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Line Forms At Apple's Always-Open Manhattan Cube
SpectreBlofeld writes "According to EngadgetMobile, a line has formed in front of Apple's flagship Cube store in Manhattan. From the article: 'So word on the street (literally) is that a large number of people are queuing in line outside of Apple's flagship store on 5th Avenue in New York City — keep in mind the Cube is open 24 hours a day. Our intrepid girl-on-the-scene reports that the group is more than 60-deep, though most people seem confused about what they're waiting for, but some believe they're actually camping out for a 3G iPhone.' Prank, or mass hysteria?" I wonder if the crowd already has its own Flickr group set up -- if not, what are they waiting for on that front?
It's apple people. What ELSE could it be but mass hysteria? ;)
Does this remind anybody else of the Eloi gathering to be taken underground by the Morlocks?
"Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right" - Salvor Hardin
You know Apple fandom is getting excessive when a product doesn't even need to exist to get hyped...
So the link is "iphone-line-forms-at-apples-flagship-for-absolutely-no-reason." It seems quite obvious that the reason is marketing. Same as when there were lines at Apple stores selling iphones but not at AT&T stores selling iphones.
This post climbed Mt. Washington.
People lining up in front of stores in the hope that maybe there will be something for sale that they are after - sounds like the Soviet Union to me!
And the Lord Jobs did address the faithfully assembled masses, saying "Unto you my loyal supplicants I do bestow the bounty of the 3G iPhone, that ye may use it at all times, and in sickness, and in health, and in times of pestilence and low bandwidth, and it shall comfort thee."
And then did the Lord Jobs hand out the Holy 3G iPhone unto the chosen who harkened unto him, and it was good.
Maybe it's the same people who pulled off this stunt? http://improveverywhere.com/2006/04/23/best-buy/
I think that's up for debate, and really, this is most likely a social prank, not a mass gathering to encourage Apple to speed up production of the i[newest-product-name-goes-here].
Twitter, you need to learn the basic rules of social interaction.
That Apple employee did NOT care about your stupid canned lecture about Free Software(tm).
They didn't demonstrate setting up dual-booting with Windows, not because there's a vast corporate conspiracy against Free Software(tm), but because the display was already set up with all the steps laid out, and the employee wasn't going to spend 3 hours of a workday setting up Free Software(tm) for the sole purpose of demonstrating software that works the same with any 2nd OS.
The employees didn't like you, not because they're part of a vast corporate conspiracy against Free Software(tm), but because you went to an Apple store for the sole purpose of harassing employees about information you could have obtained much more easily with Google, JUST so you could give an absolutely retarded canned lecture about Free Software(tm) to an employee who didn't give a shit at all.
They kicked you out because you were acting like an obnoxious prick, not because you were asking too much about free software and/or you were embarrassing them with your superior knowledge of software and/or they were ignorant or forbidden to tell what they knew. In the future, just shut the fuck up, 'kay?
The ILine :)
I've been calling Apple fans lemmings for years. Finally I have clear and irrefutable evidence of herd behavour!
(Hint: This is tongue in cheek humour, you want to mod it funny not troll. Either that or there's nothing to see here, move along. The secret history of star wars says so, so it must be true).
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
"Hi, I'm Twitter! I refer to my^H^Hhimself in the third person! I bother a busy store about products they don't support! I have a journal!"
Are they moaning as well?
Nothing that the British like more than moaning and queuing.
"Trademarks are the heraldry of the new feudalism."
"Line forms spontaneously at NYC Apple Store" It sounds like a headline on The Onion! I guess we've been at the point where The Onion sounds like real life for some time now.
This looks like a marketing stunt. Note that posts, barriers, and security people for line control were all on hand for this "unexpected" event.
Apple probably isn't even paying them. All they'd have to do is send anonymous text messages for a few of their fanboys, er, customers.
The fact that they line up for nothing, making them little more than a flash mob...
OR
That this story gets media attention at all and has anti-macheads all in a sweat shouting "sheeple!" and trying to put various political/religious/fanboi spins on the story?
-- Boycott Shell
Meanwhile, at the Sony Style store, 5 blocks away, the glow of HDTVs illuminated the vapid faces of salespeople in tshirts as they stared across the racks over empty aisles. Aisles of laptops, PS3s, CDs and other items went unpurchased, and no one was there to see it.
Brand name computer stores are the outlet for those too weak to resist the urge to make impulse purchases in excess of a month's income. The fact Apple has been able to capitalize on this trend so well speaks to the fetishistic appeal of those shiny laptops and the absence of any real value in their products. Convinced the worth of something that is not even there, people are literally waiting in line to buy nothing.
Truly, they are the dead.
M
Yes, it must be tough to deal with such huge crowds.
60 people? NYC's entire Mac-using population has shown up!It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong.
This stunt sounds alot like what Improv Anywhere would do.
But your mention of "a friend of mine got an invite for it" sounds strange. Normally when Improv Anywhere stages an event, the invitation makes no mention of what the event actually is. It just says something vague like "bring a green shirt and be prepared to walk alot" or whatever. Only once everyone is gathered do they explain the stunt. (This is intentionally done to prevent information leaks and to keep everyone genuinely surprised.) If you want proof, watch some of their videos: the first step is always a briefing session for the volunteers.
I suppose your friend could have phoned/emailed you after receiving the instructions...
Improv Anywhere is officially denying involvement (not sure if you can take them at their word, however!). All this to say that without more proof, I don't think it's warranted to conclude this is Improv Anywhere's doing. (Yet.)
I've never seen people waiting outside of a cube to be assimilated!
I've never noticed twitter's trolling, assuming it exists. I have noticed the constant barrage of "you're a twitter sockpuppet", which is the only way I ever really notice the posts in question. So if twitter is trolling, they're not so trollish that they stand out above the background noise (I read at -1, so there's a fair bit of background noise). So, can you please shut the fuck up and stop polluting Slashdot with your whining? If I was a troll I'd have great admiration for twitter - they have succeeded where most fail in that every one of their posts gets numerous "stop trolling", "you're a twitter sockpuppet" replies. It's you and your ilk who need to stop feeding the trolls.
Chernobyl 'not a wildlife haven' - BBC News
A giant fanboy orgy is going to take place inside the cube. Steve Jobs will allow them all the blow him 10 seconds each.
Jokes aside, an Engadget story on slasdot, about Apple, on a queue. I know Apple is worshiped here, but can it go lower than this?
I'd be interested to read your references for the "historical fact that Mohammad dictated the Koran while in what modern people would call a seizer."
Not a lot of historical documents from that time period have survived, so I'm curious about your hidden stash of medical records. I'm also curious about your apparent collection of criminal (or are they professional?) records establishing the prophet as a baby-raper.
The God you worship may not like baby-rapers, but does he know how to spell "seizure"? I don't really care about the answer; I just want to use this opportunity to be a condescending punk and point out that you're not only delusional, but also can't spell properly.
You may also want to review the rules of English capitalization.
I mean; when people to queue up to buy something when they're not even sure what it IS that's a whole new level of success.
"Physics is to math as sex is to masturbation." -R. Feynman
As far as the retail experience goes, coming from the gritty do-it-yourself-BestBuy-or-bust PC white/beige box world where I see computers as tools rather than post-modernist plastic sculptures to gawk at, I have to say I was rather pleasantly surprised. I half expected these guys (Geniuses?) to be no better than the ignorant, pushy pimply teenagers at BestBuy or the Gateway Country Stores (R.I.P.), but that was certainly not the case. I mean I didn't walk out of there with a hard on or anything like that, but Apple certainly has the "don't worry about anything, just give us your money and you'll be OK" approach completely figured out.
The thing that got my attention was the number of kids playing with the Macs on display, and the number of older people browsing around. I'm not sure what gives, but it's like the store atmosphere sort of encourages people to sit down, try things out and ask lots of questions. Inevitably I suppose this takes care of the other thing, which is to sell the boxes.
I can't say that I'm anything other than a die-hard Windows (with sprinklings of BSD and Linux) user, and I really wouldn't want or know what to do with a Mac. But at the expense of sounding a little fanboyish, the Apple store is very cool.
I think anyone with just a few working brain cells can figure out the real reasons for your lame little account of the terrible things suffered at the hands of these evil people. If I happened to be in the shoes of that ogre of a manager that "screamed" at you, I would have taken your picture and put up a website with an account of what really happened (one can only imagine your demeanor and shudder), along with a recommendation of how not to "evangelize" free software.
As always, you end up doing more harm than good - sockpuppets or not.
Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo
http://dvice.com/archives/2008/05/mystery_lineup.php
"By the time we got there, the lineup was gone, but a couple of helpful Apple blueshirts told us what was what: It turns out that the lineup wasn't for the widely -- and wildly -- rumored 3G iPhone. The store got a shipment of current iPhones this morning, apparently a rare occurrence these days, and when word got out, some touchscreen-hungry folks got in line to snatch up the few that came in."
Let's see.
The French invented the modern tank in WWI, based on an original idea by the British.
Apple invented the modern WIMP UI in 1981/82, based on an original design by Xerox.
The French didn't really improve their tank after WWI, and were totally taken by surprise by German tank warfare.
Apple didn't really improve their OS after the '80s, and were totally taken by surprise by Microsoft Windows 95.
Yeh, sounds right.
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/08/05/22/apple_seeks_expert_in_wimax_impromptu_5th_ave_lineup_more.html The answer to something seeming perplexing is usually something simple, if the observer has any common sense at all.
Whispers are circulating concerning a new Apple offering, to be known as the "iNull". Apple's latest tech blockbuster is said to involve no hardware or software, will not be offered as an online service, will not be encumbered by DRM, and in fact will have no actual existence at all, either physical or virtual.
"Apple will change the way we look at nothingness as a society," said one industry insider. "This is game-changing. Everything you think you know about nothing is going to be swept away."
Mac enthusiasts are eager to be among the first to have an iNull, despite the inherent philosophical difficulties in "having" one. "I can't wait!" blurted one blogger, "Apple has once again shown how they 'think different'. In a world of gadgets, doodads and useless techno-gimmickry, they've brought forth something of unrivaled simplicity and elegance. Way to go!"
From a business perspective, the profit potential is limitless -- the iNull will have the lowest production cost of any Apple product to date, requiring no manufacturing, shipping, or inventory, although there will be a "significant" marketing campaign. Of the $499 price tag, Apple is expected to reap the lion's share as pure profit, with an unspecified percentage paid out as a licensing fee to the Sartre estate.
Soylent Green is peoplicious!
Your argument may seem convenient and pat, but
:-)
:-)
There's something cool called the "time value of money". There's also a unique property to the PC industry, which is a trend toward exponential improvement.
If you save $1000 today, it's actually worth a lot more compounded over 5 years from now. Not to mention the value in more frequent hardware replacements in an industry where exponential improvement is the norm.
Given accepted rates of return on things like index funds (10%), you could spend $1000 every 2 years, instead of $2000 every 5 years... You would have two brand new machines during that time on the same budget and have a bunch left over at the end. The only thing you miss out on is the first two years of having a 50% superior machine, if we arbitrarily call your $2000 Mac (we'll go wild) "50% better" than the $1000 PC when it was brand new.
The neat thing is that if you spend $1000 every two years rather than $2100 every five years, those last three years, you would have a far superior machine.... so... for more than half of the 5 year life cycle, you would have vastly superior machine... of course it does involve delayed gratification.
OK, lets do the numbers. I can hear your ears turning red.... or perhaps your eyes are glazing over. I don't care. Keep reading.
Even assuming Macbooks hold their value better (lets use some numbers and assume the PC depreciates at exactly 40% per year and the mac at exactly 30% per year), your 2nd $1000 PC purchase would cost you $640 after the trade in of your 2 year old PC (which was then worth $360). Your initial $1000 savings is now also worth $1331, which you can spend on that PC. So you have a brand new computer in the second year and $691 in the bank. Two years later, you replace it again, getting a trade in and paying $640 for a machine 8 times (exponential for 4 years) faster than your original box. Again, your initial savings on the purchase means that you don't have to put down any money. Your $691 could now be valued at $836, so even after you THIRD purchase (8 times faster than the original), you still have $196 in the bank. Upon reaching the 5th year, you evaluate your position.
Your $2000 Macbook is worth about $340 since it's 5 years old (30% per year).
Your $1000 PC is actually your third one you got with the same money. It's currently worth $600 (40% per year). You also have $215 in the bank from the leftovers after the trade-ins and compounded interest.
Lets say your $2000 Mac was.. we'll go wild and say it's 50% "better" than the $1000 PC when it was brand new. Today, you have a 1 year old PC that's valued at about $600 and is generally about 6 times faster (presumably "better" in most ways) than your 5 year old Mac. You didn't spend any additional money during the entire process but you got a new PC every 2 years.
Now, this argument is TOTALLY IRRELEVANT for someone who considers "money is no object", since they will simply buy the best AND replace it yearly. But for someone on an obviously restricted budget, it's simply silly to argue that you're saving money. In fact, it's a lie.
If you want to argue that the PC is so infuriatingly poor that you simply can't use it during those first two years.... there is nothing I can say and you are entitled to that opinion.
But you wanted to make some sort of kooky economic argument.....
epic fail.
Of course, this all falls apart if you're the type who will spend your spare cash on lotto tickets rather than putting it in an interest bearing account as I've assumed above....
Which is also entirely possible.
Hey, anything is possible!
o.0
(_)
Ah, I wouldn't know. There's a certain advantage to talking to yourself. For a start, you have more common topics than with anyone else, although that's somewhat offset by the fact that you're not going to hear anything you didn't know already. It also takes all the fun out of telling jokes, lemme tell you.
You're also almost guaranteed to have the same moods at the same time. When you're in a mood to go see a movie, for example, so are you. I mean it's not like you're in a mood to watch the game, while you would rather talk about moving the furniture instead. No need to nod absentmindedly and go "uh-huh". Which is just as well, because you'd know it anyway. And when you're depressed, you can always cry on your own shoulder. (Come to think of it, more of the people on the Internet should be encouraged to use their own shoulder for that;)
And if you want to call yourself to dinner, but you're still at the last boss in a MMO raid... well, chances are you'll find a way to accomodate and understand yourself.
You can also save yourself not just the phone bill, but also the internet bill. You can just use Notepad as IRC, IM and pretty much any other text chat medium rolled in one. And you know you can accept any files or attachments. Heck, even if you sent yourself a virus, you had it already anyway.
Buying gifts for yourself is fun too. It takes all the guesswork out, and it's not like you'll buy yourself a tie you'll secretly hate but pretend to like so you don't offend yourself. Downside, it ruins the whole surprise big time. Plus side again, it'll probably be something both you and you can use, and you won't get into ownership disputes about it.
Romance tends to not work too well, though.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
No, you are submissive, dogmatic, and base much of your identity on a brand for consumer products. You are the shame of Mac users.
Has anyone else noticed the similarity between Apple fanboys and Republican freepers?
Think about it:
Criticism of the (product or company | party or policy) is seen as personal attack.
Criticism of the fearless leader is seen as a personal attack.
Both groups consider themselves tiny voices of truth being attacked by a horde who constantly censors them.
Both groups employ talking points which are repeated ad nauseam with little variation.
Of course, the result of this mentally is that people enjoy baiting them.