By Rajan Narayan

The most senseless status symbol is the latest model of the iPhone. The only benefit if offers is prestige. You can buy a much cheaper smartphone for much less. Unfortunately, thanks to the covid lockdown and restrictions on the movement of people, every parent and teacher had to buy a smartphone. The American iPhone company never thought of a more affordable model for those who desperately need a smartphone.

The most senseless status symbol is the latest model of the iPhone. The only benefit if offers is prestige. You can buy a much cheaper smartphone for much less. Unfortunately, thanks to the covid lockdown and restrictions on the movement of people, every parent and teacher had to buy a smartphone. The American iPhone company never thought of a more affordable model for those who desperately need a smartphone. IT is not a Mercedes car or any other luxury car which is the biggest status symbol in Goa. Thanks to industrialist Anil Counto his son Aakash of Alcons the Goa automobile market is flooded with the latest Mercedes models. You don’t even have to go to a bank for finance. The Alcon Group itself provides finance for your new Mercedes car – that is, if you buy from them naturally.
In fact, Goa accounts for the sale of the largest number of Mercedes cars. This is because of the generous availability of loans and reasonable EMIs that encourages young people to invest in Mercedes cars for their cushy comfort and status.
Interestingly, before Liberation when the import of cars was banned, Goa was an exception and it was flooded with imported Mercedes cars and Volkwagon cars. Which were freely imported at low customs duty.
The status of symbol in Goa is not a four or five-bedroom flat in Mathias Plaza extending over 2,000 sq ft costing Rs5 crore. Or a villa in Assagao with a swimming pool which is the new aspiration location for the bold and the beautiful and the rich and the powerful. The villas in Assagao are both for personal use and renting out. Many of them even offer cars for hire with or without drivers.
The most prestigious thing in Goa is not branded shoes, watches and clothes which can cost you Rs10,000 to Rs15,000 or more. It’s not diamond or traditional Goan gold jewelry. Surprisingly, the most prestigious status symbol in Goa is the iPhone. Not just iPhone but the latest iPhone which costs Rs1,80,000.

ENTERPRISING COMPANY
THE iPhone is a very enterprising company. Apple which manufactures iPhones offers you only one mode of smartphone, mainly the iPhone. But every year there are fresh innovations to the iPhone. So much so everyone waits for the new model which is much cheaper for the iPhone family because of buybacks and discounts. There is of course the EMI with exclusive distributors even offering zero interest on EMIs along with down payments.
It is curious that other smartphones like the Samsung competitive models are equally good. The price of the latest Samsung is comparable to that of the iPhone. Samsung is just advertising five flip smartphones whatever they may be. There are a large number of smartphones in the market which are considered reasonably good and much cheaper than the iPhone.
But everyone seems to be obsessed with the iPhone. Those who have a Samsung or some other smart phone are looked down upon by people who have an iPhone. It is not only the wealthy class who have iPhones. Almost everyone from drivers to waiters, not to mention secretaries to journalists, are flashing their iPhones. The iPhone is a unique case of brand building. The hype created around the iPhone is so great that every time a new model is released there are huge queues.
The iPhone is the most written-about and prestigious smartphone. In Facebook videos I have been looking at all these pretty young things with the latest iPhone as their birthday present.

FIRST SMARTPHONE
I GOT my first smartphone way back in 2003. I did not buy it actually. It was a farewell gift from my “OHeraldo” staff when I quit the newspaper which I built up over 20 years. My first smartphone made way for a superior Samsung which seems to perform all the functions that the iPhone does as my best friend. I believe that buying any product purely for prestigious value is stupid. Particularly if the price is more expensive than something similar available in the market.
The iPhone is so popular that the largest theft of smartphones is of iPhones. The interesting part about the iPhone is that although the company manufacturing it is Microsoft owned by Bill Gates, the phones themselves are manufactured in China. This is because labor costs are much lower in China.
In view of the tensions caused by the long continuing Ukraine war (now going into almost one-and-half year), Microsoft is planning to shift its production facilities to India. Indeed, the Tata Group have a contract for manufacturing one million high end iPhones a year.
I WISH those who cannot afford iPhones will not waste their money. The largest number of defaults on EMI according to the ICICI Bank is on loans taken on buying iPhones.