Update: For everybody asking for full-sized pics, you can grab 'em here, off my Flickr page.

I call it a temple because the architecture conveys a nearly religious aesthetic, a place to worship Apple, beyond any other Apple store you've ever been to. The top floor's a vast open space, enclosed by spartan stone walls which support a massive glass ceiling. The rows of tables in the main room feel like pews.

I can't tell you—and the pictures can't show you—how utterly open and expansive the room feels. Apple says it has more demo units than any other store in the world. To give you an idea of the space, the walls are 45 feet tall, and could fit 11 Apple 5th Avenue Cubes inside. It's the spareness that's breathtaking. It's cold. Not literally, but the stone walls, the glass, the sheer space rob it of any sense of warmth or feeling. The only sense of life in room is the products. It's a temple to them, really.

The beating heart, where things actually happen is tucked underground. The Genius Bar and personal training space is the biggest ever in an Apple store, able to handle up to 100 customers at once at 45 feet long. It's pretty much like any other Apple store down there, just bigger.

It's impressive. The store, at 67th and Broadway, opens Saturday. And they're giving away 2500 commemorative shirts if you're that kind of crazy.

Apple Store Upper West Side Opening on Saturday, November 14

NEW YORK-November 12, 2009-Apple® will open its newest retail store on New York's Upper West Side on Saturday, November 14 at 10:00 a.m. Set beneath a breathtaking all-glass arched roof, the street level of the Apple Store® Upper West Side offers more Macs, iPods and iPhones than any store in the world for an incredible hands-on experience. The lower level features the largest area ever created by Apple for personal training and technical support, including a 45-foot Genius Bar. Located on Broadway at 67th Street, the Apple Store Upper West Side is just minutes from Lincoln Center and Central Park.

"We opened our first store in Manhattan seven years ago, and the response has been incredible," said Ron Johnson, Apple's senior vice president of Retail. "We hope our new store on the Upper West Side will become as much a part of the community as our stores in SoHo, the Meatpacking District and on Fifth Avenue."

A highly trained team of more than 200 employees brings the unique Apple retail experience to the Upper West Side, offering the same legendary services that Apple stores provide around the world. At the Genius Bar, customers can get free advice and expert tech support from knowledgeable experts. Customers who buy a Mac® at the Apple Store Upper West Side can join the popular One to One program for personal set-up service and personal training for just $99. Visitors can also get free tips from Specialists who are on-hand to help shoppers find the perfect gift or choose the right Mac, iPod® or iPhone® for themselves.

In time for the holiday season, customers can now reserve their favorite Apple product online at www.apple.com/retail/reserve and pick it up at their local Apple store between December 15-24. Apple retail stores will also gift wrap any iPod or portable Mac for just $5.

The Apple Store Upper West Side is the fourth in Manhattan and Apple's 15th in the New York metro area, joining the hugely successful Apple Stores SoHo, West 14th Street and Fifth Avenue. Nearly 170 million people on four continents have visited Apple retail stores this year. Apple now operates 280 stores in ten countries including the US, UK, Italy, Australia, Canada, Japan, China, Switzerland, Germany and France.

The Apple Store Upper West Side is located at 1981 Broadway, on the corner of West 67th Street. The first 2,500 visitors to the store will receive a limited edition, commemorative t-shirt.

Apple ignited the personal computer revolution in the 1970s with the Apple II and reinvented the personal computer in the 1980s with the Macintosh. Today, Apple continues to lead the industry in innovation with its award-winning computers, OS X operating system and iLife and professional applications. Apple is also spearheading the digital media revolution with its iPod portable music and video players and iTunes online store, and has entered the mobile phone market with its revolutionary iPhone.

The numbers, admittedly, are impressive.

• Apple's total sales in 2001 were $5.4 billion. Apple Stores this year: $6.6 billion. (Apple's total sales this year were $36.5 billion.)

• They hit 170 million visitors this year. 10 million people hit Genius Bars or personal training.

• Sales per store—$26 million, which is just below what Macy's, Target and Best Buy make per store. But, if you look at the real estate, it's a slightly different picture. Apple Stores do sales of $4,300 per square foot which is 5x the $872 per square foot Best Buy does.

• Wow—over 100,000 applicants on file for jobs at the Apple Store worldwide. 10,000 people submitted applications for the new Upper West Side store. Just over 200 got a job.

• Apple realized they were going too small with their stores, so now all of their stores will be at least "three tables wide." In other words, they're going to be bigger. They're also going to be opening more stores next year, more like 50. More of them will be "significant stores," iconic ones like the Fifth Ave. store with the Apple Cube. And they'll be going more international, adding stores all over Europe, like the UK, Paris and two in Shanghai getting those "significant stores."

• All checkouts are done using an iPod touch now with a new EasyPay system, if you care about the purity of the Apple Store and the old Windows Mobile system offended you.

Okay, BIG NEWS. They're gift-wrapping for the first time ever. And you can reserve presents. Your Christmas is now officially complete. You're welcome.

Apple is in the process of retiring their massive fleet of Windows CE handhelds, made by Symbol Technologies and introduced back in 2005, with custom-designed iPod Touches. The initial announcement made this sound like a self-satisfied, gloating move by Apple, during which they'd happily—and publicly—ditch their clunky, ugly, jury-rigged handhelds for sleek, shiny iPod Touches. But judging by these photos nabbed by AppleInsider, this isn't quite the case.

Apple's point-of-sale Touches take advantage of OS 3.0's hardware accessory support a lot. Each one will be wrapped in a large plastic case, which includes a barcode scanner up top and a card reader slot in the side, as well as an extra battery. The whole assemblage—iPod included—is powered through a mini USB port. Naturally, sales will be carried out with a custom iPhone app; not so naturally, credit card signatures need to be entered with a stylus, almost like you're using Windows Mobile (OH GOD!). Or, you know, paper.

More pictures at [AppleInsider]

Seen here is a magnetized iPod bookmark. If you were a little guy or gal making the rounds in Bellevue, Washington Saturday evening, you got one of these in your candy sack.

Eat less candy? Read more? Indoctrinating America's youth against the the Kindle? We can't be sure what Apple's true intent was here, but what we do know is the kiddies seemed to love it. The bookmarks were all gone by 7:30 p.m. [iPhone Savior - Thanks, Seth]

GM's offering in-car internet for $500 and +$29 a month. Great! This is a stupid thing to get—think about devices like the MiFi, and ask yourself who would buy this. Plus, do you really want to buy a GM? If you go American, go Ford. They have cool tech! [Engadget]
Apple stores are ditching those clunky handheld point of sale computers—which are Windows-run—for iPod touches that can do the same thing. There's no way to write this story up without making an easy Microsoft joke, which isn't fair because those point of sale units have been a big part of why Apple stores have been such easy places to drop loads of cash. [AppleInsider]
Virgin erases Helio and the Ocean 2. But not before we erased the love and care we had back in 2007 for the company. Remember how progressive they were? Were? [Mobile Crunch]
JVC's $200 Blu-ray player does not stream media and does not cost less than the LG bd370 which does. It doesn't even cost less than the PS3, which also, you know, plays games. Do not buy. [JVC]

Hey, why save up for the Apple Tablet or Microsoft Courier when you can have eviGroup's Pad? It's kinda chunky, costs over $500 and runs, atop Windows 7, an artificial-intelligence man-lady widget known as Seline10. Don't be afraid that the only pictures of this sucker are renderings, or that it's probably not even going to sell in the USA. Just know that no matter what happens, it's bound to suddenly eclipse both—not to mention all other—tablets, in terms of sales and buzz. On second thought, maybe we'll just forget about this and keep waiting for the real McCoys. [Engadget]

Jim Goldman, a newscaster more famous in the bloggyverse for mistakes and total BS than he is for any act of conscious journalism, made Microsoft's stock take a momentary plummet when he read a statement from their quarterly report inaccurately. Surely he wasn't doing this to turn some short-happy day trader into Rico Suave, but it was a clear misinterpretation by either him or someone on his team. Did he admit he or his network made a mistake? Nope. Did they issue a correction, as most or all of us who have worked in any form of journalism have had to do from time to time? Nope. He instead made a "clarification," one that righted the stock to the chagrin of said would-be Sr. Suave.

I don't care, honestly, if someone makes a mistake on live TV, and it certainly wasn't worth posting as "news" on Giz. I am just sick and tired of people thinking there's something unmanly about saying you're sorry for effing up. I had my own run-in with that attitude last week, and I'll be honest, you people got it all wrong: The act of apologizing for a mistake shows you've got nothing to hide downtown, if you know what I mean. On that note, I'm sorry for climbing on my soap box. [Silicon Alley Insider]

One of the hottest non-news items of the day was Verizon's CEO, Ivan Seidenberg, saying how much he'd like a bite of the Apple:

Obviously we would be interested if they thought it would make sense for them to have us as a partner. And so we will leave it with them on that score….We want to broaden the base of choice for customers, and hopefully along the way, Apple, as well as others, will decide to jump on the bandwagon.

While this is obvious and doesn't change a thing, it was probably pretty upsetting to Verizon Wireless CEO Lowell McAdam in the week or so following his launch of the iDon't anti-iPhone campaign. [AllThingsD; original image from CNet]

We all knew that Microsoft borrowed Apple Store talent in order to get its own high-end retail initiative off the ground, but Engadget pointed out a delightful little detail—too small for its own post—that furthers the conspiracy. A sales manager, featured in the background of a video with Bono and Oprah from back when Product RED iPods launched in July 2007, suddenly reappears a few days ago handing out Zunes at the Scottsdale store opening. Hey, at least they're Zune HDs. [Engadget]

The paper says the Scottsdale store will look just like the freaky fake shop Microsoft built on its Redmond campus back in January. Also, a second store in Mission Viejo, California is expected to follow in the immediate weeks after.

Ahh, the glitz and the glam. The paper confirms the floorplan will showcase everything form Windows 7 to WinMo 6.5 and the Xbox 360. And yep, there will be a 94-inch screen for folks to play on.

More: Inside the Microsoft Store With Wall-Sized Screens and the Answers Bar

And Apple isn't the only inspiration. The Microsoft stores will also be close to either a Best Buy or Wal-Mart. Oh, and the Microsoft store head-honcho was actually poached from Wal-Mart. I think I was more optimistic when I heard they were head-hunting Apple Store staff. [Wall Street Journal]

But that's what a man allegedly did yesterday at the Apple Store in Cincinnati's Kenwood mall. According to reports, the man continued, "I'll do it right now. Look!", and opened the right side of his shirt to show a black 9mm handgun.

Kudos to the Apple Store employee who stayed calm and said she'd get it fixed. She walked him over to a technician before informing her manager, who called police.

The man was charged with "aggravated menacing, causing fear of harm". And even though he has a concealed weapons permit, could face charges for the gun because he didn't tell the deputy on the scene that he had it. Now that's some iPhone rage. [WCPO 9]

That's exactly what five guys did yesterday at 2am, at the Sagemore New Jersey Apple Store. All occurred in half a minute. When the security guard came, everyone and everything was gone.

[TUAW]

Ah, the irony that Raymond Miller went into his local Stamford Town Center Apple Store because he was having issues with image files on his computer. The Genius found the suggestive images and called on one of the police officers stationed in the mall. Miller was arrested while he was waiting to get his computer back.

According to the Stamford Advocate, he was charged with one count of possession of child pornography, a class-B felony which is punishable by a minimum five-year prison sentence if convicted. No word if the Genius was able to fix his G5. [The Stamford Advocate via Tuaw]

To put that in perspective, Tiffany & Co., who says diamonds has sales of about $18,000 per square foot. In fact, it might be the highest grossing retailer on Fifth Ave. ever, according to an estimate by Prudential Douglas Elliman Real Estate.

$350 million. Kee-rist. Good luck touching that, Microsoft. [Bloomberg via ZDNet]

Nicholi has made boatloads of lip sync videos at the store, and it's funny to see people milling around behind him and wondering just what the hell he's up to. Hey, you've gotta admire his boldness. [YouTube via Boing Boing]

From all reports, everyone got a kick out of it, but when the smiling dancers made their way across the road to the Westfield shopping mall afterwards, security there gave them the boot. Kill joys! [SFist and San Francisco Chronicle]