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In a turn of events that almost seems too bizarre to be true, Russian journalist and 14-year Mac user Alex Patsay has written an open letter to Apple PR following what sounds to be a disastrous launch event in Moscow. According to Patsay, Apple has added a 75-percent markup on iPods in Russia - taking a 16GB iPod Touch to the equivalent of $710 - and priced the MacBook Air above even inflated European prices: $5,000 for the SSD version.
More worrying, Apple is apparently contravening Russian law by failing to offer the MacBook Air with Cyrillic lettering on the keyboard, nor a Russian-localised iPod Touch.
"The whole press conference by itself seems to be pretty much useless, because it went about the movie rentals, Apple TV update, iPod touch update, etc - all great stuff, but with one little problem. iTunes Store doesn't exist in Russia, and Apple doesn’t have plans to bring one here. And it makes all these news completely obsolete and useless" Alex Patsay, alexmac.net
Most bizarrely, when one journalist asked an Apple rep how he could pay to update his iPod Touch to the latest 1.1.3 firmware, since Russia lacks the iTunes Store, he was told "buy a new iPod touch with 1.1.3 firmware - it will have these applications already installed"
Patsay seems, if anything, concerned for Apple and their success in Russia - his worry is that buyers will travel to bordering Finland and buy cheaper Apple hardware there to bring back, thus causing Apple Russia to miss out on profits. But if the whole debacle is even partly true, then I can't help but think that Apple might deserve to fall flat on its face.
[via The Inquirer]
{ 16 comments… read them below or add one }
Apple : the arrogant bastards!!!!
Everyone: Just send “fuck off” to Apple and use Linux, because it’s free.
FUCK OFF YOU, APPLE MARKETING BASTARDS!!!!!!!!!!
The matter is, for years and years we all here in Russia believed in you…
And now you seem to sell yourself to marketing managers. Wrlcome! to Hell….
Really, if you hate apple, this is the wrong site to visit my dear friend.
[quote comment="18420"]Really, if you hate apple, this is the wrong site to visit my dear friend.[/quote]
We want to buy Apple stuff by European prices, but not with overpay (almost 100%), we wanna get local version of iTunes Store and cyrillic keyboard on AirBook.
If Apple inc. want to have success on russian market, they must do something with it. If its not, they can sweetly fuck themself.
Nobody said about another one thing: Apple guys forbided to make any photos during the event. A really strange press-conference…
When the Apple IMC (local Apple Inc partner) was here in Russia we had no iTS, no technical support, few localized soft, ultimately high prices, six months new products delay and months and months wating for repair or exchange defective goods. We hoped that if Apple Inc will come itself, everithing will change. We are disappointed, depressed, distressed. It is a hard blow to all Mac fans in Russia…We did not expected that Apple will be so rude. :(
I want simple iPod Touch for $150000!!! Give me this one!!! Apple, you heare me???!!! wtf with this world?!
Well, it’s only a matter of time… In 2 years Apple will fire all it’s russian pr guys or whatever they have here. And someone has to kick Jobs to ask his Sales and Marketing department “Why do we have prices in Russia two times bigger than in US?”. That would be enough, believe me.
I just doubt that Steve doesn’t know about Russian extraordinary prices. The question is, why nothing has been done about this?
I bet that Steve knows about the problem, but why such an ignorance?
Мишаня, you have to realize that Steve knows that everyone in Russia knows how to kill and to steal. We have lots of money here in Russia. We are able to pay!
People, stop yelling “Apple sucks!” and “Jobs go fuck yourself!” or something like that :))
Just buy the iPhone if you like it, crack it and use it anyway you want.
Do what you like and ignore all exasperations.
Let the Apple do what he wants. As soon as I find any McBook Air without Russian letters on the keyboard in Russian stores, the Apple will be sued for substantial amount of money, both in Russia and USA.
Apple earns money on us, than we will earn money on Apple.
Meet in the court.
если apple продает на территории России не на прямую, а через фирмы с ограниченной ответственностью, то ни чаво яблочникам за это не должно быть. А локализации нет, потому что доработка стоит времени и денег. Если продажи идут на ура и без этих доработок то чаво париться… Думаю что через некоторое время появятся. Особенно, если apple захочет продавать на территории России на прямую в своих магазинах
i think this is stupid. i shouldnt be that expensive to listen to music. A simple fix would be to put an iTunes store in Russia!
How are you going to pay for iTunes? It’s online store means you have to pay by credit card. How many of you have a credit cards? Bank system is suck in Russia this is where all problems is. Also Jobs is Hollywood baby, maybe he hates Russians because they evil.
You don’t need itunes, just go to http://www.getsharepod.com
I use this exclusively to put music and videos on my ipods, iphone etc
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