Amid the reports and rumors of the upcoming Bluetooth and WiFi iPod releases, Apple is taking its first store 24/7.

You may have heard that PortalPlayer has added Bluetooth and WiFi support to it’s latest chip (which is the heart of the iPod), and therefore, rumors are that the surprise Apple conference on 2/22 is going to be the announcement of BT/WiFi enabled iPods. However, there is a less ground-shaking announcement: they are opening the first Apple store that’s open 24 hours per day, seven days per week in Manhattan.

It’s been many years that the “experts” have been predicting the demise of Apple against the Wintel monopoly. However, IMO, the opening of this store indicates that quite the opposite is true. Apple has become the choice of the real nerd crowd, due to its use of the FreeBSD core system and the fact that real nerds don’t mind paying a bit for quality. With the huge success of the iPod, I think that the “halo effect” is going to cause a significant surge in sales of Apple computers to people who have enjoyed the start-to-finish simplicity of the iTunes/iPod combination. The recent Intel switch lends “credibility” to the people who might have been on the fence and gives the haters one less thing to cite in their poor accusations that Apples are too expensive. Anyway, back to the story – if the demand for computers and iPods did not exceed the normal 12-hour retail store business day, they would not be opening a 24/7 store. Time to go look at AAPL stock now that it’s come-down in the past couple weeks…