To Wii Or Not To Wii

(From the Janesville Messenger, 12-3-06)


For the past several months, all we’ve been hearing about in our household is the incredible new Nintendo Wii video game system that was coming out before Christmas.

My son couldn’t wait. He was caught up in the “I-have-to-have-it-as-soon-as-it’s-released” hysteria. Since there was no way I was going to stand in line outside a store for days or even hours, we signed up on the shopping web site Amazon.com to get e-mail notification of when it would be available for sale there. Every day for a month, I was asked the question, “Has Amazon e-mailed us yet?”

Finally, on November 16, the e-mail came. The Wii would be released for purchase on Amazon on the morning of November 19, Pacific Standard Time. There was no actual time on the notice, but I, like many others, assumed they meant midnight PST, or 2 a.m. Central time. The e-mail warned that for every unit they would have available, they had sent 100 notifications. So in effect, you had a one percent chance of getting one when they went on sale.

I had no intention of trying my luck. But when I was still awake late that night, I made the last-minute decision to stay up and see if I could give my son a giant surprise the next morning.

At 2 a.m., I sat in front of my computer screen, hitting the “refresh” button every minute like the people in the hatch on “Lost.” I was not alone. People from all over the world (literally) were posting messages on the site. “Has anyone got one yet?” “Are they for sure releasing it at midnight?” The only change to the screen was some opportunistic joker who bought one at a store and put his up for sale for triple the price.

I waited. And waited. The posted messages started to turn angry. People called Amazon’s customer service line and posted the conflicting answers they were given. “They said it will be any minute now.” “They don’t know when it will be.” “It won’t be available today.” There were accusations of strategically-posted lies to get others to leave the site and increase their chances.

A half hour passed, then an hour. The angry postings were mixed with amusing ones. My contribution was in the form of a haiku:

Was here at midnight
But Nintendo Wii was not
Curse you, Amazon

At 3:15 a.m., I gave up and went to bed. Four hours later when I awoke, they still weren’t for sale.

Finally at 10 a.m., Amazon released it and the available quantity sold out within a minute. I was not one of the lucky ones.

So we are Wii-less, for now. But I did score some points with my son. And that’s better than anything I could have purchased.

(Follow-up Note: We finally got one in late January.)