IT Werkz Sometimes

Since I’ve got the 32GB iPhone 3GS and that it can now store quite a lot of music I’ve been able to rationalise all of my devices and stuck three of them for sale on eBay.

I sold a 60GB iPod which was in pretty darn perfect condition apart from a few scratches you get on the back of any iPod which is a couple of years old. I described it as that and I’ve just found a message from the purchaser that it’s not in the condition it was described as. Except it was exactly in the condition I described it as. He hinted at contacting eBay which I assume was to scare me into giving him his money back. I’m not that bothered as I’m not an eBay trader in any form and I can’t see that they would side with him anyway. I think he expected to get the iPod box with the iPod but I didn’t have it any longer and never described the iPod as being sold with the box. Anyway he’ll get his money back no problem.

I also have a 160GB iPod that has just sold and mercifully it wasn’t to the same person. Again I got a good price and this time it did include the iPod box. The purchaser had also asked me, before winning the auction, what the condition it was in and the condition of the box. This one is obviously going to be passed off as new to someone.

Lastly my iPhone 3G was on sale on eBay but I had rather stupidly started the auction at 7am so it would therefore finish at that time. People don’t like that, they prefer finishes at about 8-9pm. I had put it on with a starting price of 99c and no reserve and I had about 12 watchers at one time but this morning with 24 hours to go only had 4 watchers and the price was stuck at $108. So I pulled it from auction and will start again with a far more flowery description and a starting price of $150 just to get rid of the time wasters who think they’re going to pick it up for a song.

I had another go at using the iPhones bluetooth function (with OS 3) and this time tried to pair it with a Jabra Bluetooth Speakerphone and still it wasn’t discovered. I bet the only thing that will be discovered will be some A2DP headphones that Apple will release soon and that will cost $100.

Just been reading about electronic cigarettes which seem to satisfy the craving of smokers by giving them a shot of nicotine and vapourised water as the smoke substitute.

Sounds great. Cheaper than normal cigarettes, you don’t get sick and you are supposed to be able to smoke them anywhere as they aren’t cigarettes but an electronic gadget. OK, so you get a whole loada people who use these things, and remember they actually look like a real burning cigarette, and they fire these things up in cinemas or theatres, bars, shops, planes, trains etc etc and do you really think people aren’t gonna complain. Like heck they won’t. They may not be cigarettes and may not produce any ill effects on anyone at all but they look like cigarettes and therefore someone’s gonna complain and ‘put a stop to this’.

If the only problem is that they look like cigarettes but don’t act like cigarettes then what is the problem? You could use a shortened pencil painted white and with a bit of light brown for a filter and someone sucking on that will probably annoy someone. Will we end up with people getting barred from places for impersonating someone smoking.

Where does that end?

Thought I’d try and get the new iPhone 3GS when it came out today, well at least see how far I could get.

Confidence wasn’t high as I expected there to be a queue at the O2 shop and I only had a small time window to purchase the iPhone. When I got to the shop there was a queue of only 8 people so that was a good start. An O2 person asked me whether it was a new or upgrade purchase and as it was the latter when my contract was up. Apparently I needed to contact O2 myself and sort out the completion of that contract before the shop staff could sell me the upgrade. I asked couldn’t that be done by the sales staff. Apparently not. Fair enough ’spose and she told me to call 202 on the iPhone. Did that and threaded myself through to the required person or rather a call queue. Forty minutes later I’m still waiting but it is my turn to purchase my upgrade with a sales assistant. I told her what I was trying to do and asked whether she couldn’t do the processing for me to buy myself out of the rest of the contract, a period of 7 months. Again there was no way could she do that and nor could she reserve me the iPhone, so that I could get it later, that had been allocated to me when I had initially got in the shop queue.

She did tell me that the number I had rung – 202 – was incorrect and to phone another number that she gave me. OK, but my time window was just about up and there was no way all the processing could be done so I left the shop empty handed and phoned the number she gave me to complete my contract as I figured that as soon as that was accomplished I could then return to the shop and effectively I would be a new purchaser. After 15 minutes someone answered that call and told me that it was not the correct number for what I wanted to do and that the whole paying up of the rest of the contract could be done by the sales staff in the O2 shop. Huh. I asked whether he was sure about that and he said ‘definitely’. So why didn’t the staff want to do that? Dunno.

I gave up and later today did the whole thing with O2 over the phone and that worked. iPhone 3GS due Monday or Tuesday.

Just had a look on eBay and several 32gig iPhone 3GS’s are being sold with a Buy It Now price of £1500.