I don't think any smartphone is a status symbol these days. They are available to just about everyone even in 3rd world countries.
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iPhone X how is the iphone x a status symbol if 29 million have it?
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I’m going to go out and buy one of those Amazon Fire phones that sold like 87 units so I can be the most elite of them all!
Saygus V2>Amazon Fire Phone
This is a great point, which is why I don’t buy the “branding argument”.
Similarly, audiophiles hated Beats by Dre because of their sound signature. Then Apple bought them...and people still hated beats because of their sound signature. Being an “Apple Brand” doesn’t seem to have helped them at all as far as I can tell.
That's my point though. It was always known as an Acura Integra. Now, it's the Honda Integra - removing any 'status' the Acura brand gave it.
I have 4 of them, so when you sit down next to my family at a restaurant it’s like my wife and I are the King and Queen of England, it’s like my sons are the Princes. Celebrities. Not even the Kardashians can touch us.
Can you run the math on one family with 4 iPhone X’s? Got to be the only one on the world.
Actually, I think a lot of people do see their smartphone as a status symbol. As an Android user, I'm regularly commented upon by friends and colleagues who use iPhones - the suggestion is that a Samsung phone is lesser/worse than an iPhone.
I'm surprised no-one has tried to take the top-end in the smartphone market. Apple charge incredibly high prices for a phone that everyone from 10-year-old children to 90-year-old grandparents, from doctors to the unemployed own, and they do nothing that other phones cannot do.
I always wondered if that's where BlackBerry might go - produce a phone that is truly high-end and trumps all other phones. Go for quality rather than quantity.
I'm still driving the 2006 Acura RSX that I bought in the fall of 2005 to replace an aging Acura Integra; I had the feeling that the model was going to be discontinued soon and sure enough, it was the following year. I loved (and still do!) the sportiness of the car and the hatchback.
I double and triple checked. To the best of my knowledge / research the Integra was never associated with the Honda brand in NA. only outside NA.
This. Totally agree. Maybe I'm missing something, but when anyone in the world can walk into a store and walk out with it, how can it be a status symbol?
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C'mon, not really? You're better than that, and you didn't need an X (or four) to make you better.
But that’s not saying “I’m better than you because of my phone”. That’s saying “I think my phone is better than yours”. And that’s an opinion that I’ve heard go both ways. I’m sure you probably believe that your phone is better than theirs.
I agree that iPhones don’t do anything unique in terms of features. The real value (for me anyway) is the way they do things, and that makes it worth it for me. Setting aside a few size/cosmetic/spec differences, every single iPhone in the world basically works exactly the same. And lots of people own them so accessories and support are easy to get. Add to that the fact that they work so well with other Apple devices and that’s were the value is IMO.
Maybe some manufacture can replicate the intangibles and compete with Apple at the high end of the smartphone market. I actually think google could do it with the Pixel line if they really wanted to. But I don’t think it will be easy. It would definitely be interesting to see.
This has, in my opinion and personal experience less to do with phones, and more with those commenting being vapid "elitists", so alone in their empty lives that they seek to valuate their existence by the junk they own.
I realize the internet and the discussions on the internet sometimes are what they are, but real life is something else altogether.
Entertaining, sure, until they aren't anymore.
As has been said, in this day and age where even I can waltz into a store and pick up an expensive phone I fail to see how it would be an indicator of anything else other than my interest in said phone.
I’m sure in some undeveloped countries the iPhone X is considered a status symbol but not where I live in Western Europe. It’s just an expensive iPhone and most people could get hold of one if they really wanted it, getting into debt etc. It’s £1k not £10k.
For those using it to show off and perceive a mobile phone as a status symbol, I suggest you get out more and associate yourself with less shallow impressionable beings.
For those using it to show off and perceive a mobile phone as a status symbol, I suggest you get out more and associate yourself with less shallow impressionable beings.
lol when you break math into it!7.6 billion people on Earth and only 29 million have it. The X are in the top 0.38%. They are elite!
Pretty sure i already mathed but commenters are not interested in hard numbers lol
Yes, its status as a symbol will depend on the country, as there is a different culture in every country and cost will vary relative to the average wage.
Think you have bigger problems in life if you’re buying something to impress others.
Yeah, you're right. It was reintroduced as the RSX (still an Acura) and then discontinued later.
So, my example was bad. Apologies.
My point still stands though. Branding can and does change.
I think he was being sarcastic.
Because the logic is terrible, as I and others have demonstrated.
Obviously yes. Hence the developing countries comment. You do get people from Europe and America claiming it’s a status symbol though and I think that’s pretty delusional.
The closest I have ever gotten to seeing an iPhone as a status symbol is seeing it as the "item to have", which is not the same as "the item everyone should have".
In any case I've often found this whole status symbol thing comical.
You get the snotty attitude about your iPhone being old or not current or whatever. I usually just turn the tables.
The thing is that Apple has never made any iPhone easy to identify capacity-wise. You can slap down any two models of the same generation and nobody can tell you which one is 8, 16, 32, 64, 128 or 256GB. So you have to ask.
And that's where the status symbol train derails, most of the time anyway. Because the person giving you grief over a status symbol 9 times out of 10 only had enough money to spring for the entry level capacity model. Telling that person your phone may be old but you sprang for the max capacity while they're rocking something with much less capacity has the wonderful ability to shut them up.
It can't be a 'status' symbol if all you could afford to by was the lowest capacity.
Which of course sounds arrogant in itself, but if they're going to play this game I'm going to shove it right back at them.
In any case I've often found this whole status symbol thing comical.
You get the snotty attitude about your iPhone being old or not current or whatever. I usually just turn the tables.
The thing is that Apple has never made any iPhone easy to identify capacity-wise. You can slap down any two models of the same generation and nobody can tell you which one is 8, 16, 32, 64, 128 or 256GB. So you have to ask.
And that's where the status symbol train derails, most of the time anyway. Because the person giving you grief over a status symbol 9 times out of 10 only had enough money to spring for the entry level capacity model. Telling that person your phone may be old but you sprang for the max capacity while they're rocking something with much less capacity has the wonderful ability to shut them up.
It can't be a 'status' symbol if all you could afford to by was the lowest capacity.
Which of course sounds arrogant in itself, but if they're going to play this game I'm going to shove it right back at them.
its all marketing , apple makes you believe its a status symbol, but really its 3-4 year old hardware with an apple logo.
Agreed, but here’s another point of view:
When you show up to work in a $60,000 car wearing a $3,000 suit while sporting a $20,000 watch you sort of have no choice but to throw down a $1,200 iPhone X.
It would look gauche to be seen with an iPhone 6 or 8, you’d immediately be labeled a poseur.
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