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Published in Mobiles

iPhone queues are not what you think

by on26 September 2013

Look at all the lonely people

People lining up for a new iPhone were not as dedicated as they appeared, according to a Japanese blogger. According to the Junichi Suzaki blog people were not queuing up for a week to buy a phone. When he visited the Apple store queue he found that the first two places were held by empty chairs. The first human in the queue said that he works during the day and only queues in the evenings.

The way it works is that a group takes turns holding each other’s spots when the others aren’t here,” he explained. “If you come to enough of these things, you meet people, and you become launch day line-up buddies.” It is this which gives the clue as to why people really queue up for technology gadgets. Covering each other in queues apparently builds a social contact. In fact the blogger discovered that most people in the queue did not even like the iPhone. One of the queue leaders even sported an Android.

He said that he was here “for the high-five.” When the doors open, and the new model goes on sale and the sales staff high-five the first batch of customers when they hand over their purchase? Apparently that is important because “It’s so fun! I saw people doing it on TV, and I wanted to try it, too. That’s why I decided to camp out for a launch day the first time.”

It is nothing about being on TV, in fact the people in the front of the queue didn’t like the press coverage.

“The reporters all assume we’re diehard Apple fans, so we just kind of make up the sort of answers we figure they want to hear. We want to give the TV stations something to work with, you know,” explained one.

What it appears is that rather than the phone, these guys are simply diehard high-five fans.

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