Dave Caolo over at TUAW writes:
"For me, the best part of buying my original iPhone was the activation process."
And you know what? I totally frickin' — yes, I said frickin' — agree. One of the most ingenious achievements of the iPhone was pain-free activation. Apple removed that feature in a trade-off that enabled them to lower the base price of the iPhone 3G, and frankly it's the one thing that's prevented — yes, I said prevented — me from buying an iPhone for my girlfriend.
Well, it now appears that at least some semblance of easy activation is again being offered, though this time it's by AT&T and it happens online. Not as cool as the original deal, but at least I won't have to get up off my ass, get down to an Apple Store, and possibly stand in line in the hopes that they have what I want in stock. Nope, this can all be done from the comfortable comfort of my comfiest chair.
I'll take it!
UPDATE:
The other crap thing about the new 3G iPhones? The price — yes, I said the price. Sure, the phones are cheaper, but in the end the monthly is $20 bucks more, and my lady's on a budget. So I ended up getting her the Google Phone. So far, I think she likes it, though she's actually having to look at the manual: and I quote, "Totally useless." Hmmm...
There are some things I really like about the gPhone, though. The Google integration is pretty cool, for one — all your Gmail, Google Contacts and the like are instantly synced. Nice! It looks like it will make an excellent alternative to the iPhone.