“The Apple Inc. faithful—and a few enterprising individuals [selling places in the queues] —lined up early Friday in anticipation of the iPad 2 tablet,” Roger Cheng reports for The Wall Street Journal. “Scores of people waited outside on a soggy morning here for the follow-up to Apple’s blockbuster device at the company’s marquee Fifth Avenue store in Manhattan. Another dozen were in line at Apple’s store in the Upper West Side. The iPad 2 goes on sale in stores at 5 p.m.”
“Alongside the Apple fanboys Friday were a few individuals looking to profit from their highly coveted positions. Amanda Foote, a 20-year-old college student, got outside of the Fifth Avenue Apple store at 5 p.m. EST on Wednesday. But unlike many people in the line, she had no intention of purchasing an iPad,” Cheng reports. “‘I’m trying to go home to Florida,’ she said. ‘And I want to go see Lady Gaga in concert.’ Instead, she posted her seat on Craigslist and other listing websites, and eventually sold her spot for $900 in cash to Hazem Sayed, the developer of the iPhone and iPad application AskLocal.”
Cheng reports, “The enthusiastic crowd underscores the draw of an Apple launch, even for a product that many have deemed an incremental upgrade. It also illustrates the strength of Apple’s position in the emerging market for mobile computing devices, where eight out 10 tablets purchased in 2010 were iPads… The new device is expected to produce strong sales for Apple. A study from ChangeWave Research showed that more than four out of five respondents who plan to buy a tablet soon said they’ll purchase an iPad. Although competitors have rushed devices to the market trumpeting more features than Apple’s devices, very few respondents were seriously considering them.
Read more in the full article here.
Flickr user “Out N’ Front” has posted photos of the soggy lineup outside Apple Store Fifth Avenue in NYC this morning here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Fred Mertz” for the heads up.]