Mobile-Ticketing - Delivery On Mobile Phone

quark007 writes "That's Cricket is reporting that the first match of the India-Australia cricket Test series in Bangalore next month will have hi-tech ticketing with the launch of 'Mobile-Ticketing,' a new service that enables cricket fans across the world to book the tickets online. But thats half the fun, since the tickets would be delivered directly to their mobile phones. the service is managed by Spice . The service delives the ticket as a special barcode which can then be scanned by a barcode reader. Sounds simple. Wired reported a similar story a while back." A system like this would have been great in my unsuccessful hunt for LotR Marathon tickets.

Comments

Yay for progress

[Dynedain]

This is pretty neat because it makes scalping (which is illegal in the US) almost impossible.

Unfortuneately, most people in the US don't have a phone that would be compatible with this system

Re:Yay for progress

[garcia]

How does it make it impossible? Unless you require everyone to use the cellphone system to buy the tickets and stop offering them in a tangible form it's not going to stop anything.

People are still going to buy gobs of good tickets up and resell them at a profit.

Re:Yay for progress

[generic-man]

Most sports stadiums in the US use Symbol Palm OS PDAs to scan tickets. They won't let you in until the attendant scans a bar code and the PDA reads "Go!" If the bar code readers could read a mobile phone screen, people could use mobile phone tickets at stadiums in the US as well.

It also reduces the chance of counterfeit tickets, unless the counterfeiters figure out a way to steal legitimate tickets' bar codes.

Re:Yay for progress

[jdray]

One question: If a concert disallows cameras, but your phone has one on it, and you use the phone to redeem your ticket, isn't the venue in a sort of no-win situation when they actually observe that you are carrying a camera and are forced to let you in because that's your ticket, too?

I understand that venues have started looking the other way when it comes to checking for cameras and other recording devices since they're so prevalent and easily hidden. But some promoters or artists get kind of up tight about this sort of thing, and will refuse to hold a show if recording devices are let in at all.

Holy crap!

[Quasar1999]

When I read the title the first thing that popped in my head is that while I'm driving at 70 mph in the school zone, reading the paper and yapping on my cell-phone, the copy will send my speeding/wreckless driving/careless driving ticket to my cell phone directly... no need to pull me over and disrupt traffic...

Good to know I'm safe for another few years before someone implements this... ;)

Barcode?

[moonbender]

I wonder how the "barcode" works, exactly. The story doesn't go to any details. Different cell phones display images in different ways, and older models might not be able to display them at all. Resolutions vary wildly. Of course I guess they could just go for the lowest common denominator of image-compatible cell phones, like a 40x40 black and white bitmap. But it's probably an MMS image which kind of limits the audience. Still, a neat idea, beats waiting in line if your phone is up to it.

Yawn

[stratjakt]

I've been printing eTickets for a few years, all they do is scan the barcode at the door.

Nothing really new here, except for the mobile phone angle. Personally I wish people would leave their mobile phones at home just fucking once.

Everyone thinks their so fucking important that they need to take calls in the middle of the Phantom of the Opera.

If you're an emergency room doctor who's on call, by all means carry your cell phone around. But don't go out to 100 dollar a ticket broadway plays and ruin them you pretentious fucks.

Will we as a society ever get over the novelty of cell phones? You still see people talking in public with that stupid look of half-stupidity and half-conceit on their face and saying things like "GUESS WHERE I'M CALLING FROM!!!"

Old news in the UK too...

[WIAKywbfatw]

If you're an Orange customer then you can get a free cinema ticket every Wednesday (two for the price of one) just by sending a text (SMS) to or calling 241. The free ticket is sent to your phone by text (SMS) as a short (~10 digit) number, which is inputted by the cashier at the cinema when you get your tickets.

It's simple and it works. And if it works for cinema tickets then it will work for concerts, sports, the theatre, planes, trains, etc.

Way behind the japanese

[KanSer]

If you've been to Tokyo Dome City (The amusement park next to the tokyo dome) recently you'd have seen people cutting in line by putting their cellphone screens on to little scanning beds. For the modest sum of 1000 yen you could reserve four spots in line at either the main rollercoaster or the ferris wheel. They would send your cell phone an e-mail with a funky barcode that was less bar code and more dot-matrix/bitmappy black and white image. I cut a four hour line into 15 minutes. I love japanese cellphone technology.

Estonian Parking

[Peter Cooper]

Not quite the same, but in a similar area with similar gains.. in the capital of Estonia, you can use your phone to buy/pay for parking. You park up, put your registration number in, and pay via SMS/text message. Sure beats dealing with a broken meter, and also means you can 'top up' your parking from afar if you need to park for longer than originally planned.

Keygen?

[Mr Guy]

When someone figures out the algorithm for generating the barcodes, I'd imagine this company will be on that list too.

I sure hope there's more "proof" of ticket than just a CRC check.