“Shoppers snatched up about 525,000 of the devices at Apple and AT&T stores from Friday’s launch through Sunday, said Trip Chowdhry, an analyst at Global Equities Research in San Francisco,” Josh Friedman and Ronald D. White report for The LA Times.
Friedman and White report, “A ‘small percentage’ of customers experienced problems activating the devices, said spokesman Mark Siegel of AT&T Inc. ‘Our first priority is to get them up and rolling as quickly as we can,’ Siegel said. He said the problems were minimal, considering the ‘revolutionary’ device and a new activation process.”
“Half of the Apple stores on the West Coast sold out of the devices on the first day, Chowdhry estimated,” Friedman and White report. “AT&T declined to comment on the availability of the device or sales totals, but according to news reports most of its 1,800 stores ran out of stock by Saturday.”
As for the activation issues, “Chowdhry said AT&T apparently had insufficient technical support staff on hand because it hadn’t prepared for such heavy demand. ‘The load was more than the system was designed to handle,’ Chowdhry said,” Friedman and White report.
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Mike R.” for the heads up.]
I was wondering if every sale of iPhone counted as a sale of a full copy of OSX? Therefore increasing market share on the OS side of things. Just wondering.
AT&T needs to waive the $36 activation fee for everyone that had problems with activation. And existing customers that had problems should get a $36 credit to their next wireless bill. C’mon AT&T, you’re making a fortune off of this deal with Apple anyway, and since you’re the one that screwed this up, do the right thing and refund the money. Otherwise, anyone that had a problem should call and demand a waiver of the fee if AT&T won’t voluntarily give it.
AT&T needs to waive the $36 activation fee for everyone that had problems with activation. And existing customers that had problems should get a $36 credit to their next wireless bill. C’mon AT&T, you’re making a fortune off of this deal with Apple anyway, and since you’re the one that screwed this up, do the right thing and refund the money. Otherwise, anyone that had a problem should call and demand a waiver of the fee if AT&T won’t voluntarily give it.
AT&T needs to waive the $36 activation fee for everyone that had problems with activation. And existing customers that had problems should get a $36 credit to their next wireless bill. C’mon AT&T, you’re making a fortune off of this deal with Apple anyway, and since you’re the one that screwed this up, do the right thing and refund the money. Otherwise, anyone that had a problem should call and demand a waiver of the fee if AT&T won’t voluntarily give it.
AT&T needs to waive the $36 activation fee for everyone that had problems with activation. And existing customers that had problems should get a $36 credit to their next wireless bill. C’mon AT&T, you’re making a fortune off of this deal with Apple anyway, and since you’re the one that screwed this up, do the right thing and refund the money. Otherwise, anyone that had a problem should call and demand a waiver of the fee if AT&T won’t voluntarily give it.
News Flash – Crashing sounds heard all around the United States this past weekend. On sunday morning, the streets were littered with smashed Blackberry’s and Palm Treo’s. What could have caused this?
Activation went smoothly for most of the new iPhone owners, myself included. It took exactly 2 minute 46 seconds to activate my iPhone. A few out of a thousand have problems and the media run around screaming “The sky is falling! The sky is falling!”. Get a grip.
Can’t believe these idiots are still whining about their phone taking a day to activate. These morons are getting service on Sunday.
Disgusting to see America rapidly becoming the a$$hole capital of the world.
Off Topic: A curious question for any of you that have an iPhone, what’s with the ringtones? Does it cost money to make a ringtone for the thing?
I’m a Cingular/ATT customer, and have been for years. In the time I’ve been with them, I’ve had four different phones, and each one, yes, each one, failed to activate via their ‘over-the-phone’ or DIY activation. Each time, that’s four times, I’ve had to make a special trip to a tech shop (not all the shops can do this, ya know) and have the guys and gals there spend several minutes at their computers, and several minutes on the phone to HQ, to get my new phone up and running. Time is money, as they say.
Anyway, the fact that Apple took this remarkable step to make the activation process this customer friendly is, well, it’s amazing, and if it were only because of that, the iPhone is worth it.
>Many were amazed. Especially the gentleman who realized that an iPhone would mean he could travel with one device instead of phone, camera, iPod, and laptop.
What crap. An iPhone camera is not a *real* camera (nor is any cell phone camera) it’s just not possible to get half-way decent optics in something that small. And, pretty as it is, the iPhone isn’t even close to being a substitute for a laptop. Really.
“Decided that the CameraRaw format sucks because it does not make things simple.”
???
What are you talking about? The iPhone doesn’t save in Camera Raw.
while waiting 50 hours for phone activation is not something that i’d call acceptable the fact that it was over a weekend is a bit of a blessing in disguise. if your phone was up and running by the beginning of the business/workweek then you should be good to go.
okay, you spent 500 clams on a piece of equipment and you want it to work. yes, you should expect good customer service. but, if you cant go a weekend without your cellphone…?
geez, mebbe you should get a life.
it’s monday. if your iPhone works… QUITCHER BITCHIN’.
if it doesnt, please continue to bitch at your leisure.
you’re an early adopter. it happens.
@ Reality Check, What sort of reality plane are you on? have you seen the camera’s on MBP’s? Is the iphone camera any smaller?
What constitutes a real camera?
Your argument suggests that all digital camera’s are not camera’s because they do not use conventional film. If a digital camera is saving an image as a file, and an iphone is able to save an image as a file, what is the difference apart from the number of Mega pixels?
Was the iphone meant to substitute laptops?
Now you are going to say that an iphone is not even a mobile phone next……
Drink Some Camel’s Milk, the dimension warping fart you release will push you into an alternative dimension that will accommodate your shit invoking views!
Reality Check –
” And, pretty as it is, the iPhone isn’t even close to being a substitute for a laptop.”
The gentleman didn’t say the iPhone was a laptop substitute for everyone. He said he’d be able to travel with an iPhone “instead of phone, camera, iPod, and laptop.” Obviously, he travels with a laptop just to have internet access. I, too, look forward to leaving my laptop behind on short trips out of town.
a good article in the NYT
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/02/technology/02cellphone.html?_r=1&ref=business&oref=slogin
Hello? If they sold 500k phones in the past 72 hours that would equal the activation of 3 phones per second 24/7 since launch… you don’t figure that might cause just a few hiccups for a percentage of people?
its just a phone, Yip and All the others are just :bad “
Also I am sick of hearing about stupid terrorists on Tv I want Iphone news dam it.
and there are allot of reasond for limiting software at this stag; you guys all know that.
I heard 200000 ?..
at&t said they had sold out 72000 iPhones, while Apple is expected to have sold about double that…
I’m sure anything over 300000 is pushing it.
I think 1 -3 million by tuesday
really
Also : we need a apple store in NZ
please. and
I want or can someone make some chocolates lie a iphone please,
I will eat them.
@Camel’s Milk Drinker: Reality Check, like Zune Tang should never be replied to.
@Chrissy One: After further testing, I’ve discovered that the Camera Raw bug is a Photoshop CS3 issue, not an iPhone issue.
AT&T’s Activation servers must run Windows……..
To “me”
The iBrick headline and story was appropriate. So was the update that AT&T and Apple were stepping up to remedy the situation.
MDN is not a cheerleader, they only report a lot of good news about Apple because (unlike the Steve-less 90’s) Apple is indeed “firing on all cylinders, as one commentator put it.
The iBrick headline was, in fact, *not* appropriate. It is one thing to point out that *some* people are having activation problems, but whether you realize it or not, the “iBrick” term went far beyond that, and puts a negative spin on things that you’d expect from John Dvorak. It seem some of you can’t handle any nuance. You say that “it’s not the job of MDN to defend Apple”. Well, true enough. But why exactly is the only alternative to go the “iBrick” route? It is a fact that if Dvorak, Enderle, Thurott, or any of the other usual suspects had said that, those who are now defending the “iBrick” slam would be suddenly very annoyed at the obnoxiousness of it all.
“@Chrissy One: After further testing, I’ve discovered that the Camera Raw bug is a Photoshop CS3 issue, not an iPhone issue.”
What exactly is the problem? I just might be able to help you.