Apple invites media to special iPad event on March 2

iPad 2nd generation special event“Apple on Wednesday sent an invitation to media inviting them to a special event on March 2 in San Francisco, Calif,” Jim Dalrymple reports for The Loop.

“According to the invitation received by The Loop, the event will be held at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts at 10:00 am,” Dalrymple reports. “This is the same venue Apple has used to introduce a number of products in recent years.”

Read more in the full article here.

51 Comments

  1. I wonder if there is any significance to the Maps app icon being shown (other than an event location tie-in)—perhaps an Apple mapping engine sneak-peak?

    I also notice a rocker-style volume switch as opposed to a rumored change to split buttons—do the iPad 2 cases floating around out the have cutouts for rocker or split?

    1. It would be silly to reveal the actual shape, button positioning and other details of the iPad 2 in the picture so what that tells you is by peeling away the date you’re essentially peeling back the old iPad to be replaced with a newer version. 

      If you had a girlfriend who forced you to wear face masks for your complexion you’d understand the analogy.

  2. I keep asking myself if that’s the announcement for the iPad 2, why concatenate that with an announcement this week with the launch of the new MacBook line. 

    Wouldn’t that just suck the oxygen out of the iPad launch? Doesn’t Apple stagger major product launches months apart so the Apple faithful will have an excuse to queue up in front of the Apple Store every once in a while?

    1. I’m not sure I’m understanding you correctly. If by concatenate you mean announcing two devices, one after the other, on the same day, in the same event, then nothing so far is telling us that they are doing that.

      If you meant by presumably announcing MBPs tomorrow, followed by an iPad announcement a week later, then I don’t see any oxygen suction there. MBP gets its own full event, people get to line up (if they wish), press gets to report on it for almost a full week, before the iPad 2 takes the stage, for the next round of publicity. And even this assumes Apple is to announce an update to MBP sometime soon, which is doubtful. Either they will send out a separate invitation for a separate event, or there will be a minor update to the MBP not worthy of anything more than a short online store take-down and a press release.

      1. I still find it odd that Apple have to close down their entire online store operations and replace it with a holding page full of post-it notes, just to add a few new models of computer now and again…

        …or maybe that is all part of the hype machine.

  3. Correct me if I’m wrong but the back looks straight! Much like the iPhone 4 from what I can see. I’m pretty sure were losing the curve on our iPads. And I want cooler backgrounds!

  4. @Ballmer’s left nut

    I can think of several reasons for including MBP in a iPad2 announcement.

    1. The updates to the MBP line are not significant enough to warrant an event on their own; therefore, without the iPad event they would just appear on the web site. This allows Apple to introduce them and talk about a couple things of note, like the Lightpeak tech.

    2. The update to the iPad isn’t enough to fill an entire media event. It’s just hardware; the only thing they might demo is Facetime. They want to make a big splash, but if that’s all they introduce the event will be over too soon.

    3. By introducing both products together, Apple can emphasize the event as the future direction of their entire product line and mention again how Lion is bringing the Mobile and Desktop technology closer together.

  5. I intend to sell my 32GB 3G ipad and get the new one because I have finally admitted I am addicted to all Apple product updates.
    There is nothing wrong with my iPad, and I dont need cameras etc., but logic has no power over my Apple addiction.

    Will have to get the new Macbook Pro, even though my old one is still in first years warranty and works perfectly.

    If they put a backlit keyboard on the Air, I will buy one of those, too. (Well I do have the old one WITH the backlit keyboard).

    Maybe its not Apple per se I am addicted to but backlit keyboards?

    Aaaah, the backlit keyboard. Like a warm friend in the middle of a dark night….

    My God, is that the time? I have an appointment with my therapist at 11!

  6. Guys (and Gals)!

    Relax. Just checked the image on the invitation with the image on the first page of the iPad gallery on apple.com. Same exact upper right corner of the same exact image. Water droplet: same. Buttons: same. Not saying there’s not gonna be nothing new, but those two guys in sunglasses behind the fence are just railway workers…

    1. …”“Apple on Wednesday sent an invitation to media inviting them to a special event on March 2 in San Francisco, Calif,” Jim Dalrymple reports for The Loop.”

      MDN is a Apple-related news aggregator. In other words, they scour the internet for Apple-related news and post condensed version of original articles, with full attribution and links to the source.

      While they occasionally quote your MacRumours site, this article did NOT do that, neither did most of other articles today. And, by the way, your MacRumours is pretty much doing exactly the same thing — aggregating news from other sources. As a matter of fact, they are quoting exactly the SAME source as MDN for this particular story. Perhaps MDN should shut down MacRumours…?

    2. MDN copies and pastes from all over the net. That’s what it does. There are a few internally generated articles but for the most part an article is posted in part, a URL to that article is also posted and usually a witty comment is made on that article.

      That’s MDN. If you don’t like the format, bye, bye.

    3. 😀 apparently you don’t understand this site at all !

      do you use google news ? they are NOT typing or copy pasting all those articles you know 🙂

      well here it’s the same, they copy paste from all over the web, and we like it !

  7. If the iPad 2 won’t have a higher res display, how come the invite shows the line/streak indicating retina display?
    Compare to iPhone 4, iPod Touch, then look at the current images of iPad on Apple’s website – no tell-tale streak for the latter.
    What will 2011 be the year of? How about higher res displays? Please!

    1. It is something that people have become accustomed to, nobody even thinks about, and therefore nobody ever gets properly punished for.

      It keeps getting glossed over, which makes it the number one thing I’m really annoyed by…

    1. I noticed that lol.
      Or maybe cause I have to buy two….
      Going to an expensive year for me.
      Good for apple though, 2 iPads, at least 1 iMac in June/July. And maybe an airport extreme for my mother…

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