iPhone 4 Canadian Launch Experience...

Yes, I was one of those crazies that lined up for an iPhone 4 on its Canadian launch.  Not that I probably couldn't get the phone a day after, but I did it for the experience.  I've actually never lined up before for anything in my life, so I figured this would be a good one to do since I really wanted the new iPhone 4.

Why?  Lets rewind a bit for a little bit of history.  I'm not a modern Apple fanboy like the other kids these days.  Back up to 6 years ago when I met my best friend Aubrey.  She was a graphic designer for Xerox when I met her, and I got to know her quite well.  Being an IT type person, I never really had to work with Macs since the majority of IT stuff is done on PCs.  Being a graphic designer, she learned to use a Mac in school, and stuck with it until today.  Not to say that I never really used one, since one of my first computers growing up was an Apple Macintosh IIe.  But the more and more I played with her Macbook Pro, the more I got to liking it.  The only modern Apple product I owned before that was an iPod color (yes, the first color screen one). It was so easy to use, and eventually I fell in love with it, and bought my first modern Mac, the first Intel Mac Mini.  Since then, I've been through 4 different MacBooks, and MacBook Pros to the current one I'm writing this on, a 13" Macbook Pro Unibody (2010).  In that time as well, I got the first gen iPhone (the one with the aluminum backing), and have been in love with the iPhones ever since.  Had to command line jailbreak and unlock that one on my own, but to this day, its still running as my younger cousin is using it as her daily phone.  I then had an iPhone 3G a few times.  I've been back and forth between a few phones and phone OSes, but I kept coming back to the iPhone.

Fast forward to a few months ago where my Google Nexus One got stolen at the Driven car show.  I had grown to love the new Android OS on that phone, and was sad when I lost it.  After that, as much as I hated Blackberrys, I picked up a Blackberry Bold 9000 since it was cheap and accessible.  I had that phone for less than a week.  I couldn't stand it, even though I gave it a chance.  It was slow, and I had to reset it too many times.  Rolled that out pretty quickly, and picked up another iPhone 3G.  After having it again for a few days, I realized how much I missed the iPhone OS.  Not to say that the Android is good, but the iPhone has more app support, and seems easier to use in my opinion.  But the memory of my quick, and newer Nexus One was still in my mind.  I wanted something new.  And the iPhone 4 was it.

Knowing that I already had the release date off from work (its a long weekend, and I already booked the Friday off to have a longer one).  Jason, JC, and I had gotten this crazy plan to line up the night before the launch outside of Market Mall, where the Calgary Apple Store is situated.  JC had to drop out due to personal matters, so Jason and I hatched the plan.  We would drive by around 12am to check out things, and since there probably wouldn't be any crazy people there that early, we would go grab a bite at Dennys, chill for a bit, then come back and camp out.  Now Jason was just as excited as I was, he's been a Blackberry user, but he had had enough of the crashing and slowness of it.  It also doesn't help that he had been in the States a few weeks before, and playing with them in the Apple store.

Thursday July 29th came along.  We were ready.  We would meet at Market at 12, then go eat.  Diana (Jason's girlfriend), would come and camp with us for moral support.  Armed with my computer, camera, 2 sleeping bags, and some snacks, I was off.  I was running a few minutes late, so they would get there before me.  This was cool, we would be the first ones in line for an iPhone 4.  Then I got a call from Jason as I was on my way.  "Dude, there is a line already."  Serious???  I got there, and sure enough, there were already a bunch of people there.  We ended up being about 30th in line.  So much for eating.  And as a side, it was kinda funny, but a graphic designer that I used to work with was a few spots ahead of us.  So we just sat in line (Jason brought a couple chairs, I sat on my sleeping bag).  We chatted for a bit, then watched Wangan Midnight (live action) on my MacBook while Diana watched a few episodes of Glee on Jason's MacBook.  Time was going by slowly, and it was getting cold.  Jason and Diana left for a bit to get some snacks, I got up to walk around and stretch my legs.  It was only about 2am.  When they got back, Diana stayed in the car to stay warm and nap (which didn't work), and Jason and I chatted some more along with a few other people from Beyond.ca.  Turns out that standing around talking passes the time faster.

July 30, 2010 - 5:10am

Everyone is packing up their stuff, the security staff is set to open doors to the mall at 5:30am.  The line had grown to at least 150-200 people.  Took a quick snap of the line behind us, can't see much with the dark, but it was there:

5:30am: They opened the doors.  We walked in, and found a very "Universal Studios"-like line up system awaiting us.  So here we go, walking though it, Jason in front of me with the green.teal cap on, and I believe he was videotaping it on his soon to be extinct Blackberry:

5:49am:  Line stopped moving, we were at our spot.  To my left, the people behind us (which wasn't even the half of it): 

To my right, the people in front of us (which had somehow swelled to at least 45 people when it should have only have been 30), along with the 2 douchebags who left like they were to good to wait in the cramped line like everyone else:

Well that was fun.  Now more waiting until 7am when the Apple store was set to open for us.  But it wasn't bad since it was warm.

Say cheese?  Hell no, I was tired:

6:55am - Hmm, all the lights in the Apple store are turned off.  And then it began.  I hear cheering and running.  I've only read about this on tech blogs and such for other Apple product launches, didn't know it was gonna happen here.  The Apple store employee bullrun had begun!  Blue shirted Apple store employees running around cheering and hi-fiving everyone in line!

This went on for about 5 minutes, and then they stopped in front of the Apple store.  "10! 9! 8! 7! 6! 5! 4! 3! 2! 1!.... and then the cheering, and the lights went on in the Apple store, and the black drapes dropped.  The iPhone for was officially for sale in Calgary.

The line started moving slowly, but after about 45 minutes, we were in (funny, I've seen that guy on the left thats buying an iPhone somewhere before... oh yeah, he works at Westworld Computers, another authorised Apple dealer in town):

I got the two unlocked ones that I needed, one for me, and one for JC, and was done.  

Jason and Diana (yes, the moral supporter turned into a purchaser within the time we spent there) weren't so lucky.  They needed ones on a hardware upgrade, but Rogers activation was down, and they didn't know when it would be back up.  I felt bad for them, it sucks that they had to wait in line and not get to take home a phone until 5pm that day.  But Jason said it was a good experience anyways.

So that was that, I went home, got everything set up, and this is how she sits today.  I'm anal about my electronics getting damaged so she was fully protected when I got her out of the box.  I had preordered a few things from eBay in anticipation, and they were all here by launch day.  My iPhones antenna band is covered with a black decal that stops the reception drop issues (which everyone has heard of by now), and to make the phone all black like I wanted it to be.  Also protecting the back was a clear snap case, and a screen protector on the front glass.

So that was it.  Was the phone worth it?  Hell yes, so much faster than my 3G, the camera is better with the HD video recording, and the screen resolution is so crisp that I can see any of the individual pixels.  And thats just a tip of the upgrades, there is so much more to it.  Was waiting in line worth it?  I can say yes, it was fun.  I know I could've just walked in on Saturday, waited for a bit, and gotten it, but the whole lineup experience was awesome.  Will I do it again next year for the next iPhone?  Depending on how drastic of a chance from this one, the answer may be yes.  Jason and I have already committed to doing it again.