge
    Joke

    New iPhone 5 gesture?

    The 'lick' ???

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: New iPhone 5 gesture?

      I've often considered iPhone users to be window lickers - so it seems appropriate

      1. Jeebus

        Re: New iPhone 5 gesture?

        Now now, those people are disadvantaged and disabled, Apple users are worse, some of them were never mentally disabled but merely grew into it.

  6. Anonymous John

    If the ice cream comes in rectangular tubs with rounded corners, they're in trouble.

    1. Mikey
      Joke

      Especially if the tubs still have that tendancy to overheat... Ice Cream Soupwich, anyone?

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    LOL

    "Have the last of Steve Jobs' ideas been used up so that all we're left with is the slow, sad demise of a once-great technology firm set to the wailing, moaning and gnashing of teeth of legions of fanbois?"

    It was never a technology firm. It's a toy company. Name anything they've ever made that could be used for anything other than drawing pictures, or playing with.

    1. Steve Knox
      Joke

      Re: LOL

      Actually, their SIM removal tool can make a handy paper clip in an emergency situation.

      1. Jess--

        Re: LOL

        their sim removal tool is also handy for removing fluff from the charger socket (where it always seems to build up and stop you plugging in the lead)

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: LOL

      "Name anything they've ever made that could be used for anything other than drawing pictures, or playing with."

      You've obviously not worked in many modern recording studios then? A vast amount of music now uses ProTools on OSX to record music, from some tinpot indy metal band recording in the guitarist's parents garage to the multi-squillion selling bands like Coldplay under production from names like Brian Eno!

      1. Loyal Commenter Silver badge

        Re: LOL

        Coldplay use it? Oh it must be good then!

        A little off topic - did anyone else see their 'performance' on Amnesty International's Secret Policeman's Ball? Chris Martin appeared to be so absolutely self absorbed that I don't think he even realised that he was performing for a charity and not for the sake of his own ego. He's just the kind of individual that out American ousins invented the term 'douchebag' for.

      2. Javc

        Re: LOL

        "You've obviously not worked in many modern recording studios then?"

        I think "playing with" covers this use.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "So many people complain about the very poor call quality, I even lent my phone to my boss for a day because where he was going he knew the I phone would not work."

    Think that's more likely to be a network issue not a phone issue.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "I live and work in China, the look alike Apple kit is FAR superior to the real thing, and very cheap too. You all know that Foxconn makes the I phone, in slave labour conditions here in china, people actually commit suicide by jumping off the factory roof."

    Superior - of course...

    Slave labour - I'm not saying the wages are good by western standard but if they were so bad why are there lines of people queuing up each day to apply for jobs.

    Suicides - I have every sympathy but Foxconn employ over 1M people - there are going to be suicides with that many people - compare it to 1M people living in London or New York and it's probably the same.

    1. ZweiBlumen

      How about torture?

      You do realize there is anecdotal evidence of employees being mistreated (tortured?) at Foxconn for such things as loosing prototype material...

      1. This post has been deleted by its author

  10. Henry Wertz 1 Gold badge

    Trademark and non-4G

    Trademarks are industry-specific. Otherwise, Apple Computer would not exist. They were in fact sued for violated the trademark of Apple Records (Apple Computer one, with the agreement they would stay out of the music business. Which they violated, got sued again, and this time lost.) This company can call their ice cream "IPhone5" if they want, as long as they don't start making cellphones.

    As for "4G"... I'd prefer a phone to not falsely call upgraded 3G technologies 4G (and shame on the ITU for basically saying "4G is whatever companies decide to call 4G".) There were data speed overlaps between 1G and 2G (CDPD over analog did about 9600bps, as did the original GSM and CDMA data). Latest-stage 2G and earliest 3G nearly overlapped (EDGE ran up to 220kbps, while UMTS started at just 384kbps.) So just because some 3G upgrade approaches the lowest-end 4G speeds does not make it a 4G technology. If your speeds and service are good enough, it doesn't matter what "G" you are running, but the fact of the matter is 4G technologies like LTE have a long upgrade path ahead of them while 3G technologies (like the HSPA+ that both AT&T and T-Mobile here in the US falsely call 4G now) are near the end.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Trademark and non-4G

      Epic. Complain the industry is falsely calling upgraded 3G as "4G" and then call LTE "4G".

      Get a clue. Only LTE Advanced is 4G.

    2. The Indomitable Gall

      Re: Trademark and non-4G

      Trademarks are industry specific, but in most jurisdictions you can still be done for "passing off" if you seem to be attempting to trade off the reputation of a synonymous entity. If I recall correctly, in the US, that was established by law, but in the UK I think it was established by precedent. Either way, the use of a mobile phone in the advert certainly would qualify as sufficiently confusing to be a case of passing off.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Trademark and non-4G

      Apparently (in China at least), you are wrong, Police recently seized a shop full of iPhone Gas cookers.

      http://www.clonedinchina.com/2012/02/iphone-gas-oven-found-in-china.html

  11. benwill

    Who cares

    Breaking news, someone in China has named an ice cream...wait for it....iPhone. Is this really news or even interesting to anyone?

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    True Capitalists & Marketeers.

    The communists are more capitalists than capitalists.

    After all, thats what America wants the world to be, isnt it?

    Capitalism rules. Why blame the Chinese for adopting such a hallowed Ameircan ideal?

  13. Lallabalalla
    Trollface

    The Trolls! The Trolls!

    The trolls are out in force today! Must be the sunny weather!

    1. Chika
      Trollface

      Re: The Trolls! The Trolls!

      Sunny weather? Why abandon their nice, damp bridges for that?

  14. Andy Watt
    Flame

    Trolling... article?

    Every time I see the word "fanboi" in an article, I reach for my gun...

    1. HipposRule

      Re: Trolling... article?

      In the same way as i do when I see M$?

  15. Field Marshal Von Krakenfart
    Trollface

    iPhone 5 Ice-cream

    Marketing fail, they should have named it Ice Cream Sandwich

    Then crApple and Gouge-le could have become joint plaintifs?

  16. mhenriday
    Pint

    The billboard states that the product -

    unsure just which, an ice cream brand or an iPhone™ 5 - is «shaking the market» (震撼上市). To which, of course, one can only reply : 蚍蜉撼大树,可笑不自量....

    Henri

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