Google I/O is sold out

https://developers.google.com/events/io/register?tryagain=1

by mbreese • 13 years ago

34 52 13 years ago

developers.google.com

qompiler2• 13 years ago

What is the added value of being there physically?

jechen2• 13 years ago

The disgusting amount of free swag they throw at you.

qompiler2• 13 years ago

Not so free if you consider the $900,- fee, excluding the cost to get there and place to stay.

smtddr3• 13 years ago

That's the only reason I attempted(and failed) to get a ticket.

cryptoz4• 13 years ago

Networking. Early developer advantages; I want to build the first innovative weather app on Glass, for example. It would help immensely to network with the other excited developers and get hardware to develop and test.

jjcm• 13 years ago

Got through the payment screens. Was interrupted during the survey to let me know that my work AMEX was declined :/

jstreebin• 13 years ago

Yeah, sat through about 6, 6 minute sessions of loading only to be told it was sold out.

Google, you suck at tickets

sjh3• 13 years ago

Same here, using a Mastercard.

pcl• 13 years ago

Did anyone else get 500s from the server? I got a 500 early on, and two of my friends got tickets and subsequently got 500s from Google Wallet. In retrospect, I wonder if my initial 500 was actually a successful ticket.

ericd5• 13 years ago

Hm, maybe, I got a 500 when I first clicked at ~t+2 seconds, then after refreshing it was all spinning wheel until sold out.

julianpye• 13 years ago

Got a 500 early on, only once, then not again during the next 45 minutes...

richo• 13 years ago

I had 3 of them, and wondered exactly the same thing.

It'd be awesome if an SRE could chime in on this.

randomvector2• 13 years ago

I had a couple of 500 error as well and have to reload.

Another thing I noticed is that, in the registration waiting page, it shows "sign in" on upper right corner, while redirected back to main page after 6 min, I saw that I was logged in Google+ without problem.

And Google Wallet has quite some issue as well.

It may be good marketing campaign for Google, but bad for desperate developers like us. I was even chatting w/ my wife on purchasing air ticket and booking hotel last night.

We want to be there, not for those free stuff.

idont• 13 years ago

Dear Google, we also love you if we are outside the USA. :) Please organize other such big events in Europe or Asia. Thanks. (BTW, why do I never see events organized by Zooglers?)

Raphael• 13 years ago

Xooglers, as in ex-Googlers.

culturestate• 13 years ago

He means the Zurich office - they're known as Zooglers.

nirvanatikku• 13 years ago

I'm pretty sure I'd be ok with the fact that I wasn't able to get a ticket if I could understand WHY. What a frustrating process.

recuter• 13 years ago

A result of PR people wanting to generate headlines such as the one in the OP. WWDC will sell out even faster, 'etc.

sjh3• 13 years ago

It's a quasi-random lottery. If the client-side code is similar to last year's, then the Javascript on the holding page polls the server at random intervals for an "available" ticket, which are released at random intervals and/or as orders fail to go through (e.g. payment times out, etc).

wting• 13 years ago

Unfortunately Google I/O has become a "why not" conference. I would love to go to Google I/O at current prices even if they did not offer any swag. Unfortunately that doesn't seem apply to most people trying to get a ticket. They really should get rid of the swag and/or add random programming challenges during the registration process.

I was able to reserve a ticket only to time out trying to pay with Google Wallet: http://i.imgur.com/vSCppd8.png

The problem is Google I/O is used to launch new products and hold tech talks. There's a lot of overlap of people who are interested in both, but now the audience has grown too big.

This was the same problem GDC was having a while back--too many attendees weren't interested in the game developing but were there to check out new games. Making GDC developers-only and creating PAX for product announcements was a great way to handle the issue.

suyash• 13 years ago

Well, I personally believe if they stop giving swags a lot of people won't go with $900 price tag. I personally will not. It's not just because I don't want swag, I want to meet the engineers working with the products and services I like and want to ask them questions but on the other hand almost all the talks are recorded online and you can view them for free on YouTube.

ChuckMcM• 13 years ago

As opposed to the $2,200 RSA conference where the "swag" consists of a $15 equivalent back pack ? I suspect it would sell out quickly without the swag.

seancron• 13 years ago

So who else got a ticket, but then timed out at the payment screen?

I managed to find 3 academic tickets, and all of those timed out when I tried to pay for them.

kyrra2• 13 years ago

one of my co-workers did. He ended up closing the google Wallet popup 4 times and re-trying the payment and was able to get through.

sjh3• 13 years ago

I had this as well, but the payment was ultimately declined.

mfringel• 13 years ago

More accurately, "Google I/O tickets now available on secondary market for actual market-clearing price."

EDIT: I stand corrected.

habosa• 13 years ago

I think they are non transferable this year.

kyrra2• 13 years ago

This is correct, that rule changed this year. See: https://developers.google.com/events/io/help#reg_open

> Google I/O tickets must be used by the original registrant and are non-transferable. Tickets may not be sold, bartered, auctioned, or transferred in any way and doing so may result in Google rendering the ticket null and void without any responsibility to Google.

EDIT: to add, last year I bought a ticket and transfered it to a co-worker (my company picks 2 people a year to send, and I wasn't one of them last year. One of the people selected didn't get a ticket but I was able to, so I bought it and transfered it to him). So they've allowed it before, but I guess they wanted to get rid of the scalping market.

ericd5• 13 years ago

I believe they were made non-transferrable this year, main reason I was hopeful about actually getting one.

randomvector2• 13 years ago

Feel upset after trying about 40 min. I was on conf call and keep jumping back to may personal laptop and trying registration every 6 min once redirected back to main page -- and cannot get one ticket. :-(. Really want to go check out this event but it is so hard to get a seat after years of trying.

eliben• 13 years ago

Why so much bitching about everything? The conference is popular - they got sold out quickly. All important talks will be streamed live and recorded for later viewing? So what are you all complaining about?

ericd5• 13 years ago

I'm guessing you didn't spend an hour today waiting in opaque queues that weren't first-come-first-served (and errored out when it seemed likely to succeed).

benburleson• 13 years ago

Probably because it's a chance to get the latest and greatest hardware for a ridiculously low price.

ed209• 13 years ago

the problem is with the way they are selling tickets. All they've managed to do is tell a load of developers that Google Wallet is flakey.

I don't know what they are so worried about that they give you 5 minutes to pay. The thing is going to sell out even if they give people a week to pay!

sethist• 13 years ago

The problem is that people expect more from Google. People understand the conference is popular and so should Google. If anyone could handle this type of load, you would think they would be near the top of the list. However, every year people need to sit at their computer staring at animated gif or rapidly hitting F5. Even when you get past the first screen and are told that you have tickets waiting for you, the payment processing often fails. That is exceptionally frustrating.

mladenkovacevic• 13 years ago

I got two chances to buy a ticket. I chickened out the first time (about 20 minutes in)... and bit the bullet the second time (40 minutes in). I'll be coming from Toronto. Also my first time visiting San Francisco so this is a perfect excuse to do that. See you all there.

theatrus2• 13 years ago

Lots of 500 errors when I "got" a ticket and was being sent to the registration. Unfortunately, that means I instantly appeared to lose the ticket and had to jump back into the ticket lotto machine.

jug6ernaut• 13 years ago

Can anyone explain to me why academic faculty get a discount? And students for that matter also.

k-mcgrady• 13 years ago

Not sure about faculty but students is probably because it would be more difficult for them to afford the full ticket price and Google probably wants to introduce them to their technologies at the beginning of their career.

xoail• 13 years ago

This is very disappointing. I started attempting to reserve at 7:05AM tried for 8 times (waiting 6 mins everytime for it to find a ticket) and finally came back with Sold Out message.

mattsgarage• 13 years ago

Fairly disheartening to watch the countdown hit 0 - Hit the register button immediately and spend the next hour being thrown back to the start for the progress 7 / 8 times to eventually find they are sold out. I personally didn't get to see the payment screen but I hear many peoples purchases timing out or making purchases to have them cancelled after they sell out.

lifeisstillgood2• 13 years ago

I am surprised Google keeps this "everyone pile in" approach - it seems hundreds or thousands of Google-evangelists are guaranteed a bad experience (apart from not getting a ticket).

A simple 72 hour pre-registration period where everyone can leisurely sign up, and a random allocation of tickets out of the hat, seems to be both fair, and lead to a experience for everyone where servers don't melt and 500 errors dont get presented to people who for the next year will be recommending to their clients / employers whether to use GAE or Google Wallet.

Why piss off your core supporters?

Google I/O is sold out

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