Tickets For Apple’s WWDC 2013 Sell Out In Under 2 Minutes

Post by xenophanes » Thu, Apr 25, 2013, 8:58 PM UTC

lutusp wrote: post #100

xenophanes wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You "don't think you've thought your position through" despite me predicting the complaint you made and pre-including an acknowledgement of the problem? The fact is -- contrary to your claims, compatible with mine -- raising prices does both. It slants things towards people who value it more in dollars. People get a higher score for this both by valuing WWDC more and by valuing dollars less. That is better than rando…

> Note also that, "if demand exceeds supply, raise prices" is basic economics and standard advice on HN for many other things. Yes, if the point is to maximize profit. If you have any other goal in mind, then maybe it's not the best strategy. For example, if you want diverse attendance at a conference, raising the prices to what the market will bear may not be the best approach. > ... you would not then reply saying…

Post by rdouble » Thu, Apr 25, 2013, 9:02 PM UTC

xenophanes wrote: post #98

lutusp wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They should raise their prices. A lot. So the people who value it the most get tickets. The problem with raising prices should be obvious -- it preferentially selects wealthier attendees, not necessarily those who "value it the most". > This is not an ideal solution but it's much better than the current one. I don't think you've thought your position through. All raising prices achieves is to limit attendance to th…

You "don't think you've thought your position through" despite me predicting the complaint you made and pre-including an acknowledgement of the problem? The fact is -- contrary to your claims, compatible with mine -- raising prices does both. It slants things towards people who value it more in dollars. People get a higher score for this both by valuing WWDC more and by valuing dollars less. That is better than rando…

Post by smackfu » Thu, Apr 25, 2013, 9:30 PM UTC

SeoxyS wrote: post #48

Put bluntly: this is bullshit. The advance notice was slightly better than last year, but the website was intermittently down for the entire two minutes tickets were on sale. I was there, trying to buy them at 9:59am, at 10:00:20am the website finally went live, pressed the buy button and was greeted by "unable to process your request." Seriously, Apple needs to figure this shit out. Whether that means opening up mor…

Post by neop » Thu, Apr 25, 2013, 11:49 PM UTC

neop wrote: post #94

smackfu wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way competent ticket sellers work is that they give out tokens to people as they start the process. Once all the tokens are given out, new people get denied. The token has to be refreshed as they go through the purchase steps, otherwise it gets put back in the pool.

This was certainly not the case here. Many people (including me) were able to add the tickets to their shopping cart and start the checkout process, only to be received by an error after entering shipping and billing information.