iBook sale causes stampede...

mdnky

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http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050816/ap_on_re_us/computer_frenzy

AP News said:
RICHMOND, Va. - A rush to purchase $50 used laptops turned into a violent stampede Tuesday, with people getting thrown to the pavement, beaten with a folding chair and nearly driven over. One woman went so far as to wet herself rather than surrender her place in line.

"This is total, total chaos," said Latoya Jones, 19, who lost one of her flip-flops in the ordeal and later limped around on the sizzling blacktop with one foot bare.

An estimated 5,500 people turned out at the Richmond International Raceway in hopes of getting their hands on one of the 4-year-old Apple iBooks. The Henrico County school system was selling 1,000 of the computers to county residents. New iBooks cost between $999 and $1,299.

Amazing what some people will do to save a buck. I wonder how many of these will wind up on eBay.
 
Its crazy that the mob mentality can hit even the smartest of people, Mac users.
Please no flames, just making a goofy statment. :D
 
4 years old ibooks.. These must be the clamshell books, right?
Looking through the pics it reminds me to scenes from poor countries or regions when they spread water and food to the citizens. Knowing that in this case it's actually an item you surly won't need for living and surviving makes it a lot worse. Yeah, we are so proud on our civilized society, huh?
 
Hihi
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THMTRXMN: Thanks...I had one identical to her, first car I bought, but it met an untimely doom after leaving the keys with my parents while I was out of town. Took me 3 years to find another 91 744ti SE with the M46 tranny in red/black. Had to drive 6 hours to pick her up. She's been sitting in the parent's garage (I kept the keys this time <G>) for the past 2 years, just got her out this evening and plan on taking her back to LA with me tomorrow (er...today) or Friday. Just have to install the new Clarion head unit and the iPod controller/adapter before I leave.

Zammy: I thought they were at first, but a guy (he lives there supposedly) on another forum I visit said they were the first gen white iBooks. Not sure if he's BSing or if they are white ones. Could be, the first white ones were released on 05.27.2001 according to Apple's specs.
 
mdnky said:
THMTRXMN:

Zammy: I thought they were at first, but a guy (he lives there supposedly) on another forum I visit said they were the first gen white iBooks. Not sure if he's BSing or if they are white ones. Could be, the first white ones were released on 05.27.2001 according to Apple's specs.



Sounds like you got the right info according to this : http://www.timesdispatch.com/servle...TD_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1031784106593

Quote :
"The PowerPC 750s are white and feature a 12-inch screen, a 10-gigabyte hard drive, 320 megabytes of memory, Mac OS 10.2.8 and AppleWorks 6.2.9."

and this model was discountinued in October 2001 according to mactracker so that fits the 4 years old story.
 
Zammy-Sam said:
4 years old ibooks.. These must be the clamshell books, right?
Looking through the pics it reminds me to scenes from poor countries or regions when they spread water and food to the citizens. Knowing that in this case it's actually an item you surly won't need for living and surviving makes it a lot worse. Yeah, we are so proud on our civilized society, huh?

Agree 100 % with you Zammy but seems you can't stop some people beeing materialists, here's another proof http://cgi.ebay.com/HENRICO-COUNTY-...ryZ15687QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

No further comment .....
 
I don't know where you live, but here, I can't really survive in this modern world without a decent computer. So actually, it _is_ comparable, and it IS understandable. buy an iBook for 50 bucks and sell it for 300. Means 250 bucks. 250 bucks is a lot of bread and water. Can even get some meat with that.
 
Fryke Not sure, for once, I understand you point :confused:

yes $250 ( about chf 300) would do to make food shopping here in Nyon switzerland (CH), the cost of living might even be higher than where you live, and I love meat ;)

But "participating" in a stampede for that is pushing it a bit far AFAIC
 
From the henrico website about their iBooks at the school.
The laptop issued to students offers the following:
Hardware:
Macintosh operating system X.2.6
500-800 Mhz PowerPC G3
320 mega bytes of memory
Wireless and Ethernet cards
So they would have been the first gen icebooks.
 
Gig' said:
Sounds like you got the right info according to this : http://www.timesdispatch.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=RTD/MGArticle/RTD_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1031784106593

Quote :
"The PowerPC 750s are white and feature a 12-inch screen, a 10-gigabyte hard drive, 320 megabytes of memory, Mac OS 10.2.8 and AppleWorks 6.2.9."

and this model was discountinued in October 2001 according to mactracker so that fits the 4 years old story.
Okay...

So if that is what machines they were talking about, then do you think they would be correctly described as having "less-than- desirable attributes".

IMHO any machine capable of running OS X is a good machine... especially for $50. I absolutely would have got in line for one!

I just bought my used iBook a couple months ago and I had to pay $750! ...of course that's a newer G4.
 
I would have loved to get my hands on a few of them. I have a few little cousins (8 to 14) who could use a computer for school work, and those would have been an excellent one for them. I probably would have bought 10 if they let me.
 
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