iPhone 6 shunned by fanbois in Apple's GREAT FAIL of CHINA The belated Chinese launch of the iPhone 6 appears to have been a total flop after just 100 people queued outside a flagship store to buy the new mobe. In most parts of the world, the launch of a new Apple iPhone causes a level of fanboi hysteria that is more like a One Direction concert than a consumer technology launch. But …
Harsh, but with Xiaomi now shipping in Europe from a local warehouse, Huawei chummying up the British Government, and Oppo trying for a slice of the Apple brand mystique with the N3 (seemingly trying to outdo the 6 plus on everything possible including a better aluminium alloy for the case) things could get interesting. Del Boy might just turn out to run the next big company that started in a garage. (I'd say the next Alan Sugar, but he's far too left wing for Chinese tastes.)
"I'm feeling quite emotional," Mr Liu later told reporters
Really??? Over a PHONE??? I swear the brand has become like some sort of religion! Steve Jobs being the Messiah or the Prophet Zarquon or something like that. Tim Ccok, the foundation now upon which the Church of Apple is built. Being first to emerge from the store with the new iPhone the equivalent of being touched by God or something??
Frankly I liked the comment directly after that quote in the article about feeling emotional after wasting hours of your life to stand in line at a store when you could have easily done something else.
I'm just waiting for the day when Apple fandom is declared a religion and suddenly all Apple Stores are declared tax exempt like a church is now. (Oh wait....Apple is already mostly tax exempt in the US since they funnel their money out of the country right?)
Reaching for my Holy Water and Garlic to ward off the Apple faithful....
You might actually do research before you write about China & technology. They are now set up for ONLINE PRE-ORDERING so all you had to do is take your printed reservation form (just like in the US & EU) - no need to wait in line. That's called proper logistics. The people who lined up did not pre-register and had no phone reserved at the store for them. BTW, Apple has sold 20-MILLION iPhones in China so far in one week of ordering and one day in stores.
Ignorance of the Chinese market fuelled this article. For your average, up and coming, middle class Chinese (i.e. the new money), an iPhone is still a few months pay. That's fine; they save. What's remarkable is how they use the phone. They've gone from a standing start to being pretty much as advanced as western users (likely more so, in some ways). The iPhone market in China isn't briliant, but it sells to those who can afford it. I don't think Apple can expect any more than that.
That said, it's hard to argue with the numbers. There will be a healthy iPhone market in China, but Android is the real winner.
I live 10 minutes from an Apple Store in Hong Kong, where mainland Chinese have been camped out on the street buying iPhones off anyone willing to sell them since the 6 was launched. If you walked out the shop with one, you'd instantly be swarmed by these assholes screaming at you. And if you look back at the queues outside the NY Apple Store back on launch day you'll see that it was mostly Chinese. So I'm guessing millions of Chinese have already got one.
Recently reported was that the iPhone 6 is now China's smartphone market leader with other 10% market share, while the iPhone 6+ comes third, with Apple's total market share about 27%.
This headline from last year surely made some people happy, but the reality looks different.
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