Apple Selling 20,000 iPads Per Hour? One Dude Thinks So.

Unless you live in a tree you’re well aware that Apple opened up the flood gates for iPad pre-ordering this morning. In an attempt to gauge just how successful those early sales were, Andrew Erlichson, CEO of photo-sharing site Phanfare, made a rudimentary comparison of his order IDs to surmise that Apple is selling 20,000 iPads (or $12 million) per hour.

Here’s Erlichson’s not-so-scientific means of coming to this figure: “We just bought two iPads, about 30 minutes apart. Our order IDs are 10,000 apart. Assuming those order IDs are sequential, and they appear to be, then Apple is selling 20,000 iPads per hour. Assuming most orders are for the $499 model, and that people are only buying 1 per order, that means Apple is selling $10MM/hour. Of course that is not sustainable, but if they did it for a year, it would be $87.6B. Now, of course, we can’t be sure every order was for an iPad. Apple does sell other stuff. But at 830am in the morning on the east coast, my guess is that most of the orders were for iPads.”

By no means is that hard evidence, but it does indicate a strong start for the iPad. We know those 20,000/hour aren’t coming from one rich dude with a big Apple-boner because Apple put a 2-per-customer limit on pre-orders. [via Silicon Alley Insider]