Stefan Mileschin

In a fit of marketing spin which should be seen as an insult to the intelligence of the American nation, Apple is peddling a phone it has dubbed "obsolete" in the rest of the world as "vintage" in the land of the free.

According to Trusted Reviews, from 11 June, the original iPhone 2G model will gain 'obsolete' status, which means the device will no longer be serviceable in the Apple care centres. The 'obsolete' status for the iPhone model applies in Canada, Asia, Europe, Japan and Latin America.

All this sounds fair enough - after all the Apple 2G is as dated as black turtle necks, but for some reason Apple does not want to admit that on its home turf.

Instead the first-generation iPhone will be given 'vintage' status, in the hope that the terminally dumb will want to buy it. They will even be given limited support to do so.

Running iOS 1.0, the iPhone could be upgraded to iOS 3.1.3 but could not cope with anything more advanced than that.

Only Apple could take the word "vintage", which is normally applied to fine wines and cheese and stick it on a clapped out piece of junk which the rest of the world considers obsolete.

What is more amusing is that Apple clearly does not think that the rest of the world is dumb enough to fall for the marketing scam and it is not trying it on in nations where its customers are a little more discerning.

Apple is also rendering a large number of other technological gadgets 'obsolete'. These include the 17-inch and 20-inch iMac G5, the late 2005 Mac mini, and the 15-inch and 17-inch versions of the Apple PowerBook G4.

Also retired are the mid-2007 iMac, Mac Pro, late-2007 iMac, Xserve and AirPort Express Base Station. None of these are considered vintage and indeed some of them should probably be labelled "fire hazard."

http://news.techeye.net/mobile/apple...one-is-vintage