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Super Shuffle: Just Kidding

At the CeBIT trade show last week, the biggest news was an iPod shuffle rip-off called the Super Shuffle, which a Chinese company called LuxPro was offering. The Super Shuffle looked identical to the iPod shuffle but included an FM radio and voice recorder. Apple Computer, as you might expect, went apoplectic and sent in the lawyers, requiring LuxPro to remove the Super Shuffle from its CeBIT display. There's just one problem: LuxPro never had any intention of selling the Super Shuffle, and the company was instead just engineering what might later be regarded as one of the best PR coups of all time: By driving an unwarranted amount of attention to its vaporware product, LuxPro got exactly what it wanted: a set of partners interested in selling MP3 player products that include all the features of the Super Shuffle but look nothing like Apple's player. According DVForge's Jack Campbell, who emailed Engadget about the ruse, LuxPro's plan worked spectacularly. And Apple can't sue, because it wasn't a real product. Good stuff

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