Everyone buying too many tickets?

[junglesmacks]

B - The liberal responses to me helping my fellow Burner PARTICIPANT accomplish their goal while not getting trampled by the BORG

Sean Hannity? Is that you?


All of a sudden, this is all starting to make sense..

[trilobyte]

@NOT Larry HarV - see Remi's post, I'm going to go with C. While not everyone who registered for the pre-sale was awarded tickets, the majority of people did get them. It's certainly plausible that you might know of someone that wasn't successful (and whose registration info carried forward to the main sale), I don't buy that entire projects and crews were denied. I'd be curious to know which project (or projects) were so horribly affected.

[theCryptofishist]

I can't wait to see what comes first:

A - moderator denies me my right to free speech and your right to:
Freedom of assembly, sometimes used interchangeably with the freedom of association, is the individual right to come together and collectively express, promote, pursue and defend common interests.[1] The right to freedom of association is recognized as a human right, a political freedom and a civil liberty.

Couple things... Freedom of Speech doesn't work that way. You're not insured Freedom of Speech on someone else's website that they fund. You're posting entirely at the pleasure of other people here, and you can and will be silenced for very good reason or sheer whim. The mods here have a track record of being pretty fair. You certainly do NOT have a constitutional right to post on ePlaya.

Secondly, my guess is you'll probably be silenced quick-smart for your choice in pen names. I mean, unless you're ACTUALLY Larry Harvey, in which case... did you forget your password? One of the mods can help you with that, I'm sure.

Nipples
Have I told you I love you?

Well, except when you beat me to the punch in explaining how freedom of speech works, because then my admiration is tempered with the twinges of frustration that someone else beat me to my chance for showing off...

Maybe they'll let him change names. Or does he have to re-register?

[theCryptofishist]

@NOT Larry HarV - see Remi's post, I'm going to go with C. While not everyone who registered for the pre-sale was awarded tickets, the majority of people did get them. It's certainly plausible that you might know of someone that wasn't successful (and whose registration info carried forward to the main sale), I don't buy that entire projects and crews were denied. I'd be curious to know which project (or projects) were so horribly affected.

I'm still trying to work through why not getting tickets in December precludes one from getting them in the main sale.
I'm easily confused, I guess.

[Eric]

I'm still trying to work through why not getting tickets in December precludes one from getting them in the main sale.
I'm easily confused, I guess.

It doesn't- they're automatically entered into the Main Sale; the only thing that changes is they only get 2 tickets max instead of the 4 they may have registered for in the Early Sale.

Anyone who is complaining about not getting tickets before the drawing even happens is just a whiner, IMHO. I have no sympathy, though I will if someone doesn't actually get one in the sale.

[theCryptofishist]

I'm still trying to work through why not getting tickets in December precludes one from getting them in the main sale.
I'm easily confused, I guess.

It doesn't- they're automatically entered into the Main Sale; the only thing that changes is they only get 2 tickets max instead of the 4 they may have registered for in the Early Sale.

Anyone who is complaining about not getting tickets before the drawing even happens is just a whiner, IMHO. I have no sympathy, though I will if someone doesn't actually get one in the sale.

Yeah, what he said.

[Mofessor]

Mofessor- in regards to the "name on ticket" idea (that's been talked to death over the last few months): not only does the LLC, by their own admission in the FAQ, not have the resources to do that system, but there is also the fact that lots of us don't want to go through the TSA to get into the event. I'm fine with the Gate search (we don't carry stow-aways & I know why they do it), but having to give my ID when I flash my ticket is really an intrusion I don't want when I'm trying to get away from "normal society" and it's paranoia."

Uhmmm... showing your ID is equivalent to the TSA, but searching your vehicle is fine? Really? If it's justifiable to do a quick search of your vehicle, I have a hard time understanding how showing a fellow burner your ID would be a TSA-like intrusion.

Q: Why not just register each ticket with a name and require ID at the Gate to use the ticket?
A: It has been our experience that a great many tickets are purchased for giving away, ensuring a project has coverage, or selling later to a friend in need. The administrative cost of changing the name on every ticket that ever changes hands exceeds our capacity. And frankly, many of your fellow BRC citizens are uncomfortable with the notion of showing ID just to enter the event (nor suffering through even longer wait times at the Gate). While we know some events use non-transferable tickets, we're not convinced it works for our community. We're counting on everyone playing fairly so we don't have to go to an "ID-specific" process for ticket sales and event entry.

We'll see how many people "play fairly," and I doubt showing an ID really slows down entry to the event that much. As for changing the name on tickets, I'm sure that for an event with 50,000+ people and $15 million + revenue, could solve this problem--especially if it's to give more people a fair opportunity at getting a ticket.

I couldn't agree with the no-name-on-tickets more, and, yes, like the other Mods my name is in the lottery. I've never understood the complete freakout over the change- it's like people would rather have it sell out in a week with tons of people getting screwed than have an extremely good chance of getting a ticket.

I don't have a problem with a lottery, if it's accompanied by a system that doesn't encourage people to purchase more tickets than they need and does more than this one does to discourage scalpers. I actually don't understand the freakout over showing your ID, nor do I understand the argument put forth by Trilobyte that a reason for not having people show IDs is because, essentially, it would be hard for them to turn around at the gate if they forgot their ID. Since people are much more likely to forget their tickets than ID, this seems a non-reason.

[BBadger]

I don't have a problem with a lottery, if it's accompanied by a system that doesn't encourage people to purchase more tickets than they need and does more than this one does to discourage scalpers. I actually don't understand the freakout over showing your ID, nor do I understand the argument put forth by Trilobyte that a reason for not having people show IDs is because, essentially, it would be hard for them to turn around at the gate if they forgot their ID. Since people are much more likely to forget their tickets than ID, this seems a non-reason.

Could you explain to me what exactly would checking ID would even really solve? People buy tickets for other people all the time. I did it last year. So what happens if I need to transfer the ticket to a different person? What if I don't know, at purchase time, who will receive the ticket? Do I just fill in the name of "someone" temporarily and then transfer it later? If so, how does that help with scalpers, who could fill in some bogus name only to transfer the ticket later?

With having names on tickets comes a whole other slew of problems. Do you abandon paper tickets because a ticket needs to be voided when transferred? Do you ship out new ones? Is it now a printable barcode ID? How does one actually even verify that the ID the person is carrying is not false?

On BradTerm's speeding-up-the-gate thread his suggestion is to make everything electronic or have barcode scanners. However, the problem with that is that the scanning systems need to be purchased, weatherproofed, networked, and synchronized to ensure there are no duplicates. I can only imagine the true gates of hell opening up if that system went down and nobody could enter.

But again, with easily transferred names, would the above even accomplish anything?

[5280MeV]

But again, with easily transferred names, would the above even accomplish anything?

Alice and Bob (burners) want to go to burning man together, and decide to hoard and enter for 2 tickets each to game the system. Alice puts down Charlie (non-burner) and Bob puts down David (non-burner). Charlie and David have no intention of ever going, they hate camping.

Alice and Bob plan to just say that Charlie and David were unable to get time off work, and change the names to each other, and put any extras on the ticket exchange.

It doesn't seem to create much of a roadblock.

[Sail Man]

Nipples Have I told you I love you?

Cant blame me for buying to many tickets. I ain't buying none. So there

[trilobyte]

Don't think of it as an argument, so much as a rejection of your idea.

The people who argue in favor of name-on-ticket and cite Glastonbury as the shining example of what works completely fail to realize things like the time and resources involved in trying to make that run anywhere close to smoothly. Glastonbury's able to make it work for them because of a significant amount of paid staff at each gate, and SEVEN gates. That just is not possible at BRC, unless you're able to start cutting through mountains and building major roadway infrastructure (and frankly, if we could get the 447 beefed up then the problem of scarcity goes away). There are additional logistical and financial considerations as well, but just the above is enough to make it a poor solution.

Regardless of what system's used, there will always be people who want to game the system to get an advantage, or get more than they need. And based on what's been posted on the boards or on Facebook, a significant number of those who plan to register for additional tickets are planning to get them for campmates and projects. That's something they would have been able to do under a first come, first serve system, or any other planned system (as Bbadger and 5280MeV point out, if you can change the name on the ticket at a later date, what's to stop someone from loading up using a name-on-ticket scheme?).

[A Jester]

I have decided to change my mind and support a name on ticket system.

It has several nice perks:
1) it will significantly increase costs, so less people will be able to go.
2) it will make the line at gate take so long that less people will want to go.
3) it will increase the number of scalpers
4) scalpers will provide you with fake IDs to match the names on the tickets

1 and 2 will make it easier for me to get a good camping spot.
3 sucks, but whatever
4 is what I really care about.

Since I think it would be pretty awesome to have a collection of cheap fake IDs, all with some picture I uploaded onto the internet, I really like the idea of names on the tickets.

Imagine how cool it would be if you could have an ID from Istabul that said your name was "I.P. Freely" and had a picture of you sticking your tongue out on it.

[A Jester]

blah blah blah stuff and blah blah blah

[caturdaze]

Burners who hoard make scalpers look like saints. At least scalpers are just greedy, hoarders would screw over their own neighbors to get a ticket. Disgusting.

I find this pretty funny. Me and my partner registered for twice as many tickets as we need for fear of one of us not winning. Have one of us go and the other not? That's a good way to tear up a relationship with feelings of resentment.

Anyways, we plan on selling any extra tickets we may or may not have at face value. I've also been negotiating with him on the possibility of giving away our extra for free to our less financially fortunate friends. Do we still make scalpers look like saints to you?

This method seems to be the best way to ensure that a couple is able to attend together. Anyone who gets angry at us for doing it this way is either a.) mad that they didn't think of it themselves or b.) mad that they don't have enough cash or high enough credit limit to do the same thing.

The only, I repeat, the ONLY reason people got upset with the old system is because nobody believed that there was a possibility of the event selling out of tickets. Every year the people managing the event would say, "BUY YOUR TICKETS! WE'RE SELLING OUT SOON!" and they never would. So, when they actually did sell out for once, it took people by surprise. On top of that, it took them many months to sell out, so only people who were waiting until the last minute got screwed.

Now people are distinctly aware of the possibility of the event selling out. So, I don't think there was a problem with the old system other than people not being aware of that fact. Really there was no need to change anything. People know now that they shouldn't wait until the last minute because it severely reduces their chances of being able to get a ticket, whereas before the only downside to waiting was having to pay a more expensive ticket price.

So yeah. Lottery system is lame. What can you do.

[remi]

... Me and my partner registered for twice as many tickets as we need for fear of one of us not winning. Have one of us go and the other not? That's a good way to tear up a relationship with feelings of resentment.
This method seems to be the best way to ensure that a couple is able to attend together. Anyone who gets angry at us for doing it this way is either a.) mad that they didn't think of it themselves or b.) mad that they don't have enough cash or high enough credit limit to do the same thing.
So yeah. Lottery system is lame. What can you do.

I don't understand how "That's a good way to tear up a relationship with feelings of resentment". If one of you applies for two tickets, then you either get two tickets, or none.. no partial orders filled out. I think your just too stupid to realize that if you both register with the same credit card, there is no way you'll be split up. The only way you'd get split up is if you each registered seperately for one on your own cc's (which I dont' think many couples do... unless they are retarded,) So, again, I'll have to choose option C) upset that your too stupid to realize how the system is suppose to work.
EDIT: Also, if lots of people do what you do, then there will be a major surplus of tickets available in June/July (when the tickets are printed and shipped,) and it'll be pretty hard to make your money back... especially when all the true people that care to go already have tickets. Meh.. to each his own.