After I get pissed and/or curious I do crazy stuff.. So I decided to get up really early today, go by a couple of Apple stores and check my chances of getting an iPad 2.
Around 5am I was at the West 14th store. My jaw almost dropped... 400+ waiting in line! 350+ were asian scalpers and they were up front of course. They had chairs and sleeping bags, clearly they had spent the night there.
20 mins later, around 5.20am, I was at the Upper West Side store. Line was smaller but again 200+. Once again the vast majority were asians and they were up front. Same situation, sleeping bags and everything. I did not even bother with the 5th Av and SoHo stores. I was looking for a 32/64 gig AT&T model, the ones that have the most demand so I did not even bother to wait in line. 200x2 = 400 iPads to be sold before me and I doubt the UWS gets high volumes daily.
I have nothing against Asians and I am not a racist. But I have much against these scalpers. All those being "liberal" and "open minded" saying US is a free country and everyone can do anything they want with their iPads once they buy them, essentially backing up the scalpers, well, you speak because you have NO idea what's going on in NYC. All the smarta$$ comments of "get up and go earlier" do not apply here. The asians have simply dominated. All those complaining that NY gets the most of the shipments, again, we are not buying them!! From what I have seen and read since launch day, I strongly believe that 90% of all iPad 2s sold in NYC go straight to the gray market.
So I am sorry to say this but for anyone in NYC, do not waste your time. This has been getting worse day by day and we are now at the point where it is simply impossible to get an iPad 2 from the Apple stores. Unless Apple does something I only see this getting worse until the gray market is saturated. It comes to show the power of masses..
