With every iOS product Apple has sold, I've stood in line the day it launched to purchase it. The iPad 2 launch was no different. Everyone at my job knew that I was excited for this iteration of the iPad. Prior to Friday, most of my colleagues had either asked me what model I was getting or sought advice about which model they should purchase. I decided to make a day of this iPad 2 launch. I would take the day off, leisurely wake up on Friday and head over to the store after shopping (the Apple store I was going to is located in a mall).
Around 1 pm, I started to check Twitter to see if anyone had tweeted from the Short Hills store. Sure enough, people were tweeting to say that the line was getting long. Perhaps I should have tweaked my game plan a little and woke up earlier on Friday instead of later. I showered, got dressed and headed over to the Apple Store to see what the line was like.
When I arrived at the store around 2:30 pm, the line was already outside of the mall. There were at least 100 people in front of me outside. I didn't stop to examine the line that was formed inside of the mall. If the line was already outside, I knew there had to be a long line inside. 
People waiting behind meThe Short Hills Mall secruity only allows a certain amount of people to wait inside. Once that amount has been met the line is directed outside. I believe that for the original iPhone launch people were allowed to wait inside. The line twisted and wrapped throughout the mall. I'm sure that would have disrupted the flow of shoppers who weren't there for the iPhone launch. Since then the iPhone/iPad launches have been organized so that the line won't disrupt the other shoppers.
I didn't expect the line to be as long as it was. The previous iPad launch line wasn't nearly as long given the time I had arrived. Arriving 2 hours early last year, I was able to wait inside the mall. This year arriving 2.5 hours early meant you were standing outside. While standing in this line, I was able to talk to the people standing in front of and behind me. These were people from all walks of life who wanted to purchase an iPad 2 on day one. There were two retired grandfathers. One was a Jewish man who was holding a spot for his 13 year old grandson, a lover of apple products. When his grandson dismissed from school he would come by the iPad 2 line and wait with his grandfather. The other retired grandfather, a Taiwanese man, was making his first iPad purchase. He wanted a 32 GB Wifi+3G black iPad. He and I had several conversations about using the iPad, apps to download, and the reviews that we had read. Both grandfathers arrived after I did. In front of me was a Taiwanese recent college grad who was purchasing two iPads. His father was heading back to Taiwan next week and asked if he could purchase an iPad. The second iPad was for his cousin. In front of him was a 
Apple employees handing out hot chocolatemiddle-aged Jewish woman who's son and daughter would be the lucky recipients of a black 16 GB and white 16 GB Wifi iPad. Between the five of us, we were all connected in some way. The college grad and I have siblings who attended U Penn. We both studied Biomedical Engineering. The retired Jewish man had one daughter who graduated from Tufts University, the same university the Taiwanese college grad attended. The retired Taiwanese man and the college grad both grew up in the same city. The Jewish woman's husband is Israeli and the Taiwanese college grad works for a small startup company with a location in Israel. The more we all talked to each other the more similarities we found. Simply waiting in line for the iPad 2 wasn't the only thing we had in common.
By the time 5 pm struck the line had wrapped around the outside of the mall. This was much longer than the iPhone 4 launch line which was the longest line I've been in for an iOS device and longer than the original iPad line. My new friends were worried that there wouldn't be enough iPads for all of us. Any Apple employee that walked past our area was asked the same question "Will I get an iPad?". Friends and family members of those in line next to me came over to update us with the information they found out. Apple employees were handing out tickets with the model that you wanted. If you got a ticket, you were guaranteed an iPad 2. Now the question became "Will I get a ticket?"
By 5:30 pm, we had all received our iPad 2 tickets. Only one person from our group wasn't able to get the exact model they wanted. The last white 16 gb Wifi iPad ticket was given to the man in front of the Jewish woman. Her daughter would receive a black model instead. The line kept moving and my excitement kept building. I was inching closer and closer to iPad 2 ownership. Before I knew it, I was walking with an employee to the back of the Apple store to pick up my white 32 GB Wifi+3G iPad and pink Smart Cover. The sales associate shared that this was her first product launch. Like me, she had been in the line last year for the original iPad launch. She remembered the excitement and energy from last years launch. This year the energy was up a few notches. Our conversation was brief as the transaction took at most 10 minutes. I wasn't sticking around to have my iPad setup; that I could do myself.
As I walked out of the Apple store, iPad 2 in hand, I couldn't help but smile. I was the proud owner of an iPad 2. The experience had been more fun than any of the previous iOS device launches. A part of me wished I had arrived at the Apple Store an hour earlier in hopes that I would be inside of the mall. It was chilly outside. But I wouldn't have met the people I did. Who knows who I would have met an hour earlier or 30 minutes later. The people I would have interacted with would have been different. One thing would remain the same, we waited in line for the iPad 2 at the Short Hills Apple Store.
Sunday, June 12, 2011 at 11:13PM 
