I'm a great believer in following useful rules of thumb. Here's one of my favorites: If it ain't broke, don't fix it. The experience of buying something in an Apple Store is clearly something that is not broken. It is, in my personal experience, generally a relatively quick, painless, and accurate experience. Apple's biggest problem with this experience has probably been the fact that they use a device running Microsoft Windows Mobile. They're in the process of "fixing" this. And, AppleInsider has an excellent article with lots of photos detailing how it works...

Exclusive look at Apple's new iPod touch-based EasyPay checkout

I wonder though, if something will break in the process of fixing it. Switching to a completely new system of any kind is often filled with pain points. Will we see those pain points as Apple tranitions to their iPod touch based solution approaching the key holiday buying season?

One of the things that puzzled me was how people were going to sign for purchases on the finger oriented iPod touch. I imagined people struggling to sign their name with the tip of their index finger. I wasn't sure how that would work given my own long last name. Apple solution is to use the third party Pogo Sketch Stylus for this task. FYI: The Pogo Sketch Stylus has a retail price of $14.95. But, I found it at Amazon for $10 with free shipping.