Hundreds of people at a time continued to line up outside the Apple Store on North Michigan Avenue on Thursday, with the earliest arrivals braving Wednesday's storms to be at the front of the queue to buy the iPhone 4. It's a familiar routine for longtime Apple loyalists like South Loop resident Rick Wayne, 21, who camped outside of an Apple Store for the first three iPhones.
This year, Wayne and a friend sat in a six-hour line, lounging in green beach chairs and sipping lemonade in 78-degree weather.
"It's the best phone in existence -- it's an icon of this century," Wayne said. "There is not a single person in the world that doesn't know what (the iPhone) is."
No other consumer electronics company has been able to replicate the rock concertlike aura Apple has created around its product launches.
"The only thing I can think of is the hysteria around Black Friday, with people getting excited in anticipation, waiting in line, sitting in folding chairs outside the stores," said Andrew Eisner, director of community and content at Retrevo, a gadget shopping Web site. "Apple itself has cultivated this ... air, cachet, whatever you want to call it, where people just get emotionally involved with their gadgets."
Craig Adams, 25, wanted that experience. In previous years, he ordered the phone online or waited a few weeks to avoid the hysteria. Then in April, Adams waited in line for just an hour to buy the iPad, inspiring him to do the same for his new toy. Eight hours after getting in line, the Lincoln Park resident was still a dozen people away from his prize, but he wasn't budging.
"I'm too close to leave," Adams said.
The day didn't come without a snag. Some users posted videos on the Internet demonstrating possible trouble with the iPhone 4's antenna. The videos show the signal dropping out when users cover the bottom left corner of the device with their palm.
Apple didn't respond to requests for comment on the antenna issue. But it said it received ten times as many advance orders for the iPhone 4 than the previous version of the device. Consumers without preorders still took their chances, queuing in a separate line outside the Apple Store. Not all of them were happy about it.
Daniel Mendoza, 25, had to wait in the general line because he wasn't able to preorder the phone -- a common complaint among Apple customers, as heavy traffic last week clogged the company's Web site. Mendoza said Apple employees told him that one person from his line could enter the store for every 10 customers in the other line. He remained hopeful, though.
"Being one of the first to have it is probably my No. 1 priority for standing in line," Mendoza said. "I hope it's worth it."
Other customers were feeling less festive. Chris Quimbo, 22, waited in line because his brother had offered him $100 to do so. He said he couldn't refuse because he had dropped his brother's iPhone 3GS and broken the screen a few weeks ago.
"I feel guilty," he said.
