Apple did its usual launch performance with the customers cheered by frantic staff as they bought the shiny toy, but it could not hide the fact the queues were much shorter than before. Apple’s trick of making the product “sold out” before launch day hacked off those who were waiting because they found the new colour was unavailable.

In fact, many of the “buyers” were seen hawking them for a mark-up just outside a flagship store.

The Tame Apple Press claimed that was all because Apple had set up a pre-order system so the queues were not necessary, but that was true last year and the lines were only slightly smaller than the year before.

Sales in China are crucial to the success of the iPhone 7 but so far the chatter about the toy on Weibo is muted. An index of searches on Baidu China's most popular search engine, shows the new phone lagging both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 5.

Apple's Greater China sales dropped by a third in April-June and its market share has fallen to around 7.8 percent, placing it fifth behind local rivals Huawei, OPPO and Vivo. But the Chinese are less interested in branding than US buyers and to more discerning eyes, the iPhone 7 is a long way behind its rivals in terms of functions and price.

The feeling on Weibo is that Apple has been slower to adapt, the product and the firm's marketing has been generic. Jobs’ Mob basically can’t think Chinese because it is used to telling people what to think and expecting them to do it.

Zhou Zhanggui, a Beijing-based strategic consultant said that Apple’s refusal to cater to local demands in its marketing as well as product design is basically killing its chances.

To be fair, Apple knows this. It slashed the orders of its iPhone 7s a few months ago. It just seems that the Tame Apple Press has not got the memo and is continuing to go into its over enthusiastic “hey there is a new iPhone mode” without doing any actual research.