Hopefully this will be the last post about Minecon until the event actually starts, but Mojang Support Manager Marc Watson has posted a write-up about the event on his Tumblr blog. In the post he explains why Mojang cannot simply 'give more tickets' to fans, his personal experience organizing PAX and Minecon, and his opinion on the debacle. I highly recommend you read the original post in the link below, especially if you wanted to get a ticket. Here's one of the most interesting bits:"Conventions aren’t started to make money, they’re to gather people. Many smaller conventions [...] struggle to break even, or cost the company money. These events are run because people have a shared interest, and again, the con organizers get that. It makes them sad when people can’t go [...] It makes them really, really sad when people accuse them of not doing it for the fans. When there are comments, and tweets, and petitions, and lynch mobs… things can get out of hand."
That was near the end of the post. In the first part, he explained how conventions normally work, as well as explanations for questions that has been sent to him on Twitter numerous times. At the very start of the article, he stated:
"Right now, my Twitter is getting hammered with questions about Minecon. I’m going to stay away from talking about Minecon directly, because I am not organizing it, I don’t want to venture too far into talking about work stuff on my personal blog, and I certainly don’t want some news site to pick it up."
It's possible 'some news site' was referring to us, as he did directly respond to one of our readers when he linked an earlier article to him. We respect him in this situation, because despite his best efforts of explaining the problem that no more tickets can be created (as we explained as well), he is constantly being asked again and again for more tickets. Dealing with several thousand people asking the same question takes a lot of patience, and that's why he has that job. But in the end, I suppose people not listening is just the world we live in.
Source: Tumblr
I'm surprised that a convention like MineCon has ticket problems. Even if they had so many tickets and such a huge convention that it wouldn't sell out, they would have enough money for everything. People are willing to pay.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately there's a number of reasons why they can't make more tickets. Everything has to be made months in advance, so they can't do it now. Also the convention center has a limited capacity, and if they go over that they risk a fire hazard or inspector shutting Minecon down.
ReplyDeleteCouldn't they find an even bigger convention center? 7500 people doesn't sound like a lot for such a huge event.
ReplyDeleteThey would have known based on the 30million sales that more than 7500 would want to attend. If the venue was too small they should have picked another. I know they want to keep it the small event but it is not nice to the children in particular who are devoted to the game- I read about Florida home people not being able to have tickets!
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