My PowerBook has been acting funny again and I can't make it stop. I think it's some kind of permissions problem because various applications seem to be having trouble accessing and writing to system-level files: All of the emails in one of my Inboxes disappeared and yet the Inbox file itself seems to be intact; I can't retrieve any of my Address Book data; the music program Live gives me a "can't write to Undo file" error every time I quit.

Norton System Works repaired a bunch of problems but couldn't solve this one, and I couldn't find any cures online (if any of you have ideas, please email them my way). I had an appointment last week after work not too far from the Apple Store Soho, so I brought my laptop with me in case I had time to stop by. You never know, I thought, maybe someone at the Genius Bar could help.

I knew that the odds of having to wait to see a Genius at 5:45 on a Tuesday afternoon were pretty good: The Soho store is the only Apple store in New York City and it's smack in the middle of trendy, happenin' downtown where locals and tourists alike get drawn into its sleek granite and glass architecture and the promise of a better technological tomorrow. In other words, it's always crowded, and I was pretty sure I wasn't the only PowerBook owner planning to drop by after work for some tech support.

What I wasn't expecting, though, was that the Geniuses (Genii?) had stopped taking new reservations at 4:00 that afternoon because they had a backlog of 75 people waiting for help. Seventy-five. When I walked upstairs to the Bar, what I saw looked something like a DMV from the Italian-designed future: Tired, unhappy looking people from all walks of life sat on designer benches and paced around the hardwood floors waiting for someone, anyone to help them with their Apple woes.

In a way, this was a good thing. The last time I'd visited the store I waited about 10 minutes to speak to a Genius. The store was busy, but not like this. For a chilly evening in April -- far removed from the holiday gift season -- this was good business. The main retail floor downstairs was packed, and the theater was starting to fill up a little for a seminar on some feat of multimedia wizardry or another. Marketplace wasn't lying -- business is good for my favorite computer maker.

But to the weary, help-seeking Mac and iPod owners waiting on benches for Geniuses, the crowds weren't such a good thing. I got in line to talk to a guy named Mark who was clad in what seemed to be the official uniform of Apple staffers: faded jeans and a black Apple t-shirt (backwards baseball hat optional). Mark wasn't playing the role of genius on that day, but rather ringmaster to the tech support circus, writing names on a clipboard and calling them off as spaces opened at the help desk, er, Genius Bar.

"I told you, I can't do my homework because my iBook broke," I overheard one twenty-something woman say to another as she sat on a bench, iPod clutched in her fist. "If I could do my homework, I wouldn't be here," she went on. "But my assignment is on the iBook." Such is the double-edged sword of the hi-tech student: computers can make our work go faster, but when they go down everything doth ground to a halt.

I heard a few such snippets as I waited for the two guys in front of me to plead their cases with Mark. The Bar had officially stopped taking on new cases almost two hours ago and there were still 28 people on the list, but we could still try to talk our way into help.

The problem here wasn't, I don't think, the system itself. Though the first guy I heard talk to Mark complained that he hadn't known about the online reservation system (and I hadn't, either), you can't really blame that one on Apple. The link is, in fact, there on the website and Mark was more than happy to tell people about it. To his credit, Mark was doing a very professional job of crowd control, adhering to the store policies regarding closing down the Bar while offering people every chance he reasonably could for tech support.

This first customer in line ahead of me wanted a new battery for his iPod. He said that his Pod seemed to recharge just fine, but when he unplugged it and started playing songs, the battery would drain after an hour or so of constant use. Mark did a good job of impromptu Level One tech support, making sure that the customer knew his iPod continued to draw battery power even when "off" (iPods never turn completely off, they just go into a very low-power mode when not in use), and mentioning a couple of other possible causes to the problem. When the customer said he'd tried all of these things, Mark offered to see if there was a Genius in the house willing to work a little overtime.

"I can't promise anything," he said as he wrote the young man's name at number four on the iPod help list. "You could wind up waiting around and not get any help. We closed the list off, but if one of the guys is willing to see you after everyone on the list, well that's up to him."

There are a lot of people in New York City. A lot of them use computers. A lot of them have iPods, whether they own a Mac or PC (or maybe even don't own a computer but use one at a friend's house, school, or some other place to download music). Now there's an official Apple store in town offering free tech support, but there's only one. Of course it's going to get crowded.

Apple has always been something of a boutique company in the computer world, and now that they're restaking a claim to the big time -- though this time in the music and not education market -- they're suffering the fate off all small companies that get a taste of the big time. Even on this multi-million dollar level, Apple's smallness shines through sometimes. The success of the iPod only maginfies this phenomenon: Lithium batteries eventually die, and the ones used in the iPod are no exception. Apple got away with their unpopular replacement policy for awhile, and gave into public pressure when the story broke big. Thankfully, the tech sector is used to hastily released software and innovative hardware that never quite catches on. In this kind of a market, Apple's tried and true technology and real world innovation more than makes up for the occasional red herring or long line at the Genius Bar.

When it was my turn, I asked Mark about my permissions problem, hoping maybe he'd have some suggestions for me before inevitably sending me on my way. Unlike the man just ahead of me in line -- one of two irate Applecare-covered owners I heard they they "weren't leaving the store" without replacement batteries for their laptops --I wasn't at all prepared to stick around in hopes of getting some eleventh hour help. My problem had been going on for a few months now, so I could certainly live with it for another few weeks.

"You tried Norton?" Mark confirmed. "I don't really know so much about working with permissions, so I wouldn't want to steer you wrong. There are a few guys here who could help, but you probably wouldn't get to see them tonight. We recommend (Alsoft's) Disk Warrior over Norton, so you could try that." Mark went on to explain the basics of how Disk Warrior differs from Norton in its approach to fixing and rebuilding corrupt files and drive directories. By then I was happy to escape the mayhem of the Genius Bar for, well, the chaos of Manhattan.

As I left, I could hear the unhappy iBook owner behind me talking to Mark. "I don't agree with your reservation policy," he argued. "I paid for my AppleCare, so I get my service. I have to give a presentation tomorrow and I'm not leaving without a replacement battery. I'll linger around here until the store closes, but I'm not leaving."

Earlier I'd asked Mark if the Genius Bar was always like this, or if tonight was just a particularly busy night. "No," he sighed. "It's pretty much always like this."

* * * *
Noah Kravitz is an educator, musician, and writer who calls Brooklyn, NY home and takes his iPod with him everyday on the commute to work at a school in Spanish Harlem. He is the author of the forthcoming book, Teaching and Learning with Technology and the drummer for Automat, who can be found rocking various clubs in the five boroughs and beyond.