After a harrowing day-long ticket saga and ensuing firestorm of pissed-off tweets and scathing commentary (see Brokelyn, FiPS and Gothamist), last night at about 9pm GoogaMooga ticket confirmations started rolling into the inboxes of many disgruntled Brooklynites, myself included. Now I kind of feel like an a-hole. After speaking to a spokesperson, we have been assured that there will be a “significant amount” more free tickets distributed closer to the date of the event. As mentioned at the press conference a few weeks back, the Nethermead grounds of Prospect Park can accommodate 40,000 revelers per day. Access codes will be distributed by email to everyone who received confirmations yesterday by April 3. GoogaMooga encourages you to share these codes with your friends. No one likes waste, and they want this to be a great big free-for-all party, so if the access codes are not redeemed for tickets, those codes will be recycled for redistribution on a rolling basis. So, we all just need to relax, man.The whole point of this free thing is to bring the good vibes and celebratory atmosphere, usually reserved for hippie festivals in far off locales, to our fair borough, and all the hating is totally killing the buzz. What did we really expect? It’s a food, booze and music festival in BROOKLYN: This is the stuff we live for (and apparently feel entitled to, judging from the Twitter and comment firestorm yesterday).
The GoogaMooga folks were inundated with the wrath of angry Brooklynites and local bloggers, but they responded by circulating an email address ( [email protected]) so the disgruntled masses who skipped lunch only to be repeatedly timed out in the ticketing process could voice their complaints. Also they began directly responding to tweets and even responding to comments on the local blogs (including Brokelyn). So obviously they were doing lots of stuff to make things right and restore peace and order to the Googa-verse.
I still find it hard to believe that the Superfly folks were unprepared for major site traffic given that they have loads of experience putting on large scale events like this and are based in New York. EventBrite claimed formal responsibility and even sent an apologetic email to Fucked in Park Slope. But as a pretty major ticket distributor, they should know what they’re doing and have a server that can handle large capacity. Maybe it was a scalper issue like the recent Kraftwerk and Radiohead debacles? PR ploy to detonate the blogosphere/twitterverse (all press is good press)? Attempt to push the pricy VIP tickets?
Anyway, now that we’re past the wielding pitchforks phase and back on the psyched-track, let’s get rational about what to expect in May. We’re sure the lines will be long and the hot dogs will be overpriced. But with any luck, this will become an annual institution that will benefit local business and culture. Everyone just needs to stop being douchey and get into the hippie-zen frame of mind.
Follow Rachel: @raeinbk.
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Totally OT here, but why did douchey become such a popular word in the last few years when douches themselves are such an outmoded personal hygiene product? Did some TV character or book spawn this phenomenon?
correct. totally off topic.
Who are you, the freaking comment editor? Anyway, can more than one person use the access codes?
Sheepshead Bay’s annual party, home grown in BROOKLYN! I’ll be there!