The Energon Pub

Perhaps the second Tuesday of next week?

Here is your BotCon registration update...not today. Not this weekend. Maybe Monday. There are still a couple of errors that must be corrected in the code.

Have a good weekend!

Brian

I'm sure you can just cut and paste your disappointed and/or exasperated response over this whole fiasco from some other thread.

At least this means that they're probably working on site security.

Though...one questions why this wasn't something that was being worked on earlier in the year.

It's not like BotCon is some surprise event that we couldn't plan for...

News'd. Thanks!

This is getting really obnoxious, but at least I can enjoy the weekend.

Well, you can relax your 'F5' key until at least Monday. Brian Savage of Fun Publications just sent out this update regarding registration:

Brian Savage wrote:Here is your BotCon registration update...not today. Not this weekend. Maybe Monday. There are still a couple of errors that must be corrected in the code.

Have a good weekend!

Brian

As always, Seibertron.com is your source for sizzling BotCon 2010 news and much more!

Oh for crying out loud, just do the fax registration already and get it over with.

Can we get some rocket scientists to help assist this poor guy ???

People have money tied up in hotels and are holding out on plane tickets for confirmation...and he dont even wanna work weekends fo fix the problem ???

...which means no registration for non-attendees until the week after this coming Monday (most likely). No big deal to me.

It's all these people who've got plans on the line that this causes big concerns.

Have a good weekend!

Brian

Blow it out your ass......

I'm tempted to just drive up to funpub and see what the hold up is..It's only a few hours away

LiKwid wrote:

Have a good weekend!

Brian

Blow it out your ass......

I'm tempted to just drive up to funpub and see what the hold up is..It's only a few hours away

LMAO !!! Now this Brian guy has got some people really pissed off. How much you wanna bet at Botcon he's gonna wear a mask to hide his identity ???

I would be embarrassed too If I was him...

LiKwid wrote:

Have a good weekend!

Brian

Blow it out your ass......

LMAO! Don't hold back your feelings!

I have all but given up being pissed over this. A bit irritated, but no longer pissed.

Here's the facts: It's BotCon. A lot of people are going to go, irregardless of when the site goes active. The whole online registration thing is snagging everything up and they should have held off on it til next year. FunPub is.........well, you all know!

At least they're saying something, even if it is a whole lot of nothing. Sounds to me like they're at least trying to get registration up, even if they are going nowhere in an extreme hurry.

Maybe I shouldn't say anything at this point as I have no plans to attend...

This is really just a laughable situation. If this entire hold-up is due to them wanting to get the registration system up and running, then they should be ashamed of themselves?

Was Joecon for this year done the old way? and if so why wasn't Botcon so they could have 10 months+ to work on the system before next years conventions.

To be fair, getting a system like this up and running is not easy but if you can't have it running a good 6 months before your event then you shouldn't even be planning to use it that year.

Sure I may not know exactly what the problem is, or what they need to do to resolve it, But I do know my convention is in August, and my people have had the online registration running since the beginning of the year.

Sorry FunPub, I am glad the club and the convention exist, and I do believe from previous topics regarding what the club does or doesn't do that you guys are doing your best. But from my 10+ years experience in staffing and running anime conventions, in my professional opinion this current situation you guys are finding yourselves in was not only avoidable (switching back to the old system a month ago) but you have created a PR nightmare. It is lucky you basically have a monopoly lock with Hasbro right now, because should another company with convention experience approach Hasbro with the intent of replacing you, your track record would not do you well at this time.

Editor wrote:Maybe I shouldn't say anything at this point as I have no plans to attend...

This is really just a laughable situation. If this entire hold-up is due to them wanting to get the registration system up and running, then they should be ashamed of themselves?

Was Joecon for this year done the old way? and if so why wasn't Botcon so they could have 10 months+ to work on the system before next years conventions.

To be fair, getting a system like this up and running is not easy but if you can't have it running a good 6 months before your event then you shouldn't even be planning to use it that year.

Sure I may not know exactly what the problem is, or what they need to do to resolve it, But I do know my convention is in August, and my people have had the online registration running since the beginning of the year.

Sorry FunPub, I am glad the club and the convention exist, and I do believe from previous topics regarding what the club does or doesn't do that you guys are doing your best. But from my 10+ years experience in staffing and running anime conventions, in my professional opinion this current situation you guys are finding yourselves in was not only avoidable (switching back to the old system a month ago) but you have created a PR nightmare. It is lucky you basically have a monopoly lock with Hasbro right now, because should another company with convention experience approach Hasbro with the intent of replacing you, your track record would not do you well at this time.

That was actually extremely well said.

Rated X wrote:

LiKwid wrote:

Have a good weekend!

Brian

Blow it out your ass......

I'm tempted to just drive up to funpub and see what the hold up is..It's only a few hours away

LMAO !!! Now this Brian guy has got some people really pissed off. How much you wanna bet at Botcon he's gonna wear a mask to hide his identity ???

I would be embarrassed too If I was him...

If you're wondering who Brian Savage is at BotCon, just look for the guy in the staff T-shirt with the bald head and grumpy demeanor. And if you're wanting a direct answer from him on any question, it's gonna take you longer to get that than it has taken for registration.

It's not even the delay that I find so insulting at this point (although that is pretty bad, either they should have gotten started sooner, or held off til next year.), it's the surcharge that they are going to charge for the online registration to "cover the cost of the system." (http://www.seibertron.com/energonpub/botcon-first-100-pins-and-registration-info-t65478.php)In any other business, things like this are figured into the cost of doing business, and all prices go up. Not a one time price gouge fee. When a retail store buys a new register, or point of sale system, they don't raise the prices on everything for a week.
Maybe I'm making too much of this because, admittedly, I don't know what this "one time surcharge that will be reduced to a maintenance fee next year" (wtf? seriously?) costs us, but it hardly seems fair to hold up registration for so long with a system that isn't working, and then gouge us unless we hold off for a week longer to use the fax registration and take the chance that packages will sell out (which they just might considering how rabid everyone seems for registration at this point).
Unless this was all intentional to get the fanboys to panic about HAVING to register ASAP and not notice / complain about the surcharge--"Sure, it will cost me more, but at least I'm finally registered."
Again, the surcharge could just be $5, and I could be making too much out of this. But I couldn't find how much the surcharge was anywhere...anybody got that info?

NicholasPrime wrote:It's not even the delay that I find so insulting at this point (although that is pretty bad, either they should have gotten started sooner, or held off til next year.), it's the surcharge that they are going to charge for the online registration to "cover the cost of the system." (http://www.seibertron.com/energonpub/botcon-first-100-pins-and-registration-info-t65478.php)In any other business, things like this are figured into the cost of doing business, and all prices go up. Not a one time price gouge fee. When a retail store buys a new register, or point of sale system, they don't raise the prices on everything for a week.
Maybe I'm making too much of this because, admittedly, I don't know what this "one time surcharge that will be reduced to a maintenance fee next year" (wtf? seriously?) costs us, but it hardly seems fair to hold up registration for so long with a system that isn't working, and then gouge us unless we hold off for a week longer to use the fax registration and take the chance that packages will sell out (which they just might considering how rabid everyone seems for registration at this point).
Unless this was all intentional to get the fanboys to panic about HAVING to register ASAP and not notice / complain about the surcharge--"Sure, it will cost me more, but at least I'm finally registered."
Again, the surcharge could just be $5, and I could be making too much out of this. But I couldn't find how much the surcharge was anywhere...anybody got that info?

The simple answer to many of these questions is this: they do it because they can. They know they can. It's the same mentality behind repaints: people will buy them regardless of how much they complain and moan, so why would they stop doing something that'll bring them more money? In this case, they can afford to take their time on the system because they know that despite how many people are going to say "screw it" on the forums, they won't have to worry about the number changing in any but negligible amounts. Though I personally share the opinion of a few that I'd rather wait the extra time if they ARE actually fixing issues. I don't want my credit card information getting lost, or hacked into, or the page breaking and going through registration again only to find that the first one went through and now I've been charged twice, or registrations/packages/info/whatever getting lost or any of the other conceivable issues of rushing this. Bearing that in mind, I'm still pissed, but thankful they're giving us daily updates.

Also, I heard that the fee for the new system is $10 or around there.

In BotCon's defence I can understand the need for a surcharge with online bookings to a limited degree. We had had to do this with Auto Assembly for our online booking system for the last five years (six if you count the credit card payment options we accepted in 2004 accompanying our first batch of email bookings we accepted) although it is because of the method we use rather than the system itself.

While our code on the site itself is very basic (simple html) we use PayPal to process all of our payments and the ordering side to ensure complete credit card security but by doing this, we are subject to a PayPal handling charge and as we are a non-profit making event and working to a tight budget, we have to pass on this fee otherwise we would have to increase our tioket prices.

However, we DO give all our attendees the option to pay by cheque or cash (at their own risk) and avoid that surcharge) so it is left completely down to the individual to choose how they wisk to pay / book. In all honesty, I would say that is why we have been growing as much as we have over the last few years with so many international attendees, and to the point that about 95% of our bookings are now online.

Saying that, all retailers - online and stores - have to pay a credit card handling fee (in the UK I know it's about 2.5% and more if the card used is AMEX) so they have to deduct that from their profit margin but I haven't encountered any that have made specific charges for customers to cover the costs of establishing an online shop. It's either been paid for out of existing profits or allwances are made for from future prohected income.

Simon

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Not to keep beating a dead horse (a lot of what I feel has actually already been said and better above), but every time I see an email from Brian I think "Come on already!"

If a system is giving you this much grief this close to the date, it's time for Plan B. Because there is a likelihood that glitches could continue to creep through (and is it just me or does no one else find it reassuring in the least that a system whose glitches are keeping it from launch is having other features (i.e., t-shirt sales) appended to it.

And seriously, what is the justification of a convenience charge on a system whose operation has made great inconvenience for us all. I'm also waiting on my airfare and accomodations until the event - I mean, seriously, why would you put down $500 - $1000 when you haven't even confirmed yet.

Anyway, while I would love to be able to stand up on principal and say I am not going because of these glitches, I really cannot. I want to go. I like the toys, I want to enjoy time with my fellow fans and I want to shop. But the fun and excitement of what could be a great Botcon is slowly been drained out of the event because of these delays. Because unlike an event like Auto Assembly, Botcon is intended to generate a profit. And this is no way to run a business.

Sooooooo I guess that registration could possibly go live on Monday and their going to tell us when? Monday morning when most of us are at work? I'm gonna have to drag my laptop to my resturant in the morning and be hitting F5 while Im chopping garlic and making tomato sauce?


Sigh......

LiKwid wrote:Sooooooo I guess that registration could possibly go live on Monday and their going to tell us when? Monday morning when most of us are at work? I'm gonna have to drag my laptop to my resturant in the morning and be hitting F5 while Im chopping garlic and making tomato sauce?


Sigh......

I doubt it would be before 11 EST or so due to the West Coast.

Fingers crossed that it'll go online in the morning. Wouldn't really be surprised if it gets delayed though. Here's hoping.

Not today.

There was a problem with their 56k modem.

Go fig.

Counterpunch wrote:Not today.

There was a problem with their 56k modem.

Go fig.

And this should surprise no one. *sighs*

I have an idea what is wrong with their equipment and it has nothing to do with the hardware itself!