So what went on with the holding page?

[Smeble]

The current system turns a lots of people off Glastonbury, we have friends who were regulars in the 90's and early 00's who don't bother trying now, the perception is that the tickets are impossible to get and the same ' in the know' people go every year. This may be far from reality but it is the perception.

Is their a fairer way to do it?

With the hype now surrounding Glastonbury I don't think there is,

You could not advertise when they are going on sale, but it would probably leak out and this would favour the regulars who monitor the website and word would quickly spread.

You could stagger the sale throughout the year but that would just create more Sunday mornings desperately refreshing and not getting tickets.

They could put them on sale during the previous years festival which would heavily favour people not able to get tickets for that year, but that would be hugely unpopular.

I think the current system is, like democracy, the least worst option.

[Mr.Tease]

Sorry, that wasn't directed at you specifically but every year some people go straight through to booking page on the coach sale then just shut it down. I'm always reading it.

As I said getting through to coach selection on Thursday in no way helped me get much beyond the white screen on Sunday so I guess it's not worth doing test runs on Thursday in future.

 

I can relate- if I read something annoying often enough, I'm ready to explode the next time someone even hints at it!

 

I agree, there seems no point in doing test runs in future if it makes no difference.

[Mr.Tease]

The current system turns a lots of people off Glastonbury, we have friends who were regulars in the 90's and early 00's who don't bother trying now, the perception is that the tickets are impossible to get and the same ' in the know' people go every year. This may be far from reality but it is the perception.

Is their a fairer way to do it?

With the hype now surrounding Glastonbury I don't think there is,

You could not advertise when they are going on sale, but it would probably leak out and this would favour the regulars who monitor the website and word would quickly spread.

You could stagger the sale throughout the year but that would just create more Sunday mornings desperately refreshing and not getting tickets.

They could put them on sale during the previous years festival which would heavily favour people not able to get tickets for that year, but that would be hugely unpopular.

I think the current system is, like democracy, the least worst option.

 

There's lots of things that could be done differently, but unfortunately none get over the fact that there are more people who want to go than there are tickets, so either demand has to go down or number of tickets has to go up. I would love it if tickets were more easily available and for longer (it would get rid of the ticket day stress and would allow a more diverse audience), but last time that happened the festival (2008) almost went bankrupt.

 

The silver lining is a lot of people on these boards seem to have success in the resales- it's not ideal though, as not knowing if you're going for months until the resale is tough mentally, emotionally and practically.

[frostypaw]

The folk with wrong perceptions need to look again - changing the system will probably result in things getting worse or more labyrinthine.

Unfortunately when stubborn folk have made up their minds.... and it is a different festival to back then, there's probably an element of wanting to keep that memory

I use incognito mode in Chrome and private in Firefox. 

Tell sites I do not want to be tracked

Use Ghostery.

 

Would any of this have prevented me from gaining access to buy tickets?

Yes. Why do you do all of that?

I mean it shouldn't affect it, but you've made things more complicated for yourself by a large amount and increased potential problem points/lag points, and waited for a countdown to run out despite a massive number on posts on here and facebook etc saying don't wait.

Keep it simple, keep refreshing and good luck next time - you probably don't need the tin foil hat either, but it won't do any harm

[Zoo Music Girl]

There's lots of things that could be done differently, but unfortunately none get over the fact that there are more people who want to go than there are tickets, so either demand has to go down or number of tickets has to go up. I would love it if tickets were more easily available and for longer (it would get rid of the ticket day stress and would allow a more diverse audience), but last time that happened the festival (2008) almost went bankrupt.

The silver lining is a lot of people on these boards seem to have success in the resales- it's not ideal though, as not knowing if you're going for months until the resale is tough mentally, emotionally and practically.

That's where I'm at. It's not that I don't want to go enough. It's that I don't want to put my plans on hold at the risk of further disappointment.

[Peroni]

Just read this... made me laugh.http://www.timeout.com/london/blog/glastonbury-discriminates-against-the-lazy-the-hungover-and-the-disorganised-100115

Edited October 7, 2015 by Peroni

[phillyfaddle]

Just read this... made me laugh.http://www.timeout.com/london/blog/glastonbury-discriminates-against-the-lazy-the-hungover-and-the-disorganised-100115

 

That article was a most excellent spot Peroni x :-)

[LondonTom]

Bingo. I'd be all up for addresses being blocked after one transaction goes through - initially seems harsh but if it's a group of six that's strictly five more still with a chance to get in for others - but it would tilt things back to a happier place I think. It's sad seeing the folk who got in again and again, they probably did get tickets for folk that wanted them so no fault there it's just so painful for the people who didn't get through at all

You couldn't really block by IP address though as someone might genuinely be using it.  If you are using the same public wifi as someone else/even some ISPs will use the same IP address for different houses? Or those using VPNs for various reasons. It'd be a massive clusterfuck to block people.

You do at least need to try again like everyone else in order to get in now.

[midnight]

midnight tho - long time no see - shall try for yous if you're still wanting come resale

 

Hi frosty, thanks, much appreciated!    I shall need all the help and and luck I can get when the time comes! I'll be in touch about it.

 

And I'll attend to my other pet topics in a few days, when I've recovered my equilibrium a little, sorry about the delay. 

[Purple aki squat]

Oh yeah I agree they're being a tit. Bit it's low-level tittiness. Imagine someone organising a DDOS against the site for the entirety of the sale weekend. Now them's some big tits.

Yep. Them DD's are big tits.

[incident]

Bingo. I'd be all up for addresses being blocked after one transaction goes through - initially seems harsh but if it's a group of six that's strictly five more still with a chance to get in for others - but it would tilt things back to a happier place I think.

Here's an example of why that'd be a terrible idea.

I work for a large university. Most devices connected to our network (including everything using Wireless or in Student Halls / Computer Rooms / Libraries) go via a gateway that means as far as seetickets (or any other website) is concerned, they all come from one of about 2 IP addresses.. So as soon one of those gets a successful transaction, you're pretty much blocking every other student from buying tickets.

[Pinhead]

I'm pathologically incapable of reading that joke without responding with:

I'd tell you a UDP joke, but I'm not sure if you'd get it.

 

I'll tell you all a multicast joke, whether you all want to hear it or not....

 

 

(tumbleweed rolls past...)

Edited October 8, 2015 by Pinhead

[Pinhead]

See use Riverbed Stingray balancers. Mixed opinion on the exact set up but the most likely is 3 public DNS records pointing to 3 balancers each in front of a VM farm of webheads and a backend database tier.

 

And if I remember the original thread on here from, was it 2014, that discussed the architecture of the See ticket system used for Glasto, they do use an IP Reputation Filter in front of those balancers. I can't remember the product used, but I remember going off to look at the vendors web page about it at the time to see the particulars of how it worked. Obviously this stops something doing a DDOS during the ticket sale as mentioned above, but it must also be intelligent enough to be able to distinguish between that activity and a vigorous number of F5 refresh request hits that perhaps emanate from a relatively few number of source IP's. This it likely achieves by referencing a dynamic global IP reputation database, or perhaps also by deeper packet analysis heuristics. Pity those whose home broadband IP of the moment (where these are rotated dynamically), has been added to this database because its last user was naughty with it....

[Mr.Tease]

And if I remember the original thread on here from, was it 2014, that discussed the architecture of the See ticket system used for Glasto, they do use an IP Reputation Filter in front of those balancers. I can't remember the product used, but I remember going off to look at the vendors web page about it at the time to see the particulars of how it worked. Obviously this stops something doing a DDOS during the ticket sale as mentioned above, but it must also be intelligent enough to be able to distinguish between that activity and a vigorous number of F5 refresh request hits that perhaps emanate from a relatively few number of source IP's. This it likely achieves by referencing a dynamic global IP reputation database, or perhaps also by deeper packet analysis heuristics. Pity those whose home broadband IP of the moment (where these are rotated dynamically), has been added to this database because its last user was naughty with it....

 

I remember that discussion too- I think the advice at the time was to log on to the seetickets once in a while on the weeks/months running up to ticket day to build a 'good' reputation. I have no idea whether that was true or not. 

 

I think there definitely is some sort of preference thing or block going on, it's not just luck- if it was just luck then people would have roughly a similar experience of failed holding page load ups. When some people are consistently getting the white page or time outs, and others are consistently getting to the holding page, then there must be something going on.

[verrymerry]

In Aprils coach resale after my partner got ours he couldn't get another booking page for love nor money, I did eventually from work

It did seem that once he'd booked he was blocked out, but this year after he got ours again he did get more booking pages, although the LDN coaches were sold out by then

Anyone want to go work at SEE in their IT dept

[Pinhead]

Yeah I would - better than this shite job. Plus I'd probably get my own backdoor to the system to snag a ticket each year

[Peroni]

I think i said on another thread... i had a mate who just basically waited for the countdown clock every 20 seconds, thinking she was in a queue. Her faced dropped when I told her that she was reducing her chances and if i was pressing F5 once a second, I was basically having 20 more chances to get a connection to the booking page vs her.

 

The only time I was auto- refreshing was on other devices, where I couldn't press F5 as easily... and they were just there to extend my odds over having 1 laptop and a single session (no different to having lots of other people trying...

 

I did get the a white page every now and again, but just closed down and started again.... not sure if others were endless refreshing a white page or re starting browsers...

[Andy0808 v5]

Here's an example of why that'd be a terrible idea.

I work for a large university. Most devices connected to our network (including everything using Wireless or in Student Halls / Computer Rooms / Libraries) go via a gateway that means as far as seetickets (or any other website) is concerned, they all come from one of about 2 IP addresses.. So as soon one of those gets a successful transaction, you're pretty much blocking every other student from buying tickets.

 

No wonder I had a mare in October 2010 for tickets in 2011. 

 

edit: re-read it. Turns out I just had a mare through no reason other than luck.

Edited October 8, 2015 by Andy0808 v5

[Brave Sir Robin]

Ha, someone recorded their failed attempt at buying tickets and has put the video on YouTube. Highlights include getting the holding page at 13:24 and, er, it getting stuck on 1 second at 13:44...

 

[majormajormajor]

They click on the URL and press enter? Amateur hour...

[stuartbert two hats]

I'm glad that was posted. There were reports since the sale that the holding page was advising one browser with one tab. It wasn't. it was advising "a single browser tab". When it goes into explanation, it's clear that they're advising against multiple tabs per browser. Nothing is said about multiple browser whatsoever.

[DeanoL]

I'm glad that was posted. There were reports since the sale that the holding page was advising one browser with one tab. It wasn't. it was advising "a single browser tab". When it goes into explanation, it's clear that they're advising against multiple tabs per browser. Nothing is said about multiple browser whatsoever.

 

The vast majority of PC users only haven one browser installed anyway.

[stuartbert two hats]

The vast majority of PC users only haven one browser installed anyway.

The vast majority may use only one browser, but third party browsers (Chrome or Firefox primarily) have a not insignificant desktop market share. If someone is using either of those on the Mac or PC then they have more than one browser installed.

Anyway, I'm not bothered about anyone else. I just wanted to establish for my own benefit that using multiple browsers didn't run contrary to official advice.

Edited October 9, 2015 by stuartbert two hats

[BadgerMatt]

I have zero technical knowledge but my anecdotal evidence supports the idea that some setups are doomed to fail from the outset.

We had 2 laptops and 2 tablets. The 2 tablets and 1 laptop were connected to home broadband and the other laptop was connected to 3G via my phone as a hotspot. That laptop got the holding page almost immediately, and kept getting it back when I hit f5 whereas the other 3 just got nothing but the white screen. After about 15 mins I switched the other laptop and one of the tablets to the 3G hot spot and both of those immediately got the holding screen too. Eventually we got through with a couple of minutes to spare on the tablet connected to the hotspot. Throughout the whole time nothing got through to the holding page while connected to the home broadband.

A similar thing happened to me a few years ago when I had 2 home broadband lines, one cable. Had about 5-6 different devices spread between the two. One had luck in getting the holding page after a while whereas those connected to the other line didn't get a sniff. When we switched a couple of devices across the same happened, they magically started getting the holding page. We didn't get tickets in that sale though.

Whether it is wholly random or there is some method in the madness I don't know, but I am confident that some connections are doomed to fail from the start.

Edited October 9, 2015 by BadgerMatt

[carlosj]

The vast majority may use only one browser, but third party browsers (Chrome or Firefox primarily) have a not insignificant desktop market share. If someone is using either of those on the Mac or PC then they have more than one browser installed.

Anyway, I'm not bothered about anyone else. I just wanted to establish for my own benefit that using multiple browsers didn't run contrary to official advice.

Dunno about advice, but I had opera, (multiple) chrome, and IE open, 1 tab each and chrome got the page this year, so the lack of multiple tabs helped against errors.