AT&T SNAFU for 3G iPhone

It took me forty minutes to activate an iPhone at AT&T here in GA and
I was the first to actually get one from stock at my location.

As seen by a quick search this news is repeated all across the country
this morning - see CNET report listed below.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-9988807-1.html?hhTest=1&part=rss&subj=news&t
ag=2547-1_3-0-20

Thanks AT&T

July 11, 2008 7:39 AM PDT
Mandatory in-store activation slows lines, frustrates iPhone buyers
Posted by Caroline McCarthy CNET

NEW YORK--The process of obtaning an iPhone 3G appears to be going in
slow motion.

Unlike its predecessor last year, the iPhone 3G must be activated in-
store, an anti-hacking measure that Apple has said can take 10 to 15
minutes. That's long enough to make the line move a lot more slowly
than the speedy process that made last year's iPhone launch
astonishingly efficient.

That was probably why the lines for the iPhone 3G paled in comparison
to the the lines for the original iPhone, when everyone predicted mass
shortages but ultimately it was possible to waltz in several hours
after launch time and get a phone almost immediately. Apple set an
excellent precedent for any future tech product launches, but it
doesn't look like it's lived up to its own standards.

As Apple store employees get the crowd geared up, the first guy
waiting for the iPhone gets restrained by security.

The new process doesn't have the same assembly-line precision, as
evidenced by the first person to walk out of the Fifth Avenue store
with an iPhone--24-year-old David Yoo estimated he'd been about 75th
in line, but somehow managed to be first out of the gate with a phone
activated.

Adding to that, if the lingering lines on Friday morning outside many
Apple and AT&T stores is any indicator, activation time for the iPhone
3G may be significantly longer than 15 minutes. The Fifth Avenue store
seemed to be one of the quicker ones; as the hordes of geeks and
bloggers on Twitter reveal, some lines appeared to be at near
standstills. High-energy product launches can of course lead to
exaggeration, but it's clear that some people are a bit impatient.

"In-store activation is a really really bad idea--every line I saw was
around the block and not moving," New York-based Fred Benenson wrote.
"I tried getting an iPhone today--lines, lines, lines," wrote Darren
Herman, who posted photos to his blog of a slow-moving line outside
the SoHo Apple Store in downtown New York.

A tipster informed CNET News.com that the mass activation was making
some necessary servers crash, and indeed, Twitterers backed this up.
Stephen Heuer in Minneapolis, Minn. said that the local Apple Store
activation process was down.

Outside of major urban hubs, there were also signs of shortages.
Boulder, Colorado-based Matt Galligan Twittered that his local AT&T
store had only 55 phones in stock and that he wasn't sure he'd be able
to get one. And Jacksonville, Florida-based Judson Collier said that
he'd checked three AT&T stores only to find them all out of stock.
Murray Williams in Lowell, Arkansas Twittered that the store would be
out of stock before they got to his place in line.

Meanwhile, some owners of older iPhones who are attempting to upgrade
the software are getting error messages instead.

But ask yourself this, gadget fans--do you really need the iPhone
today? At worst, the activation process will get more efficient as
store employees grow more used to it. At best, you can get one
tomorrow, or next week. It's okay. You'll survive.