Please Stop Embarrassing Me in the iPhone Line

June 24th, 2010Blog0 comments

For every moment, there is a special place to be. A place where, in that moment, it’s all going down. February 1964: JFK Airport as the Beatles touched down in America. May 1977: Any movie theater as Star Wars: A New Hope opened for the first time. June 2010: In the line at the Apple store, waiting for the iPhone.

It was Deja Vu all over again. In fact I’d already done this two times before. And now the whole process of waiting in line for the phone had gotten kind of pedestrian. Now that the iPhone is supremely popular, the magic was gone — it was like waiting in a very long line at Walmart.

Yeah, it’s not a nerd thing anymore. It’s not even a geek thing anymore — the line was now made up of regular, every day people. This really hit home for me when a mother grabbed her child and said: “Please stop embarrassing me in the iPhone line.” It was a golden moment, but also a mixed one.

At the front of the line, a rocker dude with long hair and an Ed Hardy tee was arguing with Apple Store employees, telling them that they “were a disgrace to this process.” * This man is clearly a genius at unintentional comedy and he is now my hero.

What happened? Where did the magic go? And yes, there was something cool and magical about the iPhone way back when it first came out three years ago. It was unique, special, fun. Now it’s just sort of… A thing. A thing that everybody has and plays Angry Birds on.

I mean, it’s still a great phone, still a great environment to develop on. But a little of the luster has gotten lost with its ubiquitousness.

But I guess that’s progress for you. It’s like that old adage about how everything begins as a movement, then becomes a business, and finally ends up turning into a racket. Everything’s got a lifespan — even magical devices.

* Yes, I have a razor-sharp memory for juicy real-world quotes because, well, that’s my job.