Was there a waiting room problem?

[Livingplayfully]

I saw a post in the "Random" thread that some people who logged into the ticket sale at 12:06 went straight to a ticket buy page while people who had logged into the waiting room were in stuck into a supposed queue.

My question is did anybody buy a ticket without using the waiting room; log into the ticket system after 12:05?

[uncle sticky]

be interesting to find out. I jumped into the waiting room at 20 til, never got past about half way in the queue.

[gateway]

be interesting to find out. I jumped into the waiting room at 20 til, never got past about half way in the queue.

8 friends and I also had this issue.. started waiting room at 11:45 then 12:05 came, we saw the man.. and he ever ever so slowly moved, around 12:35 or so we saw the message all tickets where in the hands of card holders etc..

See my comments in the other thread why people who might of not waited had better luck than us who did.

[ridingnitro]

Me, my wife, my brother, and four friends of ours all entered the waiting room sometime between 11:45-50

4 of those entries got 2 tickets and vehicle pass
1 got two tickets (no vehicle passes available)
1 got a vehicle pass only (no tickets were available)
1 got nothing

So....no waiting room problems here

[Elorrum]

I know one person who got direct to ticket sale at 12:05. Could not enter the waiting room before that. So maybe an oops, but problem? They sold out. How is that a problem? Nothing ever gets reversed in this show.

[Lenstar]

Both myself and my girlfriend logged on to get tickets. We didn't get redirected for a minute or so. The green man hardly made any progress for the entire time for both of us. Sadly we weren't lucky this time around.

Still hoping to pick up tickets somehow but we know the odds are heavily stacked against us.

[smiffman]

Same here Uncle Sticky, logged in waiting room @ 11:45 then my green man went half way and that was it.

I did receive the sold out notice though, but my man kept walking.

Following the rules gets you nowhere.

[trilobyte]

I saw and heard sporadic anecdotal reports, but not enough to suggest there was a systemic problem. I also think some of the folks who had issues with getting held up in the waiting room a while may possibly have also had more to the story... multiple browser tabs, or one tab each in multiple browser types (IE, firefox, etc), or used multiple machines on the same IP, or computer + mobile device, or other behavior that would raise a flag to the ticketing provider that would lead to greater scrutiny of the account before they get through.

Burning Man has certainly had systemic problems in the past (mostly with previous ticketing providers). Even when there's much less demand (yesterday's odds were more than 4 to 1 against), if there's a problem with the system...the internet (here and otherwise) erupts with reports of issues.

[Timezone LaFontaine]

I also think some of the folks who had issues with getting held up in the waiting room a while may possibly have also had more to the story...

Trilo, I don't see how your own speculation or reference to anecdotal reports of attempts to game the system are any more helpful than ones that would indicate there was a technical problem. But if you're actually keeping score (I doubt it), I followed the procedure to the letter and got about 1/3rd of the way across the progress bar. Naturally with a disappointing outcome, I'm left to speculate about having been more aggressive in my attempt. But the truth is there's not enough reliable information to know one way or another, and I can't see the Borg having any incentive to offer more information, much less admit if there was some kind of problem.

[Elorrum]

I was on a computer with no other windows open, never tried to refresh. A friend told me her ticket was purchased by entering the sale at 12:05.

[c1a2m3h4a5m6]

That waiting room \ ticketfly thing didn't work at all for me or I just wasn't savvy enough to figure it out
waited for ever in queue and didn't get anywhere til near the last then website didn't seem to be responding
I got a ticket and tried to pay when it stopped and wanted me to register\login,,,,
by the time I got back to buying they took my ticket back and timed out my shopping cart

HELP???????

[trilobyte]

People are posting their anecdotal observations in a thread on a message board, as am I. Sure, I've seen and experienced the process as a participant and camp organizer a whole bunch of times, and as a volunteer on this site for nearly a decade, but there's no minimum bar for posting replies.

As always, if you have an actual ticket support issue you should visit the ticket support site linked in my signature (as well as on the ticketing pages) and take that up with the ticket team directly.

Fair is a wonderful thing, but it's also brutal. From what's been published, it sounds like odds were a little longer than 4 to 1 on getting a ticket in yesterday's sale (73k registrants, purchase avg of 1.87 per registrant... 136K tickets worth of demand and only 30K worth of supply). With or without a waiting room, with that kind of demand there would be a fairly significant amount of randomness in who was or was not able to get through. I am truly sorry that you weren't able to get what you needed in the sale, and I do hope you're able to get tickets through the after-market, but based on what I've seen I personally do not believe there was a systemic problem.

[c1a2m3h4a5m6]

would like to add,as a wannaburner,getting beyond the technical issues possibility and the general whining ,can anyone help me navigate a way to other possibilities to acquiring tickets??????
echoes of aftersales options that I know nothing about omgsales et.al
Haven't read all of Trilobytes posts yet ,,,,,,still venting......

[Ratty]

Cam. Stop venting and read your email.

[Timezone LaFontaine]

Well, let me put it this way. If anyone who was in the waiting room did not get an opportunity to purchase a ticket, then - if the system worked as intended - the only people who could have gotten tickets were other people who were in the waiting room. No one who arrived after the sale started at 12:05 should have been able to have an opportunity to purchase a ticket if there were still people in the waiting room who hadn't yet had that opportunity. Am I correct?

[TDPL2010]

We had 12 people in our camp trying to get tickets, only 1 got through to buy 2 tickets and 0 vehicle passes. Statistically speaking this suggests a high probability of foul play somewhere in the process.

[TDPL2010]

We had 12 people in our camp trying to get tickets, only 1 got through to buy 2 tickets and 0 vehicle passes. Statistically speaking this suggests a high probability of foul play somewhere in the process.

[gateway]

As an observer and full stack developer I know for a fact at times things can go wrong no matter how many times you run load tests on your server. I was one that followed the rules this time, in the past I had many browsers open and many ip's which I never had issues getting a ticket that way in the past. I decided to follow the rules per the email and jump in the waiting room line as well as several other friends of mine. None of us were able to secure tickets and I'm sure if a proper poll was done we would find an anomaly of people who came in at 11:45 that the chances of them getting tickets where much lower.

We can talk about server tech, open sockets, load balancers, proper session queuing and dropping off sessions as the que gets to full. It happens all the time but you will not hear anything from TicketFly of BM if their was an actual opp's.

As stated before the demand this year was much higher so of course it becomes harder to acquire tickets, I just have a gut feeling that something with the waiting room did not properly work as it should of and those who came in or did multi tabs, several refreshes were able to secure a connection to a server that had some open requests at that time.

Anyhow I'll try to get tickets via other means and hope that more down the line will open up for those of us really wanting to go vs those just looking to make money off of scalping tickets. I have already seen plenty of them on various sites go for double the price

Hopefully I will be able to see some of my friends this year at BM..

Cheers

[Elorrum]

Well, let me put it this way. If anyone who was in the waiting room did not get an opportunity to purchase a ticket, then - if the system worked as intended - the only people who could have gotten tickets were other people who were in the waiting room. No one who arrived after the sale started at 12:05 should have been able to have an opportunity to purchase a ticket if there were still people in the waiting room who hadn't yet had that opportunity. Am I correct?

Yes. This is what the email said. This is what I believed. Does it suck? Yes. Is someone going to apologize and sell me a ticket? No.

[BBadger]

From the anecdotes I've read it does seem that many follow the pattern that only at 12:05 that some people were allowed into the 11:45 queue after a long wait. Thia is different than someone signing on for the first time at 12:05, and receiving a ticket. This would not indictate foul play, but more the servicing issues described by Gateway above.

[Eric]

We had 12 people in our camp trying to get tickets, only 1 got through to buy 2 tickets and 0 vehicle passes. Statistically speaking this suggests a high probability of foul play somewhere in the process.

Statistically speaking it points out that the demand completely overwhelms the number of tickets available. Did you read the numbers Trilo posted above?

(73k registrants, purchase avg of 1.87 per registrant... 136K tickets worth of demand and only 30K worth of supply).

Roughly one out of every four registrants got a chance at tickets, and having only one out of your 12 be chosen from the 73,000 applying isn't shocking (Does it suck? Yes. Is it improbable? Not even close). This is the reality of an event that is massively more popular than the number of tickets that can be sold for it. We can only hope that the efforts to get the numbers of vehicles down is impressing the BLM & areas affected so that they allow population growth when the contract negotiations for next year start. We've been stuck at 70,000 for years while demand only grows.

[gateway]

Roughly one out of every four registrants got a chance at tickets, and having only one out of your 12 be chosen from the 73,000 applying isn't shocking (Does it suck? Yes. Is it improbable? Not even close). This is the reality of an event that is massively more popular than the number of tickets that can be sold for it. We can only hope that the efforts to get the numbers of vehicles down is impressing the BLM & areas affected so that they allow population growth when the contract negotiations for next year start. We've been stuck at 70,000 for years while demand only grows.

Needless to say, having multi tabs open and refreshing would of given you a better luck at a ticket then what was suggested in the email and waiting room.

[Eric]

Needless to say, having multi tabs open and refreshing would of given you a better luck at a ticket then what was suggested in the email and waiting room.

Would it? Just because there are some anecdotes (and the one first-hand comment I've seen) doesn't mean it would work better if everyone did it. It also doesn't mean it would work for everyone - what were the exact parameters for every person this worked for, and do those parameters have to be met for it to work for everyone (sort of like an easter-egg in a game)?

It's all speculation, whereas the FACT is that there were 73,000 registrants in a sale with only 30,000 tickets, and, even if the "One Person One Ticket" suggestion (that, IMHO, is stupid) that keeps floating around had been implemented. more than half would have come up empty. With the actual request average - 1.87 tickets per registrant - it's pure luck for anyone that got a ticket.

It also doesn't mean the system will work the same next year, or even in the DiVinci sale, because they might close that (apparent) loophole.

[gateway]

Needless to say, having multi tabs open and refreshing would of given you a better luck at a ticket then what was suggested in the email and waiting room.

Would it? Just because there are some anecdotes (and the one first-hand comment I've seen) doesn't mean it would work better if everyone did it. It also doesn't mean it would work for everyone - what were the exact parameters for every person this worked for, and do those parameters have to be met for it to work for everyone (sort of like an easter-egg in a game)?

It's all speculation, whereas the FACT is that there were 73,000 registrants in a sale with only 30,000 tickets, and, even if the "One Person One Ticket" suggestion (that, IMHO, is stupid) that keeps floating around had been implemented. more than half would have come up empty. With the actual request average - 1.87 tickets per registrant - it's pure luck for anyone that got a ticket.

It also doesn't mean the system will work the same next year, or even in the DiVinci sale, because they might close that (apparent) loophole.

Noticed I bolded luck As someone who builds backend server stacks I can mentally walk though the process and users maybe in the queue (waiting room) had their session id's stored in memory (hopefully enough to store session ids or tokens, otherwise new ones come in old ones get pushed out or persisted to disk) . If someone does another http/s request (chance) that can at times create a brand new session to the server which at the right times depending on the health check of the load balancers push you though to a server thats accepting requests, thus letting you though the waiting gates.

This may not be the case and you can try to do many things to alleviate the issue by storing the users IP (which isn't good if your at a company and it shares a single ip with its user) to avoid multi refreshes, etc.

The simple fact of server stacks is the requests come in though the load balancer, the load balancer knows the health of the servers in the web stack layer and if a server has an opening the request goes though and eventually kaboom your in.

Is this the case for the current situation who knows, but my personal opinion is some sessions/tokens/ips or what have you in the waiting room where dropped thus keeping people in the ever very slow person walking towards his goal, while potentially those refreshing or entering at the right time would get fast tracked to the wonderful world of buying a ticket

This is probably compounded on the server side due to the massive amount of people trying to get tickets as pointed out a few times already.

Question would be, where load tests of this scale tested with the waiting room to make sure no wonky things happen?

Again congrats to those who where able to get a ticket and we will never know if their was an issue with the waiting room

I will continue to search for tickets while my other friends have given up

[vargaso]

An interesting thought from DustyCrevasse (heh) on the Main Sale thread (viewtopic.php?p=1105120#p1105120):

SO here’s the thing. Assuming it worked as they said:

"when the sale opens, everyone in the 20-minute waiting room will be assigned a place in line that is not related to when they entered the sale. Anyone who joins after 20 minutes will be placed in line after those already in the queue."

Assuming there were more people in the waiting room than their were tickets available then nobody who was NOT in the waiting room should have gotten a ticket at all. If there were fewer people in the waiting room then their were ticket available then everyone in the waiting room should have gotten tickets.

The methodology certainly did no match the description as there are MANY instances of people getting tickets that were not in the waiting room AND there are MANY instances of people that were in the waiting room not getting tickets.

I know of 12 waiting room attendees. None got tickets. I know of 2 people that got tickets that were NOT in the waiting room (came after 12:05).

I have to think that there were more people in the waiting room then there were tickets available. So, yeah.

[Livingplayfully]

Thanks for the info everybody, obviously there was a problem. The org did not do what they said they were going to do. I think they should take responsibility for that and apologize.

[skeeve]

The waiting room certainly didn't work as I expected it to.

I clicked the link with the promo code 11:50. I only got the "Incorrect promo code or sale hasn't started" message. I never got a message saying that I was in the waiting room.

At 12:07, still no change. I figured that I wasn't in the waiting room or in the queue. So I held my breath and reloaded the link to the sale (the one with the promo code). I they popped right into ticket sales and purchased my tickets. Done by 12:12 or so.

[The Rod]

Thanks for the info everybody, obviously there was a problem. The org did not do what they said they were going to do. I think they should take responsibility for that and apologize.

Well, you can wish in one hand and do something else in the other...

[melomel]

It's all speculation, whereas the FACT is that there were 73,000 registrants in a sale with only 30,000 tickets, and, even if the "One Person One Ticket" suggestion (that, IMHO, is stupid) that keeps floating around had been implemented. more than half would have come up empty. With the actual request average - 1.87 tickets per registrant - it's pure luck for anyone that got a ticket.

It also doesn't mean the system will work the same next year, or even in the DiVinci sale, because they might close that (apparent) loophole.

Those are facts, but they aren't really the full story. How many of those potential "ticket desires" actually translate to people that would show up at the event this year if the ticket supply was infinite?
Some people buy 2 tickets if they have the $ because they fully intend on reselling/gifting/finding a friend who couldn't buy one, but they don't know who it will go to at purchase time.
Some people register with multiple accounts.
Some groups of people pool together and all try to buy the max, assuming not all will get through and then redistribute within their group.
Some people purchase tickets with the intent on reselling at a higher price
Some people buy tickets since they can't just go buy one later and I really don't have any idea if they will really go, but assume they can resell

.... and I don't even know how many more explanations that account for some of the difference between ticket desire vs. people that would show up if they could. Does anyone know?

[Eric]

Those are facts, but they aren't really the full story. How many of those potential "ticket desires" actually translate to people that would show up at the event this year if the ticket supply was infinite?

Again, you're taking facts and speculating, and now you're speculating on something that simply isn't going to happen ("infinite" tickets). The tickets aren't infinite - they are a finite item, full stop. They have been a finite item since 2011, they will be a finite item from here on out (they were finite before 2011, we just never crossed that threshold). Their quantity is set by the BLM in the contract Burning Man operates under - BLM says how many people can be on playa, that number determines the numbers of tickets. You can make all the idle speculation you want on the lines of "what would happen if we could float BRC in the clouds", but that doesn't make it reality.

It's really, really simple: more people want to go than the number of tickets that exist. If you removed every person who bought tickets "on spec" or fell into one of your categories there would still be more people that want to go than there are tickets. If the Waiting Room had worked flawlessly, there would still be more people who wanted tickets than there are tickets to sell. There is simply more demand than there is supply. It sucks, but that's why they are selling out. We have gone through this every year since 2011, it is the new reality. I don't like it anymore than anyone else (I have plenty of friends who didn't get tickets either), but I understand the reason.