A lot of people in China are getting desperate for a T-Mobile G1, so desperate in fact that they are buying the devices illegally from American consumers at a costly price. The T-Mobile G1 has not yet been released in any country other than the United States.

In China people are purchasing the T-Mobile G1 for about RMB 3,999 or about $584 USD, if you wish to have the device unlocked it will cost you an extra RMB 500, about $73 USD. Even though the Chinese seem to be getting a lot of these handsets, the price will remain high until they get the Android-powered handset that will become available next year.

We would not be surprised if this happened in other countries as well. However we don’t believe that the UK is doing this, for the G1 will be available on October 30th. If the phone was released in another country, you can bet that the United States market would be dying to get their hands on it. Would the price and risk be enough to keep us from doing the same?

Photo courtesy of Android Community member heyitsnan.

[Via Moconews]