So here goes, prepare to hear the sound of the world’s smallest violin playing. I am on the way to Dublin City Centre to queue for an iPhone 3GS.
O2 official policy is ‘no preorders’ but it seems very many stores have taken allocation lists. The rule should be first come first served, according to O2’s website and forum, but we’ll see.
In any case, I’ll of course be boringly tweeting from the queue, if there is one, and either pissed off to have gotten up an hour early or delighted to be one of the first in Ireland. I’m not laying bets either way. In either case, this could be bad PR news for O2, since it seems two constituents (the people who blog and use the O2 website for information and the people who go into stores to show their interest) have been told very different things.
I am very interested in one other possibility: the one where fanboys manage to convince themselves that there are hundreds of thousands of people simultaneously not in contract just on Launch Day for the new phone, who desperately want one. I am sceptical of that, but I have seen incredible hype before, and this appears to be just capable of falling into that category.
The funny thing, of course, is those who just can’t take the pressure of not getting it on launch day.
If I don’t walk out with one, I will find a nice little café and have a good hearty breakfast, realising I’ll get it soon. It is exceptionally unlikely I will die, if we’re honest. Some of the foamers on the forum yesterday, however, typing in all caps, screaming that people are incompetent, threatening to break their contracts and calling for blood, may just pop an eyeball if the manager says ‘you’re not on the list’.
