Apple doesn't give sneak peeks of new products. Except it does, at least to magazines and newspapers which require advance notice if they're going to give lavish coverage. So who's in the magic circle? Steve Jobs' office invited Time Magazine's Lev Grossman to Cupertino, before the announcement of the new iPhone. (His description of the pre-brief procedure, after the jump.) David Pogue of the New York Times had an hour with the new device announced yesterday, and Apple's CEO and VP of marketing. One assumes the invite list included Walt Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal, a judge from whom a bad review can condemn a gadget, and Peter Lewis of Fortune Magazine was certainly well-informed. But the San Jose Mercury News appears to be out of the loop. The briefings were more limited this year than usual. Silicon Valley's hometown newspaper, which has suffered a decline in revenue from classifieds, changing owners, and job cuts, doesn't have the influence it once did. And the Merc's coverage of Apple's stock options scandal, annoyingly persistent, couldn't have won the newspaper any favors from the company's notoriously touchy CEO.

If you've ever wondered how it works, this is how it works: I don't call Steve, Steve calls me. Or more accurately, someone in Steve Jobs's office calls someone in my office—someone at a much higher pay grade —to say that he has something cool. I then fly to the metastasized strip mall called Cupertino, Calif., where Apple lives, sign some legal confidentiality stuff and am escorted to a conference room that contains Jobs, some associates, and some lumps concealed under some black towels. I stare at what was under the towels. Everybody else stares at me. [Time Magazine's Lev Grossman is invited to see the iPhone]