I ordered 3 V iPhones from applestore.com on Feb 4. They arrived Feb 8 and were activated and in use a few days before the official release. I was surprised.

I finally caved in and bought two iPhones last night. I justify the purchase on the profits we made over the years from AAPL stock. We've been with Verizon for years and waited years for them to carry the iPhone. We have had a Mac, a Macbook, and multiple iPods so my expectations were pretty high but I can't believe the iPhone is exceeding them.

We went to the Verizon store in Encinitas, CA and everyone was buying an Apple product. Most people were getting the iPhone but I saw an 80 year old man buying an iPad. It was unreal.

We got the lowest plan available:700 min, unlimited data and 250 msgs each. I set up my Google Voice so we will never go over the limit. My wife is a teacher so we get a 15% discount off her line as well. All in all, this will be worth it. I read a lot with the Kindle app and play games as well. It's hard to believe that GPS programs like Mapquest are free!

As I posted in comments yesterday, I placed an order for the iPhone through Verizon just after 3 AM EST on the 9th. I received shipping notification yesterday with an ETA of Monday the 14th. Fedex is now saying that it's already on the truck for delivery.

Only 16GB, Dan? Tsk, tsk, tsk.

I doubt it was a 'more efficient ordering process' at all. Rather, only a small cut of folks on ATT have reception so horrid that they were willing to pay a high ETF to get out right away. Instead they are waiting for their contract to run out or at least down to say under $100 to get out. Which might mean this spring or summer when maybe there will be an iPhone 5 for them to switch to as well.

So outside of major areas of ATT crapness like NYC, there were no lines and few reservations and the warehouse has all that stock they would have shipped out yesterday to restock stores. They are shipping that to online orders since the stores don't need it, rather than having to wait for new produced units from China.

All that said, while not as huge a launch as the previous ATT models, apparently the ViPhone topped any single Vphone launch to date within the first 2-3 hours of preorders so that isn't shabby. If they could create one lineup of iPhones that could work with both systems, they could kill on the next release. Same with the future iPad. I know I and several friends love the idea of not having to buy another iPhone to switch carriers. Heck, make it pay as you go and it would be even better. Or say a mix, I also never call anyone so I would pay $30 a month for like a 5GB data allowance and $10 for a thousand texts (especially if you could roll both of them for like six months) and on the rare day I need voice pay $1-2 for that day. I would save a ton. Too bad the carriers would never go for it.

Holy crap! Apple is shipping via UPS? Forget about a week early, you'll get it a week late. If just two snowflakes fall from the sky, these lazy bastards stop all shipping and go on vacation. Overnight package? Doesn't matter. You'll get whenever the Hell they feel like resuming deliveries.