Google I/O Sells Out In 20 Minutes

netbuzz writes "Last year it took almost an hour, but this morning Google's enormously popular conference for developers sold out in about 20 minutes, Vic Gundotra, Google's senior vice president of engineering, told his followers on Google+. 'While we're overwhelmed with the interest and enthusiasm around Google I/O, we know it can be very disappointing and frustrating when an event sells out this quickly,' he wrote. Those who did not get tickets were not only disappointed and angry, but mystified as to why they were left out of a first-come, first-served sale despite being online and ready to buy the second the bell rang. And, of course, tickets were quickly being scalped on eBay." Of course, everyone who gets in drives away in a free Tesla.

Comments

Solutions to Scalping

[Firethorn]

It's a little late, but I have two thoughts. One was a band that discovered something like 80% of their tickets had been bought by scalpers, who were demanding 10X the ticket price. Their solution? They held 3 more shows. The first, originally scheduled, show was practically empty - the other 3 were packed.

Solution type: Increase supply.

Another option is to hold a 'dutch auction' for the tickets. Easy enough for shows with one seating category, but only a touch more difficult with multiple to handle people who are willing to pay $X for 'good' seats, but $Y for 'normal' seats only if they don't get good ones. The tickets then go for the minimum price that 'just' sells all tickets. Yes, this means that only the richest and/or most dedicated fo fans get to go, but at least the money ends up in the hands of the artist's company, not scalpers. If the artists feel that the price has risen too much, add shows.

Solution type: Increase the price so that demand equals supply.