The people lining up at the NYC flagship Apple store since last week or so are "sponsored" by various companies for marketing purposes, but not by Apple. Historically, Apple has never really had to pay much for over-the-top marketing because their products automatically generate a lot of that by themselves. A good example is the amount of Apple products used in film and television... Apple doesn't spend any money on product placements, but these shows continue to give free advertising to them voluntarily. It's the kind of publicity that competitors like Samsung can only drool over. (Samsung, by comparison, spends BILLIONS every year to generate hype for their smartphones, including paying celebrities to take selfies with a Galaxy Note during the Oscars, even though those celebrities actually use iPhones).
