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Undercover reporter spends weeks building iPhone 5 in a well-timed report from Shanghai Evening Post

MICGadget translates a report from the Shanghai Evening Post that sheds some more light on the Foxconn assembly plants. A reporter went undercover as one of the many people hired to build the iPhone 5. He (pictured right) kept a diary but was only able to stomach the work for a few weeks (reporters are lightweights when it comes to real work, trust me).

By my own calculations, I have to mark five iPhone plates every minute, at least. For every 10 hours, I have to accomplish 3,000 iPhone 5 back plates. There are total 4 production lines in charge of this process, 12 workers in every line. Each line can produce 36,000 iPhone 5 back plates in half a day, this is scary … I finally stopped working at 7 a.m. We were asked to gather again after work. The supervisor shout out loud in front of us: “Who wants to rest early at 5 a.m !? We are all here to earn money ! Let’s work harder !” I was thinking who on earth wants to work two extra hours overtime for only mere 27 yuan (USD$4) !?

There is not much here you have not heard before and unfortunately no tech specs. The bottom line is it is incredibly hard work with little wages under pretty bad working conditions, but it is voluntary, legal and people know what they are getting themselves into.

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