Apple’s iPhone 3G launched today in 21 countries, at precisely 8:00am in each local time zone. The logistics of pulling off such an event are absolutely insane to ponder, and preliminary market reports of activation issues are being trumped now by stories of out-of-stock warnings around the world. Hong Kong has a history of literally maniacal mob scenes when a major product is introduced, so Apple took no chances and hired guards in kevlar vests and helmets with shotguns. For a phone.

This is the point where I stick my tongue out at the people who told me Apple was going bankrupt in 1997 and wouldn’t live to see 1998!

Nielsen BuzzMetrics, the Internet “conversation” tracker, released some stats on iPhone 3G’s online presence, which, admittedly, are not that interesting to view.

However, it appears the peak in the online buzz came a few weeks before launch, specifically between June 9 and 13, the time of the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference during which Mr. Jobs detailed the new iPhone features and specs. This is what conveys a true latent demand in the smartphone market, and I wish Apple all the best of success, though it appears I won’t need to:

“iPhone buzz is through the roof. One out of every 100 new blog posts is about the iPhone - more than Barack Obama or John McCain. And while the blogosphere may pay special attention to new technology, this buzz underscores the important role the iPhone is playing in raising awareness of and interest in multimedia phones,” said Nic Covey, Director of Insights, Nielsen Mobile.

In an attempt to capture stories that didn’t receive much face time on most news sites, here are this month’s “Between the Cracks” picks:

Fortune Cookie Payout (via AZ Central)
One hundred ten people from 26 states won from $100,000 to $500,000 each in the U.S. powerball lottery (totaling $19 million) by betting on a series of numbers they found in a fortune cookie. It made for an expensive night for Powerball, with winners beating the odds in a game with a 1 in 3 million winning combination.

‘Ginormous’ Tops Non-Dictionary Word List (via Yahoo!)
The editors of Merriam-Webster dictionaries got more than 3,000 entries when, in a lighthearted moment, they asked visitors to their Web site to submit their favorite words that aren’t in the dictionary. First place went to “ginormous” — bigger than gigantic and bigger than enormous — followed by “confuzzled” for confused and puzzled simultaneously, and “whoot,” an exclamation of joy. A “lingweenie” — a person incapable of making up new words — placed 10th. I’m guilty of using ginormous as often as humanly possible.

Xbox 360 Demos Running on Macs (via CNet)
Yup, just a week after Microsoft’s Bill Gates blasted Apple’s iPod as being “toward the end of its life” (among other anti-Apple statements), Microsoft released a statement saying that they, in fact, were using Apple G5 desktop computers to power their demonstration video illustrating the powers of the new XBox 360. The statement read, “We purchased a number of Apple G5’s because very specific hardware components of the G5 allow developers to emulate some of the technology behind future Xbox products and services.” What the heck does that even mean?

Have more to contribute? Leave a comment, per favore.

Well, have you?

OK, perhaps I should be more specific.

Did you see the new, über-cheap Mac mini announced by Apple yesterday afternoon? It has quickly become the most heavily blogged new Apple product in less than a day and has been winning praise from review houses like c|net. I think it’s the coolest thing, considering how it is only 6.5 inches square and stands only 2 inches tall. You can literally stack seven of them next to your desktop computer, provided you’re feeling crazy and can drop $3500 to get them. But, then again, it’s only $3500 and you would have the most impressive desktop cluster in the neighborhood.

Among other Mac news shared at Macworld San Francisco, Apple announced that they sold 4.5 million iPods in the previous quarter, up from 733,000 in the year-ago period. The primary reason Apple didn’t sell more iPods was that it couldn’t keep up with the incredible holiday demand. Apple posted their earnings report just a few moments ago and stated that they quadroupled their profit from a year ago to 70 cents/share and beat analysts expectations of 49 cents/share.

MacNuts have long been speculating the company’s next great move. Paul Nixon has concocted a pretty decent approach to figuring out Apple’s market strategy.