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Apple has sold more than 1 million units of its iPhone 3G S, which launched Friday. Credit: Apple Apple this morning announced it had sold more than 1 million units of its iPhone 3G S by the end of the weekend.
Although the iPhone was available in stores starting Friday, buyers were able to pre-order beginning June 9 -- that is, until AT&T and other retailers depleted their allotment of pre-orders five days before the iPhone was to go on sale. That led to some shorter lines at stores this weekend compared to last July when Apple debuted its iPhone 3G, which also sold a million units during its first weekend on sale.
Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs crowed in a statement, "Consumers are voting, and the iPhone is winning." Jobs, who has remained largely out of sight since taking a medical leave of absence in January, has reportedly undergone a liver transplant, according to the Wall Street Journal. Apple this weekend said Jobs will return in a week or two in an advisory capacity.
The Cupertino, Calif., company, which launched the iPhone two years ago, had sold more than 21 million units as of March 28, according to its second-quarter financial report. By the end of the year, Apple is projected to have carved up 10% of the global market for the fast-growing smartphone category, up from 8.4% in 2008, according to iSuppli, a research firm in El Segundo.
"The good news is that smartphones are really on a tear," said Ken Dulaney, an analyst with technology research firm Gartner. "From May this year to January of next year, you will see more smartphone announcements than you have ever seen before. Even with a down economy, I joke that food, shelter, clothing and now smartphones are becoming an essential part of people’s lives."
Earlier this month ...
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 An iPhone 3G S waiting for "some time" to become activated on the AT&T Network. Credit: David Sarno / Los Angeles Times
The iPhone 3G S certainly arrived on time, but some owners of the new phone eager to start voice controlling, video recording and just enjoying their new gadgetry had their instant gratification put on hold. In some parts of the U.S., AT&T's activation systems were experiencing delays on newly purchased iPhones, including the older 3G model, whose price was lowered to $99 recently. A message on the screen of phones straining to be recognized by the network read: "Waiting for activation. This may take some time." We called an Apple iPhone customer service representative to help us with our own activation (see picture above). She cautioned that, after the initial online setup, consumers might have to wait hours for their phone to find the network. "We just got an e-mail saying, ‘Please advise customers that there could be 2-3 hour delay in activation' of the phones," she said, explaining that the glitch was "due to an absolutely huge volume of phones that went out today." "Evidently we’ve sold more phones than we thought we were going to sell," she said. "It’s taking AT&T longer than we thought it would take them to get all these phones set up." Apple's media relations team did not return an e-mail seeking comment. CNET reported that some users are receiving a message noting that activation could take "up to 48 hours." The activation delays closely resembled a similar source of user frustration from last summer's launch of Apple's 3G model. However, an AT&T service representative suggested that repeatedly cycling the power on a new phone might speed the activation process. We used this method and, whether it made a difference or not, our phone finally jacked into the network. And it took only two hours. -- David Sarno
Sign in 2005 at a Santa Monica school where students were caught using a computer to cheat. Teenagers are, if nothing else, are extremely resourceful. A survey by Common Sense Media of more than 1,000 students ages 13 to 18 found that more than a third said they'd used cellphones to cheat at least once. In addition, about 38% said they'd copied text directly from the Web and turned it in as their own work.
Other ingenious forms of cheating include storing notes on a cellphone, using camera phones to take pictures of tests to send to classmates and text-messaging friends for answers. The incidence of cheating is the same for honors students and non-honors students, the survey found.
These students are redefining digital ethics. One in four said they thought looking up notes on a cellphone did not constitute cheating. One in five felt it was perfectly ethical to text-message friends or to copy and paste text from the Internet. Shocking!
Interestingly, more than 76% of parents who participated in the survey believe that cheating using technology was rampant, but only a tiny fraction -- 3% to 7% -- said their own children cheat.
Text-messaging is also widespread among this crowd, regardless of whether schools have policies banning cellphone use. The average teenager sends 440 texts a week, 110 of them during class, according to Common Sense Media, a nonprofit advocacy group that studies the effect of digital media on children and families. That translates to about three text messages each class period.
"Kids have always found ways to cheat in school," the group said in a statement. "But the tools they now have at their disposal are more powerful than ever."
-- Alex Pham
iPhone users don't want to pay more for the 3G S. Credit: ArabCrunch via FlickrIt was a conflict for some Mac lovers when Apple unveiled its iPhone 3G S this month: drool over the newest gadget, or riot over the fact that they couldn't have it for cheap? Apple and AT&T, it seems, didn't provide a way for existing iPhone 3G users to upgrade to the newest model at a reasonable price. Instead, they'd have to pay $399 while new users pay $199.
Irate iPhone owners blogged, Tweeted and trash-talked, all in an effort to get Apple to stop "ripping us off." More than 4,000 signed an online petition.
The strategy appears to have worked. AT&T said today that customers who are eligible for an upgrade any time between now and the end of September, and who spend at least $99 a month in service fees per phone line, can get the 3G S for the same price as new buyers starting tomorrow online, or Friday at its physical stores.
Previously, only those who had owned their iPhones for 12 to 18 months would have qualified for the "best upgrade price" -- $199 for the 16-gigabyte version or $299 for the 32-gigabyte phone.
If you don't fall into any of those categories, you're out of luck for now. AT&T offers you some not-so-exciting options. You can pay $599 for a 16-gigabyte model or $699 for a 32-gigabyte model without having to sign a two-year contract, or wait until you're eligible for better upgrade pricing.
Don't shoot the messenger, AT&T says, as it's actually losing money by listening to its customers.
"Like most U.S. carriers, we offer a variety of phones that we sell below our actual cost when customers agree to sign service agreements. In general, the more a customer spends with us, the quicker they become eligible for a price break on a new device," the company explained.
Will this be enough to assuage angry early adopters?
-- Alana Semuels
 Credit: Kevin Thrash / Bloomberg News Being the new kid in school can be challenging -- especially if the other kids are way ahead of you in their lessons and achievements. So is the case with Palm's new Pre smartphone. Particularly in terms of apps, it's hard to compete with the memory of Palm predecessors, who practically invented the notion of apps, let alone the valedictorian -- the iPhone, with more than 50,000 apps available to its users. The Pre catalog is still in beta, with lots of room to grow -- especially in the gaming category. Right now, a number of categories are already listed, even if there isn't yet a critical mass of apps to fill them without multiple redundancies. And many of the offerings, like the ones reviewed below, have already debuted on other devices such as iPhone and Blackberry. Downloading is fast and easy. You get the option of immediately launching them after download or of continuing to browse without exiting the catalog. This to me was most notable: Being able to open and operate multiple apps at the same time is very user-friendly. Most people living a digital life have one thing in mind: multi-tasking. All of that understood, we scanned its nascent catalog and picked out a few to try out. Pandora (Free)
What it is: A personalized radio station streamed to your device Bottom line: The Pre's interface allows the app to continue playing your tunes even as your attention shifts to another app or function. The tiny "P" icon sits in the bottom right corner and lets it launch an unobtrusive strip from which you can pause and play and vote up or down the songs it selects for you, without having to open the app.
Fandango (Free)
What it is: Movie listings Bottom line: The app offers movie listings, trailers and photos, and uses the internal GPS to locate nearby theaters. The interface is nice and clean for the most part. On the same screen, you can twirl down movies opening this week and what's been popular. Buying a ticket is fairly straight forward, although I did want to be able to tap a time directly from the list of offerings under the movie and just buy the ticket. Unfortunately there weren't many theaters in my area that would let me buy tickets through Fandango.
Flixster (Free)
What it is: Movie listings Bottom line: Like the Fandango app, Flixster includes movie listings and trailers. The app lets users list the movies by title, box-office popularity or
viewer ratings -- Pre users can set in preferences to get ratings by Flixster reviewers
or Rotten Tomatoes. In addition, this app offers a movie synopsis, links to related movie sites and lists DVDs that are available, with user ratings. I immediately loved the fact that you can, with a tap, set up a movie date in your calendar. It gives directions to the theater using Google Maps. A plus here is that this app doesn't open additional cards. It does the work within the app. As with Fandango, finding theaters that would be nearby to buy tickets was a challenge. Tweed (Free)
What it is: Twitter client
Bottom line: Like many useful mobile Twitter clients, Tweed lets users log in to multiple Twitter accounts. Search is fairly simple, as is keeping up on trending topics, re-tweets, replies and direct messages. You can also change the font size, which is nice for those of us going blind from looking at these small screens all day. Users get a notification at the bottom of the screen about replies, for example, when another app is prominent. All that's great, but I'm not wild about having separate pages, or "cards" as the Palm folks call them, for the separate accounts. I want the app to multi-task for me, not me for it.
Sporting News Baseball (Free) What it is: Sports fix in your hand. Bottom line: As with Sporting News' apps for other devices, this one includes just about all the sporting news a baseball fan could handle. You can select your favorite teams and key players for quick access to their news and stats. The app also offers in-game updates. Tapping into the Pre's WebOS, the app lets you add your favorite team's calendar to the device's calendar app -- probably my favorite feature, since I can look one place to find out whether my movie date is going to conflict with a Dodger game. -- Michelle Maltais Subscribe to the Appiphilia RSS feed  and follow us on @Appiphilia or Facebook.
In a reminder that spurned gadget lovers can quickly turn rabid, several thousand angry iPhone owners in the U.S. and U.K. have signed a pair of Twitter petitions to protest pricing regimes for Apple's new iPhone 3G S. In the U.S., those currently under two-year contract by AT&T must pay $200 more than for the new phones than customers not under contract.  Screen shot of a Twitter petition. That means $499 for the top-of-the-line 32-gigabyte iPhone 3G S and $399 for the 16-GB version, rather than $299 and $199 respectively, the prices for those with no existing contract. If you want to buy the phone with no contract at all, it's a piggy-bank-breaking $699 and $599.
(In the name of fairness, it should be noted that this movement comprises a vanishingly small fraction of iPhone 3G owners. The company has sold more than 15 million of the second-generation devices since their release last summer.)
In a typical complaint on the AT&T message boards, user apw34 seethed, "This is ridiculous and slap [sic] in the face to long time loyal iphone customers. . . . We have to mount a vigorous campaign to change this policy."
"Longtime iPhone customer" is a borderline oxymoron, however. The phone debuted only two years ago at a price point of $599 for the first 8-GB phone, or $399 for the 4-GB -- contract or no. Moreover, customers who purchased those original models in 2007 would now find themselves eligible for the discounted, new-contract pricing.
Unless Apple decides to institute a quick price reduction -- a move it made soon after the 2007 release (triggering another mini-outrage), customers who expect to be exempted from their contracts may find themselves bound by their own signatures.
"Why should the iPhone be any different than any other ATT phone?" argued user kgipp. "Your reasoning would imply that anyone that has had a Blackberry should be able to upgrade to a new Blackberry anytime they want. What would be the point of offering incentives such as discounted phone prices if they're just going to keep making exceptions?"
Indeed, discounting new handsets to new or out-of-contract customers has long been part of mobile providers' strategy to filch market share from competitors.
But before you try telling that to the owners of the now-outmoded iPhone 3G -- who woke up Monday to find themselves in possession of a 12-month-old relic that is slightly slower than the new version, not to mention lacking its compass and video camera -- make sure to strap on your helmet. Corrected, 12:16 a.m.: An earlier version of the post used prices from Apple's iPhone "Apple Store" page, which currently states that existing AT&T customers will pay $699 for the 32GB iPhone 3G S and $599 for the 16GB. An AT&T representative, however, told the Times that the actual prices will be $200 more for customers under contract, not $400.
-- David Sarno
Cellphones -- the new boob tube? Credit: masochismtango via Flickr. You are by now perhaps a little sick about hearing about the digital TV transition that will take place Friday. The country isn't prepared, televisions will be thrown away, dozens of people won't be able to watch "Days of Our Lives" anymore. And so on.
But for San Diego-based Qualcomm, Friday marks a big opportunity. It's the day the company can finally flip the switch on FLO TV, its expensive and long-awaited mobile TV service that will broadcast about a dozen channels to mobile devices so addicts can watch live shows on their phones.
As a story in today's Times outlines, though, FLO TV may or may not be what one observer calls "one of the colossal business mistakes of the first decade of 2000." That's because Qualcomm spent more than $800 million to build a service that's available now on only nine models and only on Verizon and AT&T.
What's more, as the Open Mobile Video Coalition, a group of broadcasters developing their own standard, gets its act together, FLO TV will have a competitor that offers live TV -- for free. (Of course, they'll need to get phones optimized for the ATSC standard, which no phones in the market are, says Debra Kaufman, who blogs about the topic at MobilizedTV).
Both groups see a future in which we'll be able to access live TV in our cars, on our computers and on virtually any screen we can carry with us, all thanks to the spectrum freed up by the digital transition.
So maybe some people who rely on analog signals will be watching a lot less TV after Friday, but odds are many of us will be eventually watching a lot more. Maybe it's all part of the master plan explained by Alec Baldwin to turn our brains into mush. Or a way to get us even more dependent on our cellphones.
--Alana Semuels
 The Palm Pre has finally surfaced, and so far most of the reviews are glowing -- some even gushing.
Here's a look at what some are saying about the Pre:
In our initial hands-on look at the Pre, we found the keyboard to be a very welcome addition (even if moderately crowded for an average-size woman's fingers), the interface smart and Web surfing swift. A cursory test of calling up a website found that Pre loaded the Los Angeles Times website faster than the iPhone.
The platform-agnostic messaging is quite impressive. No app switching required when a friend moves from instant messaging to texts. The conversation keeps going, uninterrupted.
Of course, Palm has a huge mountain to scale in taking on Apple Inc.'s much-adored iPhone. Even at Wednesday night's geek-meets-chic launch party for the Pre at Raleigh Studios in Hollywood, there was a preponderance of iPhones in the crowd.
On Friday morning, be sure to join us online -- on this blog and on Twitter -- as we put this device through its paces. Tell us what you're most interested in knowing as we walk through the device.
-- Michelle Maltais
Photo credit: Paul Sakuma / Associated Press
 The Palm Pre isn't just for Sprint anymore. Credit: renaissancechambara via Flickr.
The Palm Pre, the device that was pegged to save both Palm and Sprint Nextel, will soon be available on Verizon Wireless, CEO Lowell McAdam said today. Verizon plans to market both the Pre, which will initially be available only on the Sprint Nextel network, and a new version of the BlackBerry Storm early next year. That's not great news for Sprint, which needs the Pre to keep it from losing more customers. "It's an incremental blow to Sprint," said Steve Clement, a senior research analyst at Pacific Crest Securities. Verizon subscribers who were thinking of switching to Sprint to try the Pre might just wait until next year, rather than jumping ship, he said. Sprint has been struggling to reduce churn, an industry term for the subset of customers who leave one carrier for another. It lost nearly 5 million customers last year to rival carriers. "Sprint will have this device exclusively through at least the end of 2009," said Kathleen Dunleavy, a Sprint spokeswoman. "Beginning on June 6, customers can purchase the Pre only through Sprint. Sprint was chosen as the exclusive provider due to the power of its network, the fantastic value our offerings provide and our commitment to a great customer experience." Sprint's most important goal with the Pre is to keep existing customers from going to other carriers such as AT&T, the exclusive carrier of the iPhone, said Ashok Kumar, an analyst at research firm Collins Stewart. This announcement won't hurt that goal, he said. But Palm has had trouble producing enough devices to meet demand. Best Buy has already said it will probably run out of stock when it goes on sale this summer. "Palm thus far has been misexecuting on the production side," he said. If the device is a flop, or gets lampooned by consumers, neither Sprint nor Palm will benefit. Sprint's stock was up 1% at $5.13 at 12:12 PDT today. Palm was up 9% at $11.49. --Alana Semuels
 Would you want to hear her talking on the phone on your plane? Credit: adria-richards via Flickr.
Wireless on airplanes is getting its 15 minutes of fame today, when Oprah makes a call on her show to a Virgin America flight attendant who will be on a plane in the air. There's a catch, though -- and no, it's not that everyone on the flight will get free cars. Oprah is calling the plane using Skype, the voice-over-Internet protocol service that allows you to make calls over a computer. And Aircell, the WiFi provider, doesn't actually allow passengers to use VoIP, including Skype, on any of its flights. "We made an exception just for Oprah," said Arianne Venuso, an Aircell spokeswoman. Aircell, which is expanding to dozens of American Airlines and Virgin America planes this summer, works by transmitting a signal from cell towers around the country to small antennas installed on the planes. Technically, you could make phone calls with the service, and you could easily make VoIP calls over a service such as Skype. But the airlines have all request that VoIP service be blocked, Venuso said. "The airlines know that their passengers don’t want to hear people talking on the phone," she said. But what if that person is Oprah? -- Alana Semuels
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