TheBilcourt: The iPhone Saga

The iPhone Saga

Well, I got my iPhone.

I knew there would be a line at the store in Mt. Juliet for the phone. My original intentions we're to start scoping out the lines between 12 and 2 and just kind of play it by ear. I got up around 8:30 Friday morning and started looking at some online forums on Apple's official site. There we're some posts from Nashville that said there we're already 50 people in line at Green Hills mall. I immediately thought this can't be good. So I broke down and left home at around 9:00 am, headed for Mt. Juliet. Surprisingly, when I got to Providence Place in Mt. Juliet, there was only one guy in line. He had been there since 7:45. I decided that it obviously wasn't bad and I would come back. I ended up leaving for about an hour. I drove around, went to look at my old house in MJ, went to see Lesley at Target, and then went to Books a Million. Around 10, I drove back around to the AT&T store and saw a second person with his young son get in line. I knew it was then time for me to start my wait. Luckily(maybe not so luckily. i'll explain), they had an awning over the stores entrance so it was comfortable to be outside. I brought a chair, a cooler full of ice and water, a carry bag with some books, magazines, and ipod. I was set for my 8 hour wait.

The day actually went by kind of fast. It felt a lot faster than say the Wii lines or day after Thanksgiving lines. The people in line we're really nice as we're the AT&T store employees. They we're super cool. We all held each others places in line while we all occasionally stepped out to go do something. Around 11:30, Lesley came by on her lunch break and we had a nice small lunch in line. Around 2, I think, I noticed a car pull up and Scott and Todd Burka got out. They walked up and said they we're passing by and decided to say hey. They said they we're going to eat with their mom and I could come if I wanted. The other guys in line didn't care, so I went. I got back in line about 30 minutes later. I stayed in the line the rest of the time. I would say there we're about 10-15 people in line most of the day. The line didn't get long until about 4pm or so. At one point, it did rain for a little bit, but the awning was good cover. I wouldn't have even called it a shower really. As it turns out, we we're very lucky as the rain was REALLY bad everywhere but where we were. It stopped and we got all our stuff back out. It was actually really nice out during the entire day. It was very comfortable to wait. The sun only stayed out for about an hour and half and the rest of the day was overcast. That hour and half of sun though was enough to sunburn me pretty good, even though I was under the awning the entire day. I don't really understand how I got so burned. Around 4, a guy pulled up in an SUV and gave us all large fresh squeezed lemonades courtesy of Chik-Fil-A. Chik-Fil-A rules. If there was ever a model for how to run a fast food restaurant correctly, it would be Chik-Fil-A.

Anyways, the AT&T store closed around 4:30 in order for their employees to have some sort of break before the madness, put out iPhone stuff, and have some dinner. We kept asking them periodically throughout the day if they knew how many iPhones they had. I wasn't worried though because I knew they had at least 3. The AT&T guys maintained that they had no idea because they we're not allowed to open any iPhone boxes until 4:30. The only person who knew was the district manager type guy, who I can only describe as very politician like. I don't know really any other way to describe him. Due to my nature of work, I have encountered many a district manager in my time. When this guy got out of his car to come in, I told the guys in line that I knew he was a district guy. I could spot it a mile away. When we asked him how many phones they had, he would only say that they had "limited quantities". It would have been cool if he had told us, because we felt for the people waiting in line that would inevitably not get an iPhone. But it was obvious that he wanted that line for attention, so he wasn't about to be nice and tell anyone.

At 6:00, they unlocked the doors and the first 4 of us went in to get our phones. They we're all super nice. It did take them a while to sell some of us our phones because their computers and network we're acting up. I think the onslaught of people on the network on the east coast and now central zones was the obvious cause. As I stood there, I heard the district manager guy tell someone that they only had 15 8gig phones and 10 4gb phones. I kind of felt for the guy when he went outside to tell the people in line. I know what its like to confront an angry mob when your just doing your job the correct way. Something that was weird was that their Laurenceburg store 100 miles away, had no lines and they had almost 20 more phones than the Mt. Juliet store. Why would they expect a lot of iPhones to be sold so far out in the country? It was obvious that the District guy was kind of ticked, so he actually got someone to volunteer to drive 100 miles to go pick some phones up. I call that really wanting to get out of work. Anyways, I paid for my phone, took my SEALED SHUT(yes it was sealed shut) and headed home. I didn't have one of Mt. Juliet's finest walk me out to my car like a few people did. My car was right beside the front door. On my way home I called my friend David and he had gotten a phone to at the Cool Springs store. He got the last 4gb phone they had in the store. He decided to head over to my place for an "unwrapping ceremony". lol! When he finally got to my place, we sliced open the bag and found a black box of goodness known as the iPhone. Setup was sort of easy. It connected to iTunes and I went through the activation stuff. The problem I had and I'm actually currently still having is that AT&T obviously wasn't prepared for the onslaught of new phone activations and people switching their services like me. So right now as I type this, my iPhone isn't activated. Until your phone is activated by AT&T you can't do anything and use any features. Seriously. The only thing you can do is make an emergency call. That's it. David got his to work though. He got a brand new number instead of switching his Sprint number so his activated right away. I now feel that I should have done that too, but AT&T told me it's too late for me to go back and change it.

The iPhone itself is simply stunning. The tv ads and videos just don't do it justice. The screen is so beautiful to look at. It is so clear and unlike any cell phone screen I have ever seen. I love the Google maps feature. You can zoom right down to your house. YouTube looks great. The YouTube videos I saw we're good quality. They didn't look all compressed like the normal YouTube videos look. It might not be the case for all of them, but the ones we looked at we're noticeably better quality. There has been a lot of talk about how the keyboard might take a few days to get used to. I got used to it right away. It's smart and auto corrects your mistypes. The web is great on the iPhone, but it is basic html. It does show you full websites as advertised, but some things you can't see. Even looking at this blog on the phone has its problems. Any problems though with the browser will hopefully be eradicated with a software update. That's one of the great things about the iPhone. So many people have talked about what the iPhone can't do. But most of those problems can be fixed through a future software update. The only major things the iPhone won't be able to fix through a software update is upgrading to 3G and adding GPS.

In closing, I'm happy so far with the iPhone even though mine hasn't been activated yet. Yes it was expensive. Do I feel it will be worth it? Yes, I'm hoping so. I have told everyone that I know that I only buy cell phones every few years occasionally when my contract is up. When I get a phone, I want it to be something that I will enjoy carrying around and using. I don't want a paperweight for my pocket. This does seem a little too nice right now. I feel like I need to put buttons or velcro on all of my pockets to ensure it doesn't fall out. That's never happened to me before though. Knock on wood. I would say to not judge the iPhone until you experience it for yourself. So many people are dogging it and they haven't had a chance to actually see how wonderful it looks and reacts to your touch. Could my opinion change after a few months? Certainly, but the ball is now in Apple's court to ensure that they provide updates to make sure the iPhone runs to it's full potential.

Now, I need to go apply more aloe vera to my sunburn. I look like a raccoon right now. Ouch!

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 30, 2007 at 8:29 AM. You can skip to the end and leave a response.

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The iPhone Saga

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What's Sneaky Billy up to right now???

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