I remember the same thing happening when I was working for Apple (with the iPhone 4). A few points:
1.They are not scammers, they are opportunists, looking to make some quick money due to the:
2. Incredibly high demand of Apple products. If people weren't so fixated on having everything now, and actually used their brains to weigh up the necessity of this, these opportunists would have no market.
3. Calling them "non-genuine" is judgemental and unnecessary. They are as genuine a customer as any other, paying with real money for a real product. What they choose to do with the phone they are buying is their choice entirely.
4. If you take a step back, and look at this "problem" on a whole, you will see that you are part of it. Crazed fans spending all night in the cold waiting for a phone is as ridiculous as people taking advantage of this market.
I'm going to disagree. Severely. It's really easy to dismiss this as "capitalism" and feel proud about how smart you are, but this is something entirely different.
For clarity: I just came back from the Apple Store in Nashua, NH empty handed. Wanted a t-mo silver, they ran out. This happens. It cost me a couple hours of my time to try to get one, and it didn't work out. On this point, I'm honestly not particularly angry.
However, what I witnessed this morning was dangerous. NH doesn't have a sales tax, so it's a place where A LOT of these people come to buy their apple products. There were at least 9 or 10 people walking around with backpacks, coordinating groups of dozens of kids who are in line for one of these sketchballs. There are threats made to these kids, both implicit and explicit, about how they need to do what they are told.
This morning it was all exacerbated by the mall or apple's decision to not allow line up before 6am. Predictably, this meant a complete madhouse of a rush at 6am, as hundreds of people literally started running to the apple store line entrance location outside. These profiteers could be seen literally yelling at people to "start ****ing running". As I am not a complete monster and have enough civility to not sprint to try to get a ****ing iPhone, I of course ended up toward the back. The kids who were there for these "opportunists", as some of you like to call them, were being questioned, berated, and generally not getting good vibes from their handlers for their inability to get more up to the front of the line. Line cutting was rampant, with people joining friends in pockets that already belonged to these groups. There's little any individual can do about it, since you'd be standing up to a grounp of 6-12 people who don't look like following the law is their first priority. People are openly talking to their other compatriots about how they cut the line, how they're planning to cut the line, and in general about how this entire buy and resell business works. It's always been this way, but it's getting much, much worse.
All of this is exacerbated by the fact that the "handlers" seem to have become friendly with the Apple Store employees. They universally approach the staff at the store, exchange pleasantries and a handshake, and are allowed to "patrol" the line, making sure the kids stay in line and buy the right models to maximize value. I found out about the white/silver selling out about 15 minutes before the Apple Store told us because these people are working the line so much that they know what is selling practically better than Apple does.
I don't have a problem with the general idea of people leveraging supply and demand to make a little profit. But it is reaching a bit of a mass scale tipping point, where it isn't possible for people who just want one device to show up and buy one, so to the OP's point, Apple is risking alienating people who will be there if and when things aren't as much of a bonanza for Apple in the long term. I am a happy repeat Apple customer. I generally appreciate the higher level of support and the (former) feeling that I, as a customer, actually justified being treated like a human being. Apple as a company is eroding that trust by being so implicit in their behavior. As an example, the kids in the today were openly talking about how they could sign any name they want, that the Apple Store doesn't care, and since they're using gift cards they can just get back in line and repeat. Again, this is all probably legal, but it doesn't change that it alienates me as a customer. Calling these people scammers is unfair, but calling them "fake" customers is not. If and when Apple's incredible run ends, these people will be the first to wait in line for the next big thing. They are not a part of Apple's "base" and will not display any brand loyalty whatsoever. Apple undoubtedly gets more sales because of them now, but if it starts to come at the expense of more likely to be brand loyal customers, then those sales may prove to be not worth it.
Finally, I want to come back to the issue of safety. It was an extremely toxic environment in line this morning. The types of people who are willing to do this for the little amount of money they make are not, shall we say, white collar individuals. Which is fine, but since they're not in line for themselves they really have very little to lose by attempting to cut, manipulate, or otherwise do unsavory things. They're much more confrontational and bold as a result. I grew up in a very tough area and am not particularly sensitive to these things, but I can honestly say I didn't feel safe this morning, especially during the mad dash to create a line at 6am. It had all the feelings of the stories you read about people being killed at Walmart on Black Friday, and I suspect this is not an experience Apple wants to endure.
I suspect the solution is a modified version of the one Apple tried to implement a few years back. Apple IDs and the computer systems in Apple stores have come a long way. With real names, it would be trivially easy to ensure that at least one individual = one phone style policies could be enforced. Forcing people to use credit cards would also cut down on the viability of this plan. The more that is done to increase the risk of losing large amounts of money on the part of these handlers, the less of this type of activity we will see. You likely can't and won't eliminate this, but reeling it in a bit would do a lot of good and IMO find a better balance between keeping your "real" customers happy and allowing the market to function. Right now, I think these buy and resell individuals are practically smothering the market.
