Gadgets and gizmos

The 3G iPhone goes on sale tomorrow morning and despite our all round best efforts it has become pretty much impossible to pass these events without making a comment or two. The first iPhone was admittedly brilliant and did a lot for mobile phone consumers, but it certainly wasn’t without its issues. However, it got more publicity and media time than Amy Winehouse’s latest drug fuelled antics (whatever they may be when you’re reading this).

In an almost carbon copy version of that release (the original iPhone not Amy Winehouse), O2 is claiming that most shops will only have a dozen or two handsets available and they are reiterating that it’s one per personal consumer and two per business consumer. You also need a letter from your mum, ministry of defence clearance, and you have to be available for 6 weeks upon arrival at your local O2 shop.

Full biometric scans will be run on every potential customer and the details logged, to prevent any miscreant attempting to commit the most unholy of sins by buying two from different shops. The iPhone register will be made available online so that so-called MIV (Multiple IPhone Vigilante) groups can graffiti your front door and leave a horse’s head on your pillow when you next go back to work.

Other reports have claimed that, in actual, fact you should allow twenty minutes and take two forms of personal ID including one proof of address. Not quite as hardcore, but still fairly extreme for what is, when all’s said and done, a mobile phone.