iPhone 3GS shipments start

Having only announced the device a week ago, Apple is already beginning to ship the iPhone 3GS for online pre-orders, anecdotes indicate. American orders shipping today should in theory arrive June 19th, the official launch date for the product. Delivery may be highly dependent on when an order was placed however, as AT&T's first wave of pre-orders sold out last Saturday.

2009 marks a return to an ordering policy closer to that for the original iPhone. The iPhone 3G, launched in 2008, could for months only be bought in person from an Apple or carrier store, and later a Best Buy or Walmart. The change was implemented in order to deter unlocking, but resulted in activation networks crashing, in turn leaving many people unable to buy or take home a phone during the first weekend. Online orders currently require customers to arrange carrier details via the web.

by MacNN Staff