Although the crowds weren’t quite as large this weekend, it does seem as if hundreds of thousands of new iPhones were sold. AT&T along claims several hundred thousand preorders, and there were unknown numbers from Apple before the 3G S was released on Friday. By Sunday, however, the truth was out there. Steve Jobs himself, still Apple’s CEO, reported over one million units sold, way ahead of analyst estimates.

This time, Apple and its wireless carrier partners acted in an intelligent fashion. By taking preorders, they didn’t force customers to wait hours in front of the store in the hope they wouldn’t be too late to get a spanking new iPhone 3G S.

For the most part, the activation issues that plagued customers last year didn’t occur, although there were some instances where the final activation process seemed to take far longer than it should. However, the complaints shouldn’t be near as voluminous.

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It’s quite easy for a tech writer to tell you what a certain company ought to do to become successful or at least remain successful. But the only thing is that if any of us really knew what was really necessary, we’d be making the big bucks as an executive at one of those companies. Instead, we remain in the underclass of overworked writers.

No, we don’t earn huge salaries at such pursuits, but someone has to do it, and that’s how it goes.

On the other hand, some things about a company’s behavior are blatantly obvious, and if you try to take a few lessons from history, it’s really possible to arrive at a few sensible conclusions.

You know, for example, that new Apple products are coming this week. Your expectations might have been lessened by their decision to call in a second act — in the person of marketing VP Philip Schiller — to deliver the keynote at the last Macworld Expo in which Apple will participate.

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All right, I hear the excuses raging through my mind. Apple was overwhelmed with the unprecedented response to the introduction of the iPhone 3G in over 20 countries, release of the iPhone 2.0 software and the debut of the Apps Store. Add to that came the major transition of .Mac to MobileMe, and they were asking for trouble.

Well, so far as I can see, the App Store seems to be running all right, although some developers are complaining that they can’t get their updates posted quickly enough. Another group wants the NDA removed, so they can share information and code with their fellow travelers and create a better community that can deliver superior, more bug-free products.

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Some people suggest our headlines don’t always match the content, but I don’t agree. In this case, the headline results from the fact that I made three attempts to buy an iPhone 3G before I succeeded. I hope you appreciate my dedication to the task, or my stupidity for wasting so much time before I was actually able to buy one.

It all started early Friday morning. I had assumed that the nearby AT&T factory store wouldn’t be inundated with shoppers waiting to buy one. That would seem to be the province of an Apple Store.

But I was totally wrong. When I arrived at the nearest AT&T outlet, nearly 150 people were waiting in line. I walked casually to the rear, asking someone offhandedly if this was the “Star Wars” line? My foolish remark earned a few chuckles and perhaps a number of episodes of rolling eyes.

An AT&T salesperson came by shortly thereafter. He said that they had 80 phones in stock, but nobody budged.

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