Official crackdown on Apple fanboi 'shanty town' ahead of London iPhone launch The British authorities have told two of Blighty's most passionate Apple fanbois to remove a "shanty town shack" they have constructed outside London's Regent Street Apple Store. Two diehard Apple nuts set up camp outside the fruity firm's UK flagship shop yesterday in hope of being the first to pick up the new iPhone 5S when …
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But you are sat on your own in front of a computer mocking people who are actually doing something. Whether you think it's worthwhile is neither here not there. They are making friends and enjoying themselves, while you are in a room on your own being a judgemental prick. How dare they like something you don't.
And what a completely pointless waste of time and energy for all concerned.
Is it beyond someone to come up with a better system, rather than having customers physically park themselves outside the shop for days, waiting for a completely arbitrary date & time when they have to physically walk through a door? Just thinking about it shows just how ridiculous the whole charade is.
Apple is supposed to be a tech company, but is reliant on a stupid and outdated method of throttling initial market demand.
You can walk into any carphone warehouse the next day and pick one up at your leisure...
You can also be a normal user and buy the thing one or two months later - and that's not limited to Apple kit. That way you are assured of supply, get a device that has at least made a start with getting debugged and you don't have to spend time in a queue when you wander into a shop - it's my pet hate.
This whole "queueing outside" is either for making hype, or for people falling prey to it. Neither interests me much. Just give me the device. It's that and the eternal court cases that is making me consider alternatives, however much I like the kit.
Meh, I don't have any issue with it myself. If they're in front of the Apple store and both staff and fanbois are having fun, what's the harm? I imagine there's quite a few regulars that meet up and talk at these queue gatherings.
Besides, if someone is obsessive enough to queue outside a shop for four days for a phone, wouldn't it be better to know where they are?
And what a completely pointless waste of time and energy for all concerned.Is it beyond someone to come up with a better system, rather than having customers physically park themselves outside the shop for days, waiting for a completely arbitrary date & time when they have to physically walk through a door?
To be fair to Apple, they will have it delivered to you on release day, if you order online in time. Or you can reserve at a store, if you're so sad you have to have the thing on day 1, so can pick it up where you work, at luch time.
To not be fair to Apple, they've apparently applied for the license for this tent for the last 4 years, making these poor saps basically unpaid marketing fodder for the Cult-of-JobsTM. But then they seem to be perfectly willing to get wet in this cause, so who am I to interfere with their 'fun'. Even if it does make me want to beat a bit of sense into them.
So they get to be first and get their 15 minutes of fame, care of lazy/bored journalists with copy to file. Apple get to look cool (or more realistically weird), especially when their staff start whooping and high-fiving. And everyone else gets to go, "what the hell is going on with some people?", and shake their heads sadly at the state of the world...
Do the staff in the UK stores really do all this high-fiving and whooping? I can understand the US doing it, they're less grumpy and cynical than us, but you'll notice that Wal-Mart did not introduce the Wal-Mart Cheer when they took over ASDA. Although apparently they did when they started up a chain in Germany. I have this mental image of all these poor Germans being forced to raise their hands and fist-pump while mumbling "Go Wal-Mart! Go Wal-Mart!" And I'm going to resist all temptation to make any bad-taste jokes here, I'll leave that to Basil Fawlty...
There is a better system. It's already used by Disney parks and some automobile registration offices in Texas.
You get a ticket saying the wait is x minutes long. When it gets to be near that time, you go back to the queue. The wait may be hours when you first get your ticket, but you only need to spend a few minutes physically standing in a queue.
This doesn't give you bragging rights with other fans. It also doesn't give you the chance to show the world the lengths you will go to for your iThingie by your presence on a sidewalk for days in the rain. It would deprive Apple of the free extra publicity.
.... had a sense of perspective.
These two t1t5 seem to have lost this completely. This is 'phone we're talking about here, not the worlds first brain transplant, of a water powered car, or proof of sentient life on Mars, or a perpetual motion machine.
It's a 'phone. OK, less copper wire than Bell or Meucci had foreseen.....
But a 'phone none the less.
Idiots.
Other shops sell iDevices on launch day, and they don't have queues of fanbois waiting in line. They could go to one of them if they really can't wait. Carphone Warehouse for example is just round the corner in Oxford Street.
There are companies with names such as "rent a crowd" that supply people to queue for events such as this. There is however no evidence that Apple has engaged the services of one of these companies.
An estate agent, so he is taking his holiday to get this is he? I thought estate agents were twats, now confirmed.
And a 17 year old student, studying hard I see. It's apparently too expensive to go to uni but fine to spunk the best part of £800 on a phone.
Yes it may be less on a contract, but if he bought the 5 last year he won't be out of contract yet. Plus he's not even old enough to sign the contract!
Wow, way to give a couple of harmless blokes a hard time.
You'd think from the comments that these two are next on the government hit list.
So their 'hobby' is waiting in line to buy a new gadget. Wheres the harm?
Are all the rest of us perfect examples?
Do none of us spend time watching our fishing tackle?
Or sitting around watching 22 over paid blokes run around a field?
Or melt our brains watching Big X Brother Celeb Bake House Watch?
Or grind for gold in GTA-World of-Diablo?
Given that I bet most of us got a hard time growing up for being geeks or nerds you'd think we'd have a little bit of tolerance for others.
Do none of us spend time watching our fishing tackle? No
Or sitting around watching 22 over paid blokes run around a field? No
Or melt our brains watching Big X Brother Celeb Bake House Watch? Definitely no
Or grind for gold in GTA-World of-Diablo? No - dunno what you're on about
Completely agree, saved me a bit of typing, but have to add that there are some twats in these forums, who have to spew hate and abuse, simply because 2 guys are doing what they want to do. Freedom etc. They are not affecting your life, so why the abuse?
And while you are typing your crap, think about this, maybe they are going to buy a few and flock them on ebay , making a tidy profit for a few days of enjoying human company.
But no, you slag them off while you sit at your screen as though your life is perfect
absolutely insane
"but have to add that there are some twats in these forums, who have to spew hate and abuse, simply because 2 guys are doing what they want to do. Freedom etc. They are not affecting your life, so why the abuse?"
Freedom works both ways. While this pair of pillocks are free to sit around outside the store with nothing better to do with their lives (what a waste of a holiday), El Reg commentards are free to mock the idiotic and foolish.
And what riper fruit for mocking and ridicule than an iFan queuing for a device that they'd be able to get on day one without the pointless queuing anyway. And personally there's nothing more satisfying the pricking the pompous bubble that is marketing hype that this kind of stunt usually creates.
"So their 'hobby' is waiting in line to buy a new gadget. Wheres the harm?
Given that I bet most of us got a hard time growing up for being geeks or nerds you'd think we'd have a little bit of tolerance for others."
Classic iFolly owner. Totally unaware of reality!
So their 'hobby' is waiting in line to buy a new gadget. Wheres the harm?
That is the point. If you don't know, the really cool people are not going to tell YOU!
Buying an iFolly ain't going to give you any credance.
Its not the tent that is the awesome idea, it is sitting in front of the shop and getting put on news websites that is the awesome idea. Its a free advert for the release date of the new phone. I expect there will be something about it on the BBC news tonight which is even better for Apple... a free advert on the BBC.
The cynic in me would assume that apple didn't apply for the license on purpose so it got reported in this way instead of "Only 2 guys are bothering to queue for the new iPhone".
The cynic in me would assume that apple didn't apply for the license on purpose so it got reported in this way instead of "Only 2 guys are bothering to queue for the new iPhone".
Shrimpling,
Congratulations on out-cynicalling me. I didn't think of that. And now I see you are a marketing genius. Would you like a job with my new Dogbert's Diabolical Marketing Agency?
What do these guys do when they need a pee? Seriously? Do they pop in store to use the staff toilets and when they do, do the laws of queuing result in them having to re-join the queue at the back?
Maybe they have piss-bags to keep them warm at night or worse go in bottles - but what about number 2's?
I'll stick to ordering on-line.
Black helicopter 'coz it looks like pee hitting the floor - something the local council would want to think about..
Well they could solve the number 2's issue by not eating for a couple of days before joining the queue.
I guess they could go into the store for a pee, then cross their legs between 5:30pm and 9am when it's shut. Or to keep their place, just have the Apple store staff collect their filled bottles.
Reminds me of something I read in the paper years ago, about a Sumo wrestling demonstration in Australia. It turns out that not only did JAL have to fit extra large seats for them, but they're too huge to fit in aeroplane toilets. So they had to not eat the day before, and severely restrict their drinking, to avoid the issue.
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"The streets of Westminster are not camp sites and we can’t allow people to block the streets days in advance. From Thursday, a queuing system with barriers will be in place for anyone wishing to queue for the new iPhone."
A reasonable attitude, but ultimately bound to fail.
Maybe open a can of anti-terrorism legislation on them instead?
Seriously? Wow, there may be some right idiots camping outside the iShop, but there are some bigger idiots here. Two blokes doing something that's, frankly, silly but not much more are up there with people who blow up planes and city centres now are they?
Have a word with yourself. It's not even worth it as a joke. Call them fools if you like, but that's well out of order.
Having problems with our sarcasm detector, are we ?
Reminder : a journalist was recently stopped at the UK border and detained under anti-terrorism laws in order to search him for data on his conversations with a whistleblower. I don't see that either of those two people could be classed as terrorists either, so the remark is totally in order.
I wonder if any of the commentards on here will stick to their opinions of cretins, numpties and pathetic when we see an article later in the week saying that the pair have been rewarded by Tim Cook for their loyalty (and free advertising boost to Apple) by giving them the latest iPhone for free...
Although I would never queue in this way for a phone and find the whole notion highly amusing, as someone else pointed out here... "way to give a couple of harmless blokes a hard time"
What an intolerant society we sadly live in...
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"the latest iPhone for free..."
£600 for sitting outside all day and night for 5 days whilst taking online abuse...
NO THANKS
"What an intolerant society we sadly live in..."
They aren't queuing up for a blessing from the pope.
They're queuing up and giving free advertising to one of the biggest companies in the world. A company hoarding a significant proportion of the worlds money and a company which will bend any rule it can to avoid paying tax.
At best they deserve to be forcibly removed from the pavement they are blocking
To be fair, they probably don't give a crap about taking online abuse and despite the fact that you may not consider £600 for five days to be good value for money there are many MANY people in this world that would (and lets face it, an estate agent is bound to be one of them ;-)
(Also a slight aside... IF that does happen then it's more lokely to be the £709 version)
Are we certain that estate agency is their only occupation?
". I think he thought he were yobs and told us to take our greenhouse shelter down, saying that a lot of people pay huge sums of money to rent the shops on Regents Street and that staff as well as shoppers shouldn't have to look at a shanty town."
I think they are yobs too, no normal person will wait in line for days for a phone where (by all estimates) sales will be low enough they could just walk in day of and walk out with a phone.
Plus, Apple "forgot" to get them a permit? Isn't it the job of the people erecting a shanty town in front of the store to get a permit, not the store itself? Just saying...
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