AnCaps
ANARCHO-CAPITALISTS
Bitch-Slapping Statists For Fun & Profit Based On The Non-Aggression Principle
 
HomePortalGalleryRegisterLog in

 :: Anarcho-Capitalist Categorical Imperatives :: AnCaps In Science, Technology & Environment
 

 Apple's iPhone, the New International Currency

View previous topic View next topic Go down 
AuthorMessage
CovOps

CovOps

Female Location : Ether-Sphere
Job/hobbies : Irrationality Exterminator
Humor : Über Serious

Apple's iPhone, the New International Currency Vide
PostSubject: Apple's iPhone, the New International Currency   Apple's iPhone, the New International Currency Icon_minitimeSat Feb 08, 2014 6:04 pm
I’ve been paying my bills with iPhones. Not with apps or on bank sites—I’ve been using the Apple (AAPL) hardware as currency.

Apple's iPhone, the New International Currency Tech_iphone07__01__630x420

It started by accident in December, during a business trip to New York. I live in Rome, where domestic work comes cheap and technology is expensive. An unlocked, gold, 32-gigabyte iPhone 5s that costs about $815 with tax in the U.S. goes for €839 (about $1,130) in Italy, roughly a month’s wages for workers who do laundry, pick up kids from school, or provide care for the elderly. When one worker heard I was visiting the States, she asked me to pick her up an iPhone in lieu of the equivalent cash for work she’d done. Lining up inside the Apple Store on Fifth Avenue, I was surrounded by shoppers speaking languages from around the world. The salesman looked stunned when I said I wanted an unlocked iPhone. Just one?
A new shipment of unlocked 5s phones had just come in, he said, adding that the gold model I asked for was the most popular in Europe and the easiest to resell. To my right, a man with a credit card from a Saudi bank was trying to buy his third and fourth phones of the day. “Make it two,” I said. There was one more step: The salesman grabbed a landline from behind the counter to connect me with my bank’s antifraud department. Purchases from this store, he said, are red flags.
Do the math, and that’s no surprise. Exiting the store with my plastic Apple shopping bag secured by a rope drawstring, I no longer thought of the phones inside as appliances. They were more like gold bars.

More:  http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-02-06/unlocked-iphones-are-hard-currency-in-brazil-italy-other-countries#r=read
Back to top Go down
 

Apple's iPhone, the New International Currency

View previous topic View next topic Back to top 
Page 1 of 1

Permissions in this forum:You cannot reply to topics in this forum
 :: Anarcho-Capitalist Categorical Imperatives :: AnCaps In Science, Technology & Environment-
 :: 

Anarcho-Capitalist Categorical Imperatives

 :: 

AnCaps In Science, Technology & Environment
Index, Portal, Induct Yourself Here, Forum Technical Non-Assistance, Philosophy & Religion, Realpolitik Statism & Bureaucracy, Law & Order, Rights Individualism & Lifestyles, Laissez-faire Free Trade Zone, Science Technology & Environment, Psychology Edumbcation & IndoctriNation, Culture & Art, Ancapdemia's Ebony Basement, High Octane One-on-One Debate, Celebrate Evildoers' Inadvertent Contributions to Ancap Values, Idiot of the Week Award Nominees Are, Humor, Freestyle Miscellaneous, Ancaps Emporium, OZschwitz Slave Pen Downunder Boutique, Anarcho-Capitalists,AnCaps Forum,Anti-State,Anti-Statist,Inalienable Rights Defenders,Non-Aggression Principle,Non-Initiation of Force Principle,Rothbardians,Anarchist,Capitalist,objectivism,Ayn Rand,Anarcho-Capitalism,Anarcho-Capitalist,politics,libertarianism,Ancap Forum,Anarchist Forum,Vulgar Libertarians,Hippies of The Right,Forum for Anarcho-Capitalist,Forum for Anarcho-Capitalists,Forum for AnCap,Forum for AnCaps,Libertarian,Anarcho-Objectivist,Freedom, Laissez Faire, Free Trade, Black Market, Randroid, Randroids, Rothbardian, AynArchist,Anarcho-Capitalist Forum, Anarchism, Anarchy, Free Market Anarchism, Free Market Anarchy, Market Anarchy, Market Anarchism, Volunteerism, Libertarian anarchism,
Free forum | Society and Culture | Politics | ©phpBB | Free forum support | Report an abuse | Forumotion.com