A tweet posted on Twitter account @Media_Markt_de resulted in a flurry of blog posts on leading tech news sites, reporting on possible confirmation of the existence and indicative pricing of the upcoming Apple tablet (including our own CrunchGear), albeit cautiously warning that there was something fishy there, considering the high pricing.
Turns out the Twitter account was indeed a fake. German electronics retailer Media Markt told IT news site Golem (in German) that the Twitter account does not belong to them at all.
In fact, the owner (or Twitter, although unlikely at this time of day) removed the account about 20 minutes ago. Looks like the handle was registered again shortly after, however, but the follower count went back to zero and there are not updates posted to the account at the time of this writing.
The original tweet leading to the worldwide coverage frenzy (embedded on top) spoke of the Apple iPad going on sale March 1st at a price of 499 Euros with contract with T-Mobile or 899 Euros without. It was deleted about 30 minutes after its original posting, leading many to believe it was in fact a slip-up by Media Markt. No, says the retailer, it wasn’t us.
One wonders why a prankster would delete that tweet if he or she was pulling everyone’s leg anyway, but I’m not even going to bother asking myself what happened.
Apple’s event takes place Wednesday, January 27th.