SAN FRANCISCO — Across the nation, consumers are scheming over how they'll land one of Apple's must-have iPhones today:
Surfing the Web. Kansas college student Robbie Gerling checks EverythingiPhone.com up to 20 times a day for news that might give him an edge.
Gerling, 22, a senior at the University of Kansas in Lawrence, has already loaded movies onto his laptop that he plans to transfer to his iPhone, assuming he gets one after camping out at an AT&T store starting Thursday.
Crunching numbers. In Silicon Valley's Sunnyvale, Corey Williams sifted through reams of data to boost his odds of success. First, he estimated the number of iPhones available (1 million) and counted the number of AT&T and Apple stores (about 2,000).
Then Williams, 36, assumed Apple stores will get 80 percent of the handsets, or 1,300 per location. So, the software company product manager is homing in on one Apple store in Palo Alto, where he figures he's got a 50/50 chance of success.
Charging batteries. In Philadelphia, Peter Lobl is bringing extra batteries for his video camera to record the scene he expects at a downtown AT&T store. He plans to get in line as early as 6 a.m. Friday. "It's an event," he says. "I've been caught up in the hoopla."
Lobl, 40, is resisting offers — up to a $300 premium — he's gotten from people willing to buy any iPhone he gets.
Banking on confusion. Andre Ricciardi has targeted an out-of-the-way Cingular store in San Francisco that only recently adopted the wireless company's new AT&T name. Ricciardi, 38, really wants one. But the advertising copy writer won't stand in line forever.
"There's really no way that a 38-year-old can wait in line for more than an hour for a gadget without instantly becoming a gigantic loser," Ricciardi said in an e-mail.
And he won't pay someone to stand in line for him — an offer several advertisers are making on Craigslist for fees as high as $200. "I just can't admit to myself that I'm that materialistic," he says.