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Comment by dpark | Hacker News Reader

This is solving an entirely different problem than you imagine. This is solving the problem of “no one can tell I use an iPhone when it’s in my purse/pocket”. This is a conspicuous bag that loudly announces “I’m carrying an iPhone”. That’s what it’s for.

Also, can you actually not fit a phone in your pocket? I can fit the biggest iPhone in my pocket just fine in all of my pants. Conversely my wife cannot, but that’s because women’s pockets are vestigial. She couldn’t fit the 3GS in most of her pockets either.

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The price is incredible. Many phones on the market are cheaper than this accessory. Maybe the true market need is “people don't know how much disposable income I'm willing to throw at nonsense”.

Of course. Conspicuous consumption requires a high price. No one is impressed by the $15 cross-body bag you buy from Amazon.

It’s just fashion mate. There are handbag brands that start at $4,000 on the cheap end.

Reminds me of the threads here regarding fake diamonds. How they don’t understand why people would buy a real diamond when a fake one is so much cheaper. Or how proud they are of having a fake diamond that cost them a nickel. I swear there are lots of people here who are legit autistic.

I'm not sure I follow but I'd never but a real, likely ‘blood’ diamond. I'd happily pay for the lab ones because it's cool man-made science. AFAIK I'm not on the spectrum.

I've bought plenty of nonsense, but this is some fabric to hold your phone. Come on…

Have you heard of earrings? They’re just some metal to put on your ears.

There’s nothing about this product outside of any other product that riles people up except for the fact that it’s made by a company that collabed with apple.

I've bought a former partner very expensive earrings cheaper than this bag. What is riling people, I think, it's that we're being crunched by inflation and dwindling purchasing power, but here's a mass-market company putting out a bloatedly expensive accessory. Of course Prada is still out there, but most people aren't exposed to their product lines and pricing. I'd be just as pissed if McDonalds starts selling gold leaf burgers.

95% of products in the world are just as unnecessary as this one. It’s literally just a random a phone bag of which there are literally many products made by other companies that are MORE expensive than this one. HN just sees apple + pretentious and starts frothing at the mouth.

It’s very easy to just not buy it, sheesh. Touch grass people.

I was with you until you started sledging/misdiagnosing people with autism. A bit insulting to insinuate autistic people couldn’t see the value in one side of this argument to be honest.

But I agree with you on the diamond front. I may not be interested in diamonds personally, but it’s a similar parallel - people shouldn’t be confused that may humans would care about the story behind a special item and not just the materials within it, yet some people can’t understand it.

Yeah, and they serve the same purpose.

Yes, to be a stylish product that brings people joy.

“They didn’t spend their money irrationally the same way I’d spend it irrationally, therefore they’re wrong” - this entire thread

Oh, I get it, I've worked fashion retail at H&M. The nonsense designer collections would sell out fast, even though it's a) still H&M and b) made in the same sweatshops. People like status items. But come on, this is some thread wrapped around a phone. Even Kanye's idiotic shoes had a better price-to-value ratio.

In materials maybe. However with shoes there are a thousand other shoes just like it I could buy. This is a reasonably unique product - if you wanted a knitted phone sling of this precise design, there’s no alternatives, so the analogy doesn’t hold exactly.

> I can fit the biggest iPhone in my pocket just fine in all of my pants

New pro max fits perfectly fine in all my dressier trousers, it is rather big for some joggers though. Especially with Cuccinelli joggers it’s hard to get the phone to reliably stay in the pocket because they’re just not deep enough, so the top of the phone sticks through the opening.

The very easy solution to this has been to just buy joggers with reasonably sized pockets, Lululemon does not have this problem for example.

Anecdotally, just this past month I had a pair of good quality jeans from J. Crew wear out and tear at the pocket due to friction from my iPhone 13 Pro Max. The jeans are fairly lightly used.

I would love a smaller phone that doesn't kill my pants...

Are these super skinny jeans? I’m trying to visualize how a phone would tear your pocket.

Not particularly. It’s just a very big phone.

Not to be flippant but next time don’t buy the Max. I don’t know how to reconcile “I wish my phone were smaller” with “I buy the biggest phone”.

Apple is doubtless doing the same kind of “they say they want this but they buy that” calculation that automobile manufacturers are doing. “People say they want fuel efficient cars but they actually buy SUVs And giant trucks.”

Don't listen to them, the Pro Max is the goat of iPhones. Buy a stronger pocket instead :-)

In this case I was gifted the Max; I didn't buy it myself. The next phone I purchase will probably be an iPhone 16 or 16e as those are the smallest "new" phones.

> I don’t know how to reconcile “I wish my phone were smaller” with “I buy the biggest phone”.

Maybe "I want my battery life to be the longest available" dominates the decision.

Absolutely. But then Apple is correct in believing that “I want a small screen” is not actually the deciding factor. There are probably a bunch of people out there who would like a device with a smaller screen but it’s actually #6 on the list of priorities, below battery life, performance, screen quality, storage, and iMessage.

We're saying the same thing. The reconciliation method is a straightforward prioritization.

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