12 November 2007
The launch of the most-hyped mobile phone of the decade, Apple's iPhone, passed last Friday with ecstatic scenes outside of the firm's flagship Regent Street store.
Some hardy phone fans had queued for over 24 hours for the opportunity to be the first ones in the country to get their hands on the new device - and their purchases were met by cheering crowds outside the store.
However, one industry website has detected rather less enthusiasm for the device elsewhere in the UK.
The Register claimed that the launch was a nationwide "flop", with journalists and PR representatives from Apple and O2 - which signed an exclusive network deal with the iPhone - outnumbering punters.
According to the report, scenes at Carphone Warehouse branches were more reminiscent of "an average Wednesday afternoon" than that of a major launch - surprising as the stores are the only ones in the UK permitted to sell the phone aside from Apple's own.
Several reader reports confirmed a marked lack of frenzied activity at the tills on Friday night.
"It looks as if a tight-knit group of media and PR people got caught in a feedback loop. The "event" they imagined simply failed to take place," the report added.
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