iPhone "Leak" Viral Ad Campaign

The greatest viral ad campaign. Ever.

Wondering what we're talking about? Earlier today, tech blog Gizmodo reported on a hardware leak of Apple's next-gen iPhone. They later posted a follow-up story with "undercover" details about the alleged leaked device and how it was forgotten at a bar.

It sounds like the blog has quite the scoop! It's unfortunate, though, that the entire thing is a fraud. I was as skeptical as the next guy until I read the follow-up story on the blog. This, for me, was the deal breaker. It makes sense that Apple would hit the killswitch on the lost device, but the entire story doesn't really add up. "The exterior didn't feel right and there was a camera on the front. After tinkering with it, he managed to open the fake 3GS." I don't know about you, but if I saw the device in the image below, I'd immediately notice the black shell around the outside. I wouldn't be surprised the next day to find that it was hiding something underneath.



Fair enough. Our finder is just a little slow. What really interested me was the discrepancy between the original article and the follow-up when it came to the device being "dead". According to the follow-up, the device was completely dead, deactivated by Apple. "...the phone was dead. Bricked remotely, through MobileMe, the service Apple provides to track and wipe out lost iPhones." In the original article, they claim to be able to get a USB connect image on the screen (although never photographed) that has an astoundingly high resolution (although not calculated by the tech blog, wuh?). In the original article, the author also claims to have disassembled the product and noticed each component labeled with "APPLE". None of the evidence that really matters was ever photographed or shown in any of the many videos in the article.

What can one conclude from these minor, but clear discrepancies? This entire thing is a hoax. A fake. The device is real. The entire story behind the "leak" is just a viral ad campaign (an admittedly brilliant one) to get Apple's new product some media coverage without paying out the money for it.

This article is just my own opinions and conclusions drawn from the evidence presented to me. Let's file it under "editorials."

Original Article
Follow-Up Article