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.

is it the content or the SWAG?

[raitchison]

I've always wondered with I/O how much people want to go because of whatever new technology is being introduced or discussed there or because the expectation being set that all attendees will get a full featured Android device (phone or tablet or STB).

The developer of the dominant alternative recovery for MANY android devices wasn't able to get a ticket this year (though he may well get one via back-channels) due to the mobs of people who snatched up the tickets like it was a Queen concert complete with zombie Freddie Mercury.

Also as TFS pointed out I suspect there are a fair number of people who got tickets with the intention of reselling them at a profit.

My school's CS club is very disappointed

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a shame, because a couple of these guys are Java wizards with a strong interest in developing for Android. A simple programming challenge at the gate would've thwarted all the posers.

Oh, well. I guess I'll start learning Objective-C.

Re:First raspberry pi not goog IO

[19thNervousBreakdown]

The Raspberry Pi organization and its distributors are based in the UK and manufacturing is done in China. But don't let facts get in the way of paranoid rants.

Re:Hopefully Google does the right thing

[ccguy]

I guess they could make the tickets non-transferrable but that would affect people who bought tickets with the intention of going but later found out they couldn't and would give their tickets to someone else (or sell them at cost).

Just make them non-transferrable but refundable and problem solved.

Re:no scalping

[psmears]

Link the ticket to the company and have the employee provide credentials to show they are a current employee. How was that hard to come up with?

"Yes, I do work for ScamScum Ticketing Inc. It says so right here in this letter - on their company letterhead! - which they conveniently sent me along with my overpriced ticket".

Re:Hopefully Google does the right thing

[Githaron]

I never said they should charge more. They can charge whatever they want. My point is that the only reason scalping is ever successful is because the original seller undervalued the tickets. So unless seeing something for its true value is "wrong/evil" then scalping is not "wrong/evil" like previous commenters seem to believe. Not sure what you mean by the "efficient" comment. I never said anything about efficiency.