The Reality Of The iPhone Line Is A Black Market Nightmare

The Reality Of The iPhone Line Is A Black Market Nightmare

This week, people camped outside Apple stores for days anticipating the iPhone 6. But those line-waiters weren’t all frenzied Apple fans high on the joy of a new smartphone: As filmmaker Casey Neistat portrays it, many of the line-sitters were buying the new iPhone to immediately resell it on the black market.

It’s hard to definitively verify what Neistat presents with this short movie, and he definitely made this video to chase down a very specific conclusion. It’s also not the first video Neistat has made decrying the spectacle of Apple line-waiters.

But his claim, that many of the first iPhones sold in the US were immediately shunted into the Chinese black market, isn’t far-fetched: The iPhone 6 won’t officially launch in China for another several months, meaning black market resellers can sell internationally-sourced new iPhones for upwards of $US3000 on the street right now.

Camping outside the Apple store for days before the new phone’s release Kottke]


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