Okay, somebody at Samsung has been watching too many Christopher Nolan movies. The company will let buyers in the States pre-order their pre-order for a smartphone that hasn’t been officially announced yet. But, to be fair, they’re also making doing so rather attractive.

Pre-orderCeption

Samsung’s not calling this a pre-order for a pre-order but that’s what it boils down to. Fans can reserve a to-be-announced smartphone, and then complete the cycle with a pre-order after the 5 August Unpacked event when they actually see the thing they’ve expressed interest in. You can call it ‘reserving’ a phone if you wanna, that’s a pre-order. For a pre-order.

Even if it doesn’t make that much sense, Samsung’s trying to get this spot of behavioural manipulation to at least feel worth it. Those that sign up (again, we’ve only seen this active in the States) and then place and pay for a pre-order after the Galaxy Note 20 is announced will get a $50 voucher to be used on “wearables, tablets, PCs and select accessories” at Samsung’s online store.

Typically Samsung also sweetens the deal by offering pre-order bonuses in the shape of Samsung tech — the Galaxy Buds and the Galaxy Buds+ are previous extras — which softens the blow of shelling out more than R20k for a brand new handset at launch. Why they’re instituting this is beyond us but hey, if it’s what the people want…