The wheel of ingenuity

You can never discount Chinese ingenuity.

Sina Weibo is all atwitter today about this wheel which rolls along a fishing line between a truck in Hong Kong and a building in Shenzhen.

With heavy demand for Steve Jobs’ iGadgets in China, the pulley was frequently carrying iPads and iPhones across the international boundary. An online story says 10 iPads could be put into a basket which was attached to the wheel and then pulled up to a balcony on the 21st floor of a building in Shenzhen. Those selling the service said it only took 2-3 minutes for the basket to reach its destination.

One imagines it wouldn’t take long for border security guards to notice a basket of iPads floating through the air en route to Shenzhen, so the scam has been shut down. Six people have been arrested and more than RMB300,000 in iPads and iPhones were recovered.