back to article Chinese coder's got 99 problems and getting hitched is one: Huge iPhone woo plot FAILS

A Chinese software developer learned the hard way that money can't buy you love, even if you invest it in iPhones – or 99 of the things, to be precise. iPhone proposal in China "Will you do me the honor of.." No!" The unnamed technology worker from Guangzhou spent over RMB 500,000 (around $82,000) buying up 99 iPhone 6 …

  1. xperroni
    Facepalm

    But... Why?

    I am no stranger to the concept of spending lavishly to woo a significant other, but how were 99 iPhones supposed to do the trick? For that kind of money he might as well have bought a crazy-expensive engagement ring, rented a sports car and taken her to a fancy restaurant, then proposed over some unreasonably priced food and drinks. Go figure...

    1. DropBear
      Trollface

      Re: But... Why?

      Ah, but this is what shows the chap may have had an inkling of things to come - 99 iPhones have a heck of a lot better resale value than a half-consumed bottle of Dom Perignon...

      1. Simon Harris

        Re: But... Why?

        As red's the colour of good fortune and joy, he might have been better off with 99 Red Balloons.

        1. Steve Evans

          Re: But... Why?

          I hope she turned him down for being stupid and wasteful... All he had to do was buy 99 *boxes*...

        2. Peter Gathercole Silver badge

          Re: But... Why? @Simon Harris

          You do know that the original song "Neunundneunzig Luftballons" is an anti-war protest song (and says nothing about the ballons being red - which originally confused me when the German video was shown with the English song).

          Heute zieh ich meine Runden,

          Seh' die Welt in Truemmern liegen,

          Hab' 'nen Luftballon gefunden,

          Denk' an Dich und lass' ihn fliegen...

          - literal translation (but not mine), definitely not the english version

          Today I'm doing my rounds,

          Seeing the world lying in ruins,

          Found a balloon,

          Think of you and let it fly....

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        @DropBear

        Apple lets you return them within 14 days or whatever, so he should be able to get a full refund.

        If he'd been able to scrape up 99 iPhones before they officially launched in China she might have been more impressed, and if she said no he'd at least make money selling them!

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: But... Why?

      Obviously, iPhone is all about some sort of fake status (iPhone owners still laughably believe people buy Android because they can't afford iPhones).

      Having 99 of them, means he is 99x higher status than someone that has just 1 of them...

      She however seems pretty sane to stay away from such an image conscious dickhead.,

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        @AC

        iPhone owners still laughably believe people buy Android because they can't afford iPhones

        Some STUPID iPhone owners believe this. Just like some STUPID Android owners believe the iPhone is all about "some sort of fake status".

    3. JeffyPoooh
      Pint

      The real news is...

      "...technology worker from Guangzhou spent ... around $82,000..."

      One still sees the occasional comment where the person posting it hasn't yet learned just how fast wealth is being created and distributed to the rapidly developing countries. They've missed the many memos from Hans Rosling. Of course there's still plenty left to do, but this one lunatic example is almost worthy of a cake in itself.

    4. Don Dumb
      Boffin

      Re: But... Why?

      Time and again we see these lavish gestures to propose. When will people learn - If both partners want to get married, the nature of the proposal shouldn't matter.

      if your proposal needs a lavish public display to get engaged (and a simple private question won't do) then your relationship probably isn't strong enough for you to get married. Either the partner doesn't really want to marry the proposer but are somehow swayed by a single silly act (not great long term prospects there) OR, worse, the partner will only say yes to marriage if the proposal is "really special", in which case I seriously question that person's priorities.

      Anyone who feels the need to go to extra effort to pop the question is simply saying "I'm not confident that they do want to marry me, so I'll have to sweeten the deal". Truth is, you should be confident about getting engaged before you ask the question, there shouldn't be doubt.

    5. Fungus Bob

      Re: But... Why?

      He thought all those Jesusphones would work a miracle...

  2. Voland's right hand Silver badge

    Was the young lady a smuggler or something?

    This is the only reason I can see for offering 99 shiny shiny along with the ring.

    If she was not into smuggling them (AFAIK you no longer need to do that down there), then her decision is not surprising.

    The cost of 99 Shiny Shiny is the start of the price bracket for an Audi or Beamer convertible. Looking at BMW UK site, series 2 starts at 29K. That is a grand total of only 58 Shiny Shiny. 99 Shiny Shiny will get you a nice spec series 4.

    1. xperroni

      Re: Was the young lady a smuggler or something?

      You'd think a software developer of all people would understand creative resource usage beats over-provisioning any day. But no...

      1. Danny 14

        Re: Was the young lady a smuggler or something?

        indeed, she probably turned him down due to his poor development skills. His planning to get hitched was good and his analysis of needing to spend money on her was also good. However his poor design of spending money on wrong shiny coupled with a less than stellar implementation (proposed outside burger king?), she figured that the maintenance was going to be problematic so best nip this project in the bud early.

      2. Voland's right hand Silver badge

        Re: Was the young lady a smuggler or something?

        You'd think a software developer of all people would understand creative resource usage beats over-provisioning any day. But no...

        You obviously never had to work with Huawei software.

        1. xperroni
          Coat

          Re: Was the young lady a smuggler or something?

          You obviously never had to work with Huawei software.

          I did work with some Taiwanese developers during the glorious days when feature phones were prominent, though. They'd get this wrong the other way around, trying to cram into compile time customization features that were better left to be done at runtime.

          Alas, poor boy. All his money could buy him no love... Or taste.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    My guess,,,,,

    ,,,she very quickly worked out that by getting hitched to this guy, she would be taking on his massive debit and irresponsible attitude to money and went err no thanks....

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Box clever?

    I suspect he just bought 99 empty iPhone boxes, rather than actual iPhones.

    1. Simon Harris

      Re: Box clever?

      As white is a colour of mourning in Chinese culture, wouldn't that be like buying her 99 little coffins?

    2. Captain Scarlet Silver badge
      Pirate

      Re: Box clever?

      I suspect they were just printed on a standard printer with images off the internet

  5. Fihart

    That headline.

    Still listening to Prefab Sprout ?

  6. Mr C

    he just had to gimp on the last one, didnt he

    1 short of 100 -- that was his mistake!

    Maybe this lady was attracted to nice round numbers, we will never know, will we

    1. Thomas 6
      Joke

      Re: he just had to gimp on the last one, didnt he

      Talking of round numbers,

      http://www.xkcd.com/1000/

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: he just had to gimp on the last one, didnt he

      IIRC 99 is a special number in china for love... can't remember why at the moment...

      1. Teiwaz

        Re: he just had to gimp on the last one, didnt he

        Yeah, I recall something about that in a refernce in Crying Freeman OVAs. 9 has the same pronounciation as in 'ever lasting' so it's used a lot in weddings etc. The more 9's the better.

        http://www.travelchinaguide.com/intro/lucky-number9.htm

        1. razorfishsl

          Re: he just had to gimp on the last one, didnt he

          It is also used as slang for peinus

      2. Zog The Undeniable

        Re: he just had to gimp on the last one, didnt he

        "IIRC 99 is a special number in china for love... can't remember why at the moment..."

        You can't ever have seen the Cadbury's Flake advert with the girl in the overflowing bathtub, then.

      3. Beast of Borneo

        Significance of 99

        The digits "99" in in Mandarin Chinese (九九) are a homophone for a way of saying "long time" (久久).

        1. Mr C

          Re: Significance of 99

          thank you - that actually makes sense ;)

          +1

  7. AbelSoul
    Trollface

    Singles day

    > participants often start the day with.... a stuffed bun

    Sounds like a roaring success.

  8. Hilmi Al-kindy

    What a sad case. How is 99 iPhones romantic? Or maybe the girl was hinting that she wanted an iphone and he thought that was a perfect excuse to get her to agree.

    Where I leave a new iphone model is just the ticket for a guy wanting to get laid and has early access to one. It's definitely not what you would use to propose to a girl

  9. Peter 39

    With the gender-selection in China (and some other countries) there are lots more men than women.

    She knows that she will be able to find a husband with more common sense.

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    99 iPhones from a coder

    The problem was that he started counting from 0 instead of 1.

  11. zen1

    I would have ditched his ass too

    the damn fool payed pretty much full retail for them. In CHINA. I don't care how hot they sell, buying in a quantity like that you should at least get a 10% discount.

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