Apple Thoughts: Check iPhone Availability Online

"You decided to skip the lines on June 19th and now you just have to purchase an iPhone 3GS for yourself. If you're like some of our readers, you've found out the hard way that availability of the latest iteration of iPhone is limited. Wouldn't it be nice to know which Apple Stores actually have the devices in stock before you hop in the Family Truckster, drive through traffic, and only then find out that they're out of iPhones?"

This worked out well during the 3G launch for me, used it several times to check availability when I was waiting for the Portland stores to replenish. You can access this at Apple, so if you haven't purchased a 3GS yet, check it out to see if your neighborhood stores are depleted or not before you burn all that carbon (only in the US though).