Due to the high demand for the iPhone 3G, Apple’s retail stores are now set to open at 8 AM, two hours earlier than normal, for a while. On top of this, Apple continues, “We’re also adding staff to help you get up and running as quickly as possible.” It’s great that Apple is taking more »

The Apple Store employee seemed very nervous as he approached me, yesterday. I’d been standing in line for nearly three hours, as had everyone else, and he was about to tell me I couldn’t upgrade my wife’s Nokia phone to an iPhone 3G. After he tried to give me the reason, I told him, “Are you sure? Because I went to an AT&T store on Sunday, and the guy said since her Nokia line is already on my Family Talk plan, I could switch her to the iPhone, but would have to pay extra for the data plan.” The employee said they’re not equipped to do that at the Apple store, to which I replied. “Well, that’s my fault for not confirming it, so I won’t freak out on you.”

The employee was relieved. He glanced at the line behind me, and sighed, “Thank you.”

I felt bad for the guy. Waiting three hours for a phone, half of which were spent standing in the mid-day sun on a 90° day, will set anyone to boiling. Tell that person after the wait that he can’t get the phone, and you’ve got an explosive situation on your hands. I get why Apple’s doing the whole in-store iPhone 3G activation thing, but I don’t get why they didn’t have more 1 to 3 people at a time activating phones. I also don’t get why the Apple employees, a week after the launch, still aren’t better trained on how to handle anything but the most basic activations. And considering that they aren’t, I don’t get why Apple isn’t sending more phones to AT&T…because that’s where I had to go to complete my iPhone set-up.

Jump past the break to learn how to set up your iPhone your way, not Apple’s.

Is it the 3G iPhone? A new Apple product? Steve Jobs coming to visit? Nope. The line is simply for the opening of the Sydney Apple Store at 5 P.M. on June 19th. This new store, which will be handing out 2,500 limited edition T-shirts upon opening, was first spotted back in May. The store more »

Morgan Stanley is sticking it to the man and strongly believes iPhone sales will double in 2009. Analysts are saying they expect 27 million iPhone sales to be reached during the 2009 calendar year. “We believe the market generally expects a doubling of iPhone units with the lower price point ($199), and we believe this more »