Rockies Web Site Crashes
Sorry, I'm from Boston, so I can't help but find this amusing. It's the Sox
and the Rocks starting the 2007 World Series in Fenway tonight. Just yesterday,
though, the Rockies were having a
bit
of technological trouble with their newfound success.
The computer systems that manage the Rockies' online ticket sales for the World
Series, run by Irvine, Calif.-based Paciolan, crashed after a huge initial surge
-- 8.5 million hits in the first 90 minutes. They sold several hundred tickets
before they had to shut down. Paciolan and Rockies reps expected to have the
ticket sales site back up by Tuesday afternoon.
This is a big deal, because the only way to get tickets for World Series games
at Coors Field will be online, which the Rockies' management feels is the fairest
method of distributing the 20,000 or so tickets up for grabs (the other 30,000
seats are for season ticket holders and the teams). Those who don't have access
or quick enough connection weren't about to be denied. There was reportedly
a small crowd of people lined up outside the Denver Public Library in the freezing
pre-dawn waiting to use the library's computers to nail down tickets. You've
got to admire that level of fanaticism.
Is the system crash a harbinger of their decline? Do you think it was really
a systematic, malicious attack or just hordes of crazed baseballs fans trying
to score a ticket? How does your organization handle spikes in Web traffic?
Find me way out in left field and let me know at [email protected].
Posted by Lafe Low on October 24, 2007