Tickets , Tips and Tricks

[rebeccac]

21 minutes ago, Smeble said:

There’s bigger issues than that. Far too many people on site who get a free ticket in return for doing minimal ‘work’ no other festival has so many hangers on there under the guise of ‘working’

I don’t understand why they need to give tickets to hangers on...it’s such a popular festival, there’s no danger of tickets not being sold. Baffles me 

[Suprefan]

14 minutes ago, Smeble said:

They won’t do anything to the system whilst it sells out, that’s really all they care about. Hopefully at some point soon the bubble will burst and demand will drop.

Yeah, its hard to bother changing things while its still one of the hottest tickets for anything at all. The worst thing is that everyones betting on potential line up wise and you just buy a ticket. If they went to a normal line up announcement with an onsale to follow it wouldnt nearly be as hard because you know the backlash against certain headliners and such would lower demand potentially. 
 

i feel really lucky and grateful to be going this year and if i never go back, im ok with that. Got to go the radiohead year which i wanted more than anything and the 50th. Cant get better than that especially for trying this whole decade.

[OrganicShamanic]

Regardless of discussions of a 'fairer' way to sell the tickets, there are technical issues with the current system which doesn't make it 'fair'. Particularly the page time outs.

If you were getting page time outs instead of the holding page today, you were very unlikely to ever even get to the holding page. That's because you were always being directed to the same server instance, which was over-loaded. If you can't even connect to the holding page, you're not even making successful requests for access to the booking system.
The number of over-loaded servers was huge, and I suspect something like only 1 in 10 requests were getting successful responses.

Once a session was allocated a server operating within it's capacity, all requests were successful and responded to within 2 seconds, unless that server was incorrectly allocated too many requests by the load balancer, and which point you would be kicked off the holding page. On occasion this also happened at the booking system: leading to page time outs once a visitor had put their registration details in.


I realise See Tickets are paid a small booking fee relative to the job, but I think they need to shore up some of these issues. Their load balancing is not working well, and it's creating a systemic disadvantage.
If you were unlucky to be getting page time-outs to all your requests, you needed to wipe your cookies and make another request until you were allocated a functioning server. Otherwise your odds of success were very very slim. This partly explains why some are more likely to get through several times; if you get a good server, you're alot better off than many other people.

Edited October 6, 2019 by OrganicShamanic

[Chris;]

Not a sniff of the holding page on my wired-in desktop or phone, got to the holding page on the laptop tethered to the phone (refreshing automatically every second) sadly no registration.

[DeanoL]

4 minutes ago, OrganicShamanic said:

I realise See Tickets are paid a small booking fee relative to the job, but I think they need to shore up some of these issues. Their load balancing is not working well, and it's creating a systemic disadvantage.
If you were unlucky to be getting page time-outs to all your requests, you needed to wipe your cookies and make another request until you were allocated a functioning server. Otherwise your odds of success were very very slim. This partly explains why some are more likely to get through several times; if you get a good server, you're alot better off than many other people.

That's only create a disadvantage if some people are more likely to get time-outs than others though. It's frustrating sure - but in a way it's *more* frustrating to get through what you call a working server, refresh the page every second for the entire sale, and still not get anything. I don't see how that makes me any more lucky than someone getting a time-out! 

[TheGoodWillOut]

Reality of being unsuccessful is now kicking in. I’m absolutely gutted

Had laptops, PC’s iPhone’s all failing to connect, constant holding page and connection timed out.  Got to registration page right near the end on 1 PC which auto-refreshed but clicked through to be told sold out. 

[clarkete]

Those people who feverishly crop up at 10 to 15 minutes past on this thread pasting reg and postcodes - do any of them get hooked up?

My perception is always that those able to try already have other batches to go for when free

[OrganicShamanic]

1 minute ago, DeanoL said:

That's only create a disadvantage if some people are more likely to get time-outs than others though. It's frustrating sure - but in a way it's *more* frustrating to get through what you call a working server, refresh the page every second for the entire sale, and still not get anything. I don't see how that makes me any more lucky than someone getting a time-out! 

The reason it becomes unfair is because once allocated an overloaded server, all of your future requests for the entire sale period will go to that same server. You may never even make a successful request.

[DeanoL]

Just now, OrganicShamanic said:

The reason it becomes unfair is because once allocated an overloaded server, all of your future requests for the entire sale period will go to that same server. You may never even make a successful request.

But everyone has an equal chance of being allocated that overloaded server though right?

Consider: 10 servers, 9 of them are totally busted, only 1 actually sells any tickets. You first connect, you randomly get given one of those ten servers. If you get the working one, hurrah, you have an 80% shot at a ticket. Get any of the others? 0% chance.

Now that's annoying, because you're trying for no good reason at all. Literally wasting your time, but it's not unfair. You had the same 10% chance of getting on the good server as everyone else.

(Where it is unfair I guess, is folk like you who know what's going on, and know to clear their cookies or use another browser - you were actually at a small advantage today)

[Kinzinski]

4 minutes ago, OrganicShamanic said:

The reason it becomes unfair is because once allocated an overloaded server, all of your future requests for the entire sale period will go to that same server. You may never even make a successful request.

I was private browsing/incognito and open/closed browser several times. Got nowhere. Was I unlucky to be allocated the same server? 

[OrganicShamanic]

1 minute ago, DeanoL said:

But everyone has an equal chance of being allocated that overloaded server though right?

Consider: 10 servers, 9 of them are totally busted, only 1 actually sells any tickets. You first connect, you randomly get given one of those ten servers. If you get the working one, hurrah, you have an 80% shot at a ticket. Get any of the others? 0% chance.

Now that's annoying, because you're trying for no good reason at all. Literally wasting your time, but it's not unfair. You had the same 10% chance of getting on the good server as everyone else.

(Where it is unfair I guess, is folk like you who know what's going on, and know to clear their cookies or use another browser - you were actually at a small advantage today)

It depends what you consider fair.
I think each request should be independent from the last, and offer you the same odds of success as every other request. This isn't the case if your first request determines whether or not you will be allocated a sever which defines the probability of success for each future request.

[Kinzinski]

What are peoples thoughts on blocking registrations of those who attended the year previous? Interested to know opinions. 

[OrganicShamanic]

2 minutes ago, Kinzinski said:

I was private browsing/incognito and open/closed browser several times. Got nowhere. Was I unlucky to be allocated the same server? 

There are many server instances, and alot of them were overloaded, so if you never saw the holding page, then whilst it is unlikely you got the same server everytime, you were still allocated an overloaded one.

[Popsss]

Just now, Kinzinski said:

What are peoples thoughts on blocking registrations of those who attended the year previous? Interested to know opinions. 

People would just make new registrations so wouldn’t work. 

[FrankieX]

1 minute ago, Kinzinski said:

What are peoples thoughts on blocking registrations of those who attended the year previous? Interested to know opinions. 

If that happened, I'd just re-register with new details. Likewise, if there was a ballot then a lot of people would have multiple registrations to maximise their chances. The current system is probably at least as fair (or unfair) as any of the alternatives.

[fowls]

10 minutes ago, Kinzinski said:

What are peoples thoughts on blocking registrations of those who attended the year previous? Interested to know opinions. 

What's to stop someone registering again with a slightly different photo and different address?  They'd need to collect and verify more identifying data for that to be feasible. And even then, it would need policing to stop diliberate typos to get around the detection system.

 

In principle I have nothing against the idea. It's a shame to get to this stage, but when allegedly 1.7million people are trying, something needs to give. It's only going to go up every year. A second site must surely become a serious consideration now.

[Suprefan]

16 minutes ago, Popsss said:

People would just make new registrations so wouldn’t work. 

Unless they cross referenced new registrations with photos/names addresses and of course facial recognition would kick in which would make it seem unfair if people looked the same and got denied.

 

I think there could be a way of letting new people in and possibly not letting somebody who went the previous year go again. has to be a way of locking people out and preventing them from re registering.

 

What if they split up sales by years youve gone? And thats cross referenced with your registration, so you couldnt just put yourself in the new pool of people. so let their be a loyalty sale per say, if youve gone 10 years or more and so on? 

 

You know they could just make it one ticket per person, thats about as fair as it can get. 

Edited October 6, 2019 by Suprefan

[Ozanne]

48 minutes ago, OrganicShamanic said:

Regardless of discussions of a 'fairer' way to sell the tickets, there are technical issues with the current system which doesn't make it 'fair'. Particularly the page time outs.

If you were getting page time outs instead of the holding page today, you were very unlikely to ever even get to the holding page. That's because you were always being directed to the same server instance, which was over-loaded. If you can't even connect to the holding page, you're not even making successful requests for access to the booking system.
The number of over-loaded servers was huge, and I suspect something like only 1 in 10 requests were getting successful responses.

Once a session was allocated a server operating within it's capacity, all requests were successful and responded to within 2 seconds, unless that server was incorrectly allocated too many requests by the load balancer, and which point you would be kicked off the holding page. On occasion this also happened at the booking system: leading to page time outs once a visitor had put their registration details in.


I realise See Tickets are paid a small booking fee relative to the job, but I think they need to shore up some of these issues. Their load balancing is not working well, and it's creating a systemic disadvantage.
If you were unlucky to be getting page time-outs to all your requests, you needed to wipe your cookies and make another request until you were allocated a functioning server. Otherwise your odds of success were very very slim. This partly explains why some are more likely to get through several times; if you get a good server, you're alot better off than many other people.

Really interesting post, I'm fairly tech savvy but I find this in general pretty interesting. Could you give me some insight into what happened with my experience please?

 

I got through to the reg page, then got through to the payment page! It said tickets were being held for 4 or so minutes. I put my payment details then click buy for the the page to just hang and hang. Nothing happened at all! Then after several tries of that it comes back to the payment page saying that the allotted time has run out and the tickets are allocated elsewhere. I then try again on the reg page to get through to the payment page with no luck and it then says sold out. Half way through typing a message on here I get an email from SeeTickets with my deposit confirmation and I had managed to be successful with the page hung after entering payment details.

[SleepyBob]

Managed to get through on chrome with two tabs open and got 6 tickets. Got through a second time on chrome but browser crashed. I have a theory that seetickets recognises certain IP addresses (not sure if that's possible) but out of a group of 6 it has only ever been me get through to a booking form and get tickets, on the same computer for god knows how many years. Nobody else has ever seen as much as a booking form. Not sure if you've got through before its easier for the seetickets servers to load the booking page?? Could be talking out my arse but very strange its only ever me that gets through. 

[Mr.Tease]

45 minutes ago, OrganicShamanic said:

The reason it becomes unfair is because once allocated an overloaded server, all of your future requests for the entire sale period will go to that same server. You may never even make a successful request.

Thanks for the explanations, I do feel better as at least I had a holding page on either 4g or on one of my WiFi browsers for most of the sale, so at least I had a chance. 

So essentially if you couldn't load the waiting page, you had 0% chance and needed to do a full cookie free fresh start each time to overcome the naff server. If you got through to the holding page you had, say a 20% chance (or at least a shot every time you refreshed)? 

[Mr.Tease]

41 minutes ago, Kinzinski said:

What are peoples thoughts on blocking registrations of those who attended the year previous? Interested to know opinions. 

The problem is more people want to go than can. We can sit and philosophise as to what defines a 'more worthy' applicant, but it's entirely subjective and won't alter one jot the number of people who want to go but can't. 

[aj6658]

I personally think the current system is the fairest. You got 2.4 million registrations which makes for around approx. 1200% demand outstripping supply.

Having a ballot decreases your chances and lets people who are not fully committed get tickets. Its pretty random as it is now.

Also penalising people because they've been before is unfair. If you want that you're looking for equality rather than fairness. I missed out last year but a few friends didn't and was heartbroken because I'm a die hard killers fan but it doesn't mean i have anymore right to go this year than them.

Cutting the size is also terrible. I think 6 is perfect, any smaller and i think its a tad too small personally. And cutting it to 4 doesn't really increase your chances. If you take it too the extreme and said you can only buy one ticket it wouldn't make a difference. You currently have 6 people trying to get tickets so if anyone gets in you're in the money rather than 1 person going for yourself. If you can only get 1 you're guaranteed to still hog the server as you're trying to get your mates as well. 

 

Personally i would like to see some tickets sold at independent stores and/or charity stores to give those sort of shops a boost. 

[bowen747]

1 hour ago, rebeccac said:

What is v frustrating is how many tickets are made available to people with a loose connection to the festival / media / industry types. Someone I know is guaranteed a ticket because his friend works for one of those posh off site camping places. One year we managed to sneak into a “vip” (in the loosest sense of the word) area, Dolly Parton was on stage and there was loads of people just sitting inside a tent on their phones, totally uninterested 

Far too many hangers on. Just look at the attendance figures, something like 135,000 tickets and over 200,000 people on site. 

[incident]

2 hours ago, Gregcharlie said:

I still think the fairest approach - which will never happen because you'd be asking See to go back to old servers - was for the fest in 2010. Tickets took about 12 hours to sell out from the 9am on Sunday. If you really wanted a ticket, were persistent and were prepared to stay trying the whole day, you'd probably get one.

Now it seems like it's just such a smash and grab with tickets selling out in 33mins. 

That's not what happened in 2010.

2010 - everyone who wanted one in the initial rush got sorted by about 11am or so (maybe slightly later than that) and the site was easy to access from then on.. They did sell out later that day but that's because people who'd decided not to bother with the scrum realised they could rock up and get tickets at their leisure.

But the demand is obviously much, much higher now.

[incident]

1 hour ago, OrganicShamanic said:

Regardless of discussions of a 'fairer' way to sell the tickets, there are technical issues with the current system which doesn't make it 'fair'. Particularly the page time outs.

Yep, I'd agree with all that. The process is probably about right, but the system really needs to cope with load better.