

Google I/O 2013 Registration Sells Out In 49 Minutes - derpenxyne
http://techcrunch.com/2013/03/13/google-io-2013-registration-sells-out-in-49-minutes-as-users-report-problems-early-on-making-payments/

======
FlyingAvatar
Three people (including me) from my team were attempting to get tickets. We
were all on the page 30 minutes before opening and entered the queue within
seconds of opening.

2 of us never got anything other than the looking for tickets page multiple
times.

1 of us got to the payment page on one attempt only to have it fail.

It's frustrating that we should each spend 1.5 hours of time to babysit what
is essentially a lottery.

If it's going to work like a lottery, then just make it one.

~~~
doodyhead
Two in our company were on it also. Started within seconds of it opening and
went through the 6-minute process 7 or 8 times. Neither of us even got to the
Wallet stage.

I managed to get one last year on my third attempt but I was using multiple
browser windows. They had a clear warning about that this time, so we stuck to
one tab each in the vain hope that it would give us some priority or
preference.

I will try again next year. The uncertainty makes it hard to plan though,
given that I'm living in Ireland.

Freebies are nice and all but would happily forgo them or pay 3-4x the ticket
price to be able to attend.

------
untog
Given that 99% of the people I could see on Twitter were not able to get
through to the checkout, 49 minutes feels like a relatively meaningless
number. I suspect that if the system actually worked properly it would have
sold out in 30 seconds.

~~~
BHSPitMonkey
From what I've been reading, it sounds like Google Wallet was really the weak
link in the chain. A significant number of reports from people who were lucky
enough to grab a slot indicated 5xx errors and other difficulties with the
payment processing stage. If that hadn't been an issue, I think the sellout
would have been reached a lot sooner.

~~~
chadmaughan
Several people at my work had the same Google Wallet problem. Most of us had a
$900 charge that was later cancelled. Ultimate tease.

This was my favorite tweet:

"Another year, another batch of developers who will be sure to never ever use
+Google Wallet in anything they build. #io13" [1]

[1] <https://twitter.com/seedifferently/status/311856162440093696>

------
bobz
I'm pretty sure this outcome is exactly what Google wants. Hardest tickets to
get in town, even with a $900 price tag. Why else would they continue to give
away such great swag at an event with such high demand?

On the up side, streaming basically the entire event for free does calm the
righteous indignation to a degree.

Still, it would have been nice to get a chance to meet and chat with other
people working on the platforms I use.

~~~
Samuel_Michon
_"I'm pretty sure this outcome is exactly what Google wants. [...] Why else
would they continue to give away such great swag at an event with such high
demand?"_

I agree. Giving away equipment worth more than the ticket price doesn't
attract the right crowd.

Apple has similar problems (lots of devs who want to come, but not enough
space or manpower) but it at least seems to put in an effort to filter out the
developers who don't need access to Apple engineers. It doesn't give away
equipment, ticket price was raised to $1600, tickets are personalized and are
non-transferrable, and the presentations are put online for free soon after
WWDC ends. Despite all that, last year's WWDC was sold out in under 2 hours.

~~~
objclxt
> _Despite all that, last year WWDC was sold out in under 2 hours._

...and I'm willing to bet that if Apple announced the time WWDC tickets went
on sale in advance, as Google do, it would sell out a lot faster.

~~~
Samuel_Michon
I doubt it. Just as with I/O, the ordering system is the bottleneck. If the
systems could manage it, both events would sell out in mere minutes.

Recap of WWDC 2012 ticket sales: for the first time, Apple didn't pre-announce
the WWDC dates or when ticket sales would start. People were quite upset
because it was so sudden and because it was so early in the day – sales began
at 8:30AM EST. Per John Gruber, on the day: _"Sold out in two hours, before
the U.S. west coast even woke up."_
<http://daringfireball.net/linked/2012/04/25/wwdc-2012>

------
zdgman
With the way the checkout system worked wouldn't it have been better to just
have developers note their intention to attend beforehand and then on sales
day just hold a raffle (in batches)? Everyone gets an email when they are able
to purchase a ticket (selected at random, hence the raffle) and you only send
out emails as long as you have tickets available for purchase.

This type of process would control the flow of participants and keep the
experience optimal for those going through checkout. I wonder if they are
going to release any numbers for how many people were trying to hit the
servers all at once.

------
joshuasortino
I was extremely frustrated that, while I had been "reserved" a ticket, the
payment repeatedly timed out and I was kicked back to the "we're looking for
tickets" page.

Oh well, I guess that's what happens when hundreds of thousands of people are
DDoSing a page.

~~~
danz
You're definitely not the only one. My order was canceled due to "unable to
notify merchant of this order". Very frustrating.

------
gcb0
And everyone thinks they're getting a glass for $900

------
evilmushroom
I got a ticket-- been lucky the last four years.

Frustrating experience every year.

I "got" a ticket three times, but Google Wallet times out and wouldn't let me
buy the first two. The third time around (after waiting in the queue), I
noticed an ajax request being fired when you clicked the "buy" button (which
would become disabled.... it would time out and it would still sit there as if
it were doing something. Reenabled the button, pressed it again... it fired
off the request... timed out... timed out... then finally it made it and
kicked me to the rest of the registration process. Apparently refreshing the
"buy" Google Wallet page would work too.

Google Wallet fail.

~~~
ericd
Any tips for next year? I never got even a Google Wallet popup.

------
idont
It looks like the dev team running Google I/O website also had issues to get
tickets... for the Velocity conference. ;)

------
crynix
I thought I had gotten a ticket. This makes me sad.

[https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/--gAC0BE9NrA/UUCiUYUp90I/A...](https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/--gAC0BE9NrA/UUCiUYUp90I/AAAAAAAAIcw/kA3qkNn8Ta4/s684/sad.tiff)

------
jimrandomh
I was on the site at opening, got to the "looking for tickets" page, and never
got further than that. I'm kind of pissed that they didn't price the tickets
high enough to clear the market; I would've gladly paid more, but now I can't.

~~~
chadscira
I was victim of this too, i even set my clock ahead and attempted to register
5 mins early (which was working as far as i could tell).

------
suyash
Not entirely true story what the headline is implying. It's not that all who
logged in before 7:50 PDT got the ticket, I waited and waited and kept on
trying without any luck. I started at 6:59 am and gave up at 7:38 am.

------
spartango
I haven't been to I/O, and have only seen a few of the talks online. Can
someone explain what the biggest appeal for going to the conference is? Talks?
Networking? Workshops?

~~~
kyrra
Free gear. Last year was the Nexus Q, Nexus 7, and Galaxy Nexus.

The talks are good too, but the appeal has definitely been the gear, which is
unfortunate.

Edit: to add, interacting with the devs is really nice. I went 2 years ago and
was able to talk with the GWT team a bit after one of the talks. As well, if
you want to network, there is definitely lots of opportunity for it, but it is
not something I've cared about.

~~~
evilmushroom
Networking is the major reason I go.

Test devices are nice, but I can have my company buy me pretty much any test
device I need.

Sessions are good too (but are also online)

------
yskchu
I wanted to go too, wow the tickets really sold out fast.

Ah well, the sessions are available online; though of course, lose out on the
networking not being there.

------
reidmain
Friend of mine had her ticket timeout twice because Google Checkout and Wallet
kept breaking.

How do they still have these problems after all these years?

