iPhone 4 is eBay’s most popular item of the year

The iPhone 4 pipped Barbie to the post to become eBay’s most-bought item this year.

The company’s ‘top shopped’ list reveals that customers bought more than 1.6 million iPhone 4-related items during the year – not bad, seeing as it only launched in June. And Apple must be very pleased to know that it’s more popular than that other iconic toy, the Barbie doll, which shifted nearly 1.2 million units.

Next most popular were military jackets, with more than a million sold, Hot Wheels at three quarters of a million, and the iPad, of which 621,000 were sold.

“Year after year, we see the hot trends, topics and pop culture obsessions translate into online sales,” says Karen Bard Sayah, eBay’s trend expert.

Indeed, the year’s World Cup fervour translated into sales, says eBay, with more than a quarter of a million related items sold – there’s no breakdown, but one wonders how many of those were vuvuzelas.

Rounding out the top ten were the Beatles, Silly Bandz, Alice in Wonderland and the New Orleans Saints.

When it came to fashion, this year Americans were mostly wearing  military jackets, plaid, 1950s styles and neon – not all at the same time, we trust.

“With more than 200 million daily live listings and a community of more than 93 million active users, eBay is uniquely positioned to take the pop culture pulse based on the millions of Marketplace purchases made each day,” says Sayah. [[iPhone]]