One has to be absolutely benighted to buy that fugly looking crap for 5 bucks, let alone 200. Bad taste and reckless financial behavior should always be flagged wherever they are found.
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$6 Fake iPhone Pocket Already Available
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I think the weird/cute factor. Like at least to me, the iPhone pocket falls into the cute category especially if someone decided to actually knit it for you.
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that likely everyone on this forum is familiar with Steve's turtlenecks, and likely next to nobody on this forum had heard of Issey Miyake prior to November 14th.
This isn't a question of taste. It is a question of whose clout is actually at play here. Hint: It isn't the Japanese designer.
The same reason that this exists. To sell something that costs almost nothing to make with an insane markup.
I wondered how long it would take someone to make a cheap version. Probably costs $3 to make and selling these for $150 is a bit of a piss take.
Design and plain simple economics.
I am going to assume that a fair amount of man-hours went into conceptualising the iPhone pocket. I don't think this is something an intern at the firm spent 5 minutes crapping out. This results in a high fixed cost, and because the iPhone pocket is sold in such limited quantities, you need a higher margin to offset the cost of R&D (essentially), packaging, marketing etc.
I also don't know what went into manufacturing this, but I have interacted with it at the Apple Store, I feel it does genuinely feel like a high-end product (not sure how it will hold up after a year) and I willing to bet that there is a night-and-day different in quality and feel compared to a $5 knock-off you see elsewhere.
The cheaper knockoffs also have a ready-to-copy template to go off on (so basically, there is zero fixed costs). The iPhone pocket had to start from scratch, and it's always harder to do something different than it is to just ape whatever is already on the market.
Then there is also the value of intangibles like owning a limited edition product (think Labubus or designer handbags, where scarcity is the entire point). This thing is sold out worldwide. No doubt a fair number of them went to influencers looking for quick and easy clout, but I am sure some also went to genuine customers.
Meanwhile, the AirPods is also similarly priced to maximise profits, but it's also a mass-market product designed to sell in the hundreds of millions (and so the price reflects that). Much of the technology and supply chain is also pretty mature and established, and all these come together to help bring manufacturing costs down.
So yeah, when demand outstrips supply, simple economics dictates that price will rise accordingly till parity is reached. Perhaps an argument could be made that it's still under-costed, but I doubt Apple is making any signifiant profit here. It's purely a marketing gesture.
Technically, since there's no ISSEY MIYAKE print on the label, there's no copyright infringement.
This isn't even a trademark infringement as there are no trademarks on the product.
This is considered a "dupe" and not a counterfeit item since the sellers are not trying to trick buyers into believing the item is an actual ISSEY MIYAKE iPhone Pocket.
The Difference Between Counterfeits and Dupes - And How These Products Impact Brands - François Maingret
But counterfeit items aren’t the only type of intellectual property (IP) concerns brands have. We have seen the concept of “dupes” getting a lot of traction on social media recently. And the difference between counterfeits and dupes can be a little tricky to understand. Are dupes legal or is it...fmaingret.com
“Dupes,” short for duplicates, are products that look like high-end branded items but do not attempt to pass off as the original. They can have similar style and function as the original product, but do not use the same trademark and brand names. There is no confusion for customers, as they understand that they are not buying the original product or brand.
As opposed to counterfeits, dupes are generally legal as long as they do not violate any patents or directly copy protected elements of the original product.
A dupe is a product similar in appearance, functionality, or design to a higher-end branded item but sold at a much lower price. Unlike counterfeit products, dupes do not copy trademarked brand names or logos and are often sold at mainstream retailers. Dupes aren’t usually counterfeit products pretending to be the real thing, but they often resemble the original closely enough that many of them might be considered as counterfeits.
Fair but there's "dupes" of lots of Apple products, and they're not normally promoted on here.
The iPhone pocket is my favorite thing about 2026. It’s such a freakn boss troll move—and there’s literally no need for Apple to do this.
Bravo! Game respects game!
Bravo! Game respects game!
Lots of people carry things in bags, and smartphones are now considered by some to be the most important thing being carried.
So why not design accessories focused first on how you might carry and use a smartphone?
Technically, since there's no ISSEY MIYAKE print on the label, there's no copyright infringement.
This isn't even a trademark infringement as there are no trademarks on the product.
This is considered a "dupe" and not a counterfeit item since the sellers are not trying to trick buyers into believing the item is an actual ISSEY MIYAKE iPhone Pocket.
The Difference Between Counterfeits and Dupes - And How These Products Impact Brands - François Maingret
But counterfeit items aren’t the only type of intellectual property (IP) concerns brands have. We have seen the concept of “dupes” getting a lot of traction on social media recently. And the difference between counterfeits and dupes can be a little tricky to understand. Are dupes legal or is it...
“Dupes,” short for duplicates, are products that look like high-end branded items but do not attempt to pass off as the original. They can have similar style and function as the original product, but do not use the same trademark and brand names. There is no confusion for customers, as they understand that they are not buying the original product or brand.
As opposed to counterfeits, dupes are generally legal as long as they do not violate any patents or directly copy protected elements of the original product.
This is true as long as it doesn't violate any patents. However, there are design patents which describe the design or "style" of an item. The POCKET is a very unique design, so if they did apply for design patents these would almost certainly infringe.
Typically that would mean that the items could be seized/destroyed by customs, and that sellers (especially domestic importers) could get in legal trouble for selling the items regardless of claiming it was a genuine ISSEY MIYAKE to the buyer.
This is BTW the origin of Apple's "rounded rectangle" patent - it wasn't a patent on the invention of rounded rectangles, but a set of filed design patents against third parties copying the look of the iPhone line and confusing the market.
That means whether the Samsung phones were counterfeits or dupes by the linked definition was ultimately a court decision.
Pay attention. Apple don't make these at all.
It's the Designer Issey Miyake. But yes they are stupid.
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I find a lot of things baffling, but such is life.
What is strange was that phone were getting smaller, my old Nexus 4 was a nice size, so was my Huawei p9lite, then the elongated 19.5:9 ratio screens and a ton of camera lenses on the back, I ended up having to get one when my Huawei gave up. But at least the phones were thin. Now it seems to have gone the way of thick large phones.
Anyone who paid $150 for a sock need their head looked at.
