Olympic tickets

Neil H · Post by **Neil H** » Sat Jun 11, 2011 8:30 pm

Ooops

I'm just glad we don't live in a country where a landmark event can be turned into a laughing stock by the organising committee. We should all be grateful that in our green and pleasant land such an event cannot be ruined by corporate croneyism

I'm glad it can't happen here.

Despite the massively intelligent ticketing distribution plan I probably wouldn't have called it LOCOG though - I assume no one believes that it's called that because they didn't think it through and the mental cogs that were working at the time lower than a snakes reproductive gear

Carlr · Post by **Carlr** » Fri Jun 17, 2011 2:37 pm

Have just had an email from London 2012 ticketing with confirmiing that all or some of ticket allocation......Ooops better put that money back in my account that i have already spent..

Dadstaxi · Post by **Dadstaxi** » Fri Jun 17, 2011 4:59 pm

Well just had Email through saying that we haven't been successful for our ticket application - but we can try for the 2nd round!! Only there isn't any available for Canoe Slalom! Got two disappointed K1W's in my house now who were looking forward to seeing their sport live at the Olympics. Oh well there is always 2016. Sure we'll have a better chance of getting a ticket for that one ???

General Flangecustard · Post by **General Flangecustard** » Fri Jun 17, 2011 5:35 pm

I agree , I am sure it will be easy to get tickets when it is not in this country.

Neil H · Post by **Neil H** » Fri Jun 17, 2011 6:15 pm

I got the same mail saying no tickets, Doesn't it make you laugh, they offer you the dregs that no-one else wanted and call it an exclusive opportunity.
Well, I'm taking it as an exclusive opportunity to hit unsubscribe so I don't get bombarded with 'opportunities' to watch Greco-Romans wrestling. You think they'd have made their peace by now.

I'll watch it on the telly like the sensible ones.

Bit of a blessing really as couldn't afford it in reality

Nick Penfold · Post by **Nick Penfold** » Fri Jun 24, 2011 5:18 pm

How to Make Friends and Win Support
No, How to Just Flog Tickets
You're running a really big event. No, bigger than that, worldwide interest stuff. How do you go about getting lots of support from a normally cynical public?
First, for years, promote it with a message like "be part of it!"
When it's time to sell the tickets, you might have a few more customers than seats. Don't take any unnecessary trouble.
Don't do any research to get an idea of how many people will want how many tickets.
Don't make the slightest attempt to get tickets to people actually interested in specific competitions. If challenged you can blag that you're "broadening interest" - like when they gave the 2050 World Quidditch Championships to Qatar. Also, although it's London's big event, don't make any effort to give priority to Londoners. They got to pay for it, so they've already had their fun.
Avoid a festival "first come, first served" rush by taking applications over a period of time, promising that where a competition is oversubscribed you'll have a lottery to make the ticket allocation "fair".
Concoct a tedious log-in system involving passwords and security questions that people will forget. This is so that you can have fun with them later on.
Don't tell people what they'll get for a given price, or how many seats are available at that price.
Make any limits generous. Up to six tickets for up to twenty competitions sounds about right.
Refuse half the credit and debit cards in the world to please your sponsor.
Now you've got the applications. Good news! You've got lots more applications than you expected. Lots of competitions are massively oversubscribed. At this point any half-competent statistician could tell you what's going to happen, and you could rethink the lottery process. Don't. Plough blindly on.
Do the lottery. Just as the stats man would have predicted, people who were rich or foolish enough to take the risk of applying for lots of tickets at fancy prices have got more than their share. Most applicants have got nothing. Now is the time to have a bit of fun with these suckers.
Tell them they have a special second chance. They have to get up early, mind, and log in with that password they'll have forgotten. Your website will be staggering under the strain, that's all part of the fun.
It can tell them to wait
It can give them a new password which then won't work
It can log them in and then "time them out" at any point 3 seconds after their last action
It can make them wait some more
It can show them "available" competitions but limit the number of tickets that can be requested to 0
Then it can show that all the competitions are sold out, except for the Inuit Boxing
The last thing you want to do is to give as many people as possible tickets for at least one thing they actually wanted to see.

Neil H · Post by **Neil H** » Fri Jun 24, 2011 7:36 pm

Nick Penfold wrote:Inuit Boxing

Inuit Boxing....excellent, that's gonna have me laughing for a quite a while.

Neil H · Post by **Neil H** » Fri Jun 24, 2011 7:38 pm

Eskimo roll.......with the punches

Pingu · Post by **Pingu** » Mon Jun 27, 2011 1:15 pm

Nice one Nick.

I too found the experience disappointing. Unsuccessful for slalom, athletics & tennis tickets in the first round and all of these events unavailable in the second round.

Eventually went for weight-lifting!

Problem was that by the time I'd got my dates sorted, only the top price ones were left. I just hope that if we're on the front row the competitors don't try and lift too much and drop the weights on our toes!!

Oh. Going to see some volleyball as well.

Phil Stevo · Post by **Phil Stevo** » Mon Jun 27, 2011 8:56 pm

It's nice to know that Lord Coe thinks that the ticket allocation has been a success!

So the Canoe Slalom will be watched by people that really wanted to go to the Judo and Archery and the people watching the Judo and Archery will have really wanted to go the the Cycling and Swimming and the people watching the Cycling and the Swimming will have wanted ...............

Although Slalom is 'sold out' it will be interesting to see how many empty seats there are on the day - if it's anything like the Athens event that is.

boatmum · Post by **boatmum** » Tue Jun 28, 2011 4:32 pm

I saw that interview too - Hmmm ???

I knew him when he was lickle lad running - and he was an inveterate politician back then !

Seedy Paddler · Post by **Seedy Paddler** » Wed Jul 06, 2011 11:03 am

boatmum wrote:- and he was an invertebrate politician back then !

Sorry thought you had made a spelling error so put up the correction for you... ???

boatmum · Post by **boatmum** » Wed Jul 06, 2011 12:21 pm

Yep even back in the day !

Neil H · Post by **Neil H** » Wed Jul 06, 2011 1:51 pm

Seedy Paddler wrote:
boatmum wrote:- and he was an invertebrate politician back then !

Sorry thought you had made a spelling error so put up the correction for you... ???

I have to stand up for invertebrates here (not because the lack of a backbone might make it difficult for them to) but because they don't have a voice (at least that I can hear) to protest about being compared to such a spineless, crawling creature.

However, I did see a documentary once about a man who invented a prototype matter transporter. Unfortunately a common housefly got into the machine with him and he ended up with a fly's head and arm. Devastating but if you were used to a fly's diet it wouldn't being so bad going to KFC.
The fly ended up with the man's head and it could speak, not sure if it happened since but that might be the best example.

It occurred to me that the other day that the pronunciation of some common surnames is different than one would expect. A good example would be Cockburn being pronounced Coe burn,

Following that principle, it would be fair to assume that the phrase What a cock up, could become, This Olympic debacle has turned in to one coe up after another