Counterfeit iPhones selling well in Asia
With iPhone Fever running high, and no official Asian sales scheduled for 2007, opportunistic electronics manufacturers in China are doing a brisk business in counterfeit iPhones. Bloomburg reports that the so-called "Chinese iPhone" sells for approximately $133US and is a fully-functioning phone. Anonymous manufacturer "Ben" said that creating the phone's internals was easy, but the external design was the hard part.
Fakes will always exist, as well as eager customers. Apple has requested that shoppers report fake phones to counterfeit [at] Apple [dot] com.
[Via MacDailyNews]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Travis Bell said 3:30PM on 9-11-2007
It doesn't surprise me this is going on, but how do these Chinese companies think they can get away with sticking the Apple logo on their boxes? That's just ASKING for trouble.
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basscadet said 4:26PM on 9-11-2007
133$!!!!??????
OMG OMG I WANT ANOTHER 100$ STORE CREDIT MR JOBS!
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Alex said 4:27PM on 9-11-2007
my roommate just got back from asia (china, taiwan, thailand) and said that people pretty much hated Apple there, so what makes anyone think that if Apple released the official iPhone there that people would actually take notice and buy it?
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Josh said 4:58PM on 9-11-2007
Bloomberg
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supersalo said 5:57PM on 9-11-2007
"Ben said that creating the phone's internals was easy, but the external design was the hard part."
Yeah, and apparently the external design is the part that they still haven't got right. That thing isn't even *close* to an iPhone. It's not even a knock-off. Who in their right mind would even mistake that for the real thing?
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Eric said 6:54PM on 9-11-2007
I think CECT makes some of the knockoffs. I doubt Apple can do anything to stop them. I see knockoff DVDs for sale on the sidewalk all over Beijing. Nobody cares. I'm looking forward to seeing the Meizu M8.
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Ben the Dog said 9:00PM on 9-11-2007
I live in Hong Kong, and the locals will buy (and queue for) anything that is considered "cool" overseas. I have workmates who upgrade their cellphones every 3 to 4 months - it's madness. So the iPhone - when here - will certainly cell well (but perhaps not quite with the frenzy that we saw in the US).
That said, as long as Apple holds out on releasing the iPhone here, a) people will buy these knock-offs, and b) no one will report knock offs. The feeling I get here is "why should we help Apple enforce their IP rights here if they won't even release the real thing here for another 6 months?"
It's only when people start forking out cold hard cash for the real deal that they will want to report knock offs (so as to justify their investment).
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TJ said 9:31PM on 9-11-2007
@basscadet
he'll probably give you a FAKE $100 as well lol
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Ecne said 11:38AM on 9-12-2007
eBay is full of this stuff, I tell you.
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mike said 2:57PM on 9-12-2007
just publish their email address in the clear and, in time, spammers will tell them they're selling knockoff iPhones
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