I just care that what I sell every day are authentic Apple products, and that our customers don’t come back to me to complain about the quality of the products.
This is what an employee at the fake Apple Store in Kunming, China told a reporter for the Wall Street Journal. Earlier this week we reported on these counterfeit Apple Store that appeared in China, that closely mimicked the layout of Apple's own retail stores.
The WSJ couldn't get in touch with the owner or manager of the store, but did get in touch with a salesperson who confirmed that the store was not an authorized reseller -- but did sell genuine Apple products at the same prices as those on Apple's website.
The salesperson said it didn't "make much of a difference" if they were authorized. Instead, as the quote above illustrates, the staff in the store simply want to do a good job selling Apple products -- just like the authentic employees at an Apple Retail Store.
Apple Store Sanlitun, Beijing, China
Regarding the counterfeit stores, the salesperson felt his "store should be one of the best in terms of scale and the level of professionalism," noting that the employee t-shirts and name lanyards give it a similar look and feel to the authentic Apple Stores in China, in Beijing and Shanghai.
Tuesday January 21, 2025 12:46 pm PST by Joe Rossignol
A leaker known as "Majin Bu" today shared an alleged image of a component for the rumored, ultra-thin "iPhone 17 Air" model.
The blurry, pixelated image shows a pair of rear iPhone shells with a pill-shaped, raised camera bar along the top. On the left side of the bar, there is a circular cutout that appears to be for a single rear camera. On the right side of the bar, there appears to be an ...
Friday January 17, 2025 2:42 pm PST by Joe Rossignol
iOS 19 is still around six months away from being announced, but a new leak has allegedly revealed a completely redesigned Camera app.
Based on footage it obtained, YouTube channel Front Page Tech shared a video showing what the new Camera app will apparently look like, with the key change being translucent menus for camera controls. Overall, the design of these menus looks similar to...
Tuesday January 21, 2025 4:31 pm PST by Juli Clover
Apple provided developers and public beta testers with the release candidate version of iOS 18.3 today, and with it comes release notes confirming what's new. While we knew about several of the features that are in the update, there are some lesser known tweaks and bug fixes.
The update adds new Visual Intelligence features for iPhone 16 models, it tweaks Notification summaries on all...
Monday January 20, 2025 9:01 am PST by Joe Rossignol
A new iPhone SE is widely rumored to launch this year, and the device has potentially been confirmed today by known leaker Evan Blass.
In a private social media post, Blass shared an image of what appears to be source code mentioning an iPhone SE (4th Gen), which casts doubt on the alternative "iPhone 16E" name rumored for the device. However, the name in the source code could be a...
Sunday January 19, 2025 6:58 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Apple on late Saturday removed TikTok from the App Store in the U.S., and it has now explained why it was required to take this action.
Last year, the U.S. passed a law that required Chinese company ByteDance to divest its ownership of TikTok due to potential national security risks, or else the platform would be banned. That law went into effect today, and companies like Apple and Google...
Sunday January 19, 2025 8:11 am PST by Joe Rossignol
After a four-year wait, a new AirTag is finally expected to launch in 2025. Below, we recap rumored upgrades for the accessory.
A few months ago, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman said Apple was aiming to release the AirTag 2 around the middle of 2025. While he did not offer a more specific timeframe, that means the AirTag 2 could be announced by the end of June.
The original AirTag was announced...
Tuesday January 21, 2025 6:40 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Apple plans to release at least one new iPad Pro model this year, according to a supplier-focused report today from Korean website The Elec. It is likely that the 11-inch and 13-inch iPad Pro models would be updated simultaneously.
After receiving an OLED display last year, the report said the iPad Pro will receive only "minor" changes this year. Overall, the next iPad Pro is expected to...
Wednesday January 22, 2025 2:07 am PST by Tim Hardwick
Popular caller ID app Truecaller is rolling out an update that brings real-time caller ID support to its iOS subscribers.
Apple introduced Live Caller ID Lookup in iOS 18, allowing third-party caller ID apps to securely retrieve information about a caller from their servers, hence today's Truecaller update.
iPhone users can enable the Live Caller ID Lookup feature by going to Settings ➝ ...
Saturday January 18, 2025 10:28 am PST by Joe Rossignol
iOS 19 will not drop support for any iPhone models, according to French website iPhoneSoft.fr.
The report cited a source who said iOS 19 will be compatible with any iPhone that can run iOS 18, which would mean the following models:
iPhone 16
iPhone 16 Plus
iPhone 16 Pro
iPhone 16 Pro Max
iPhone 15
iPhone 15 Plus
iPhone 15 Pro
iPhone 15 Pro Max
iPhone 14
iPhon...
I find the smugness and audacity of an Apple Store employee increases with the distance from Cupertino and distance from a tech industry hub. A friend of mine was back east, I think Rochester, NY, to visit family and help get a printer for his mother who owned a Mac. My friend is no civilian and has done several designs in Silicon Valley that are on retail shelves.
They get to the local Apple store and this Apple store employee, a kid just out of high school, starts to talk down to my friend's mom on what kind of printer to get. My friend interjected knowing this guy was just trying to up-sell a higher end printer with features that are not needed. The kid, in a smug note, starts to talk down to him when questioning the selection. My friend then firmly says, "That is it! Quit with the up-sell and I doubt if you know more about the Apple product line that me." Post-high school red-shirt kid totally breaks his game face and says, "Oh yeah smart-ass, prove it!"
In that moment, my friend pulls out a photo in his iPhone of himself and Woz at a party up in the Los Gatos hills. He then tells the kid he has consulted in Cupertino and if he wanted, could get him fired with a few phone calls for being such a dick. High school kid is wigged out and gets someone else in the store to help out getting the printer.
Was told he didn't get him fired by his next review wasn't the best.
So the "non-civilian" couldn't just tell his mom what printer to get?
