Second Phase of Olympic Ticketing to be Done by Lottery

Here’s the deal. The long-awaited, extremely delayed phase two of Olympic ticket sales finally started at 9am on October 30 and lasted … two hours, with phone lines and the ticketing website completely overwhelmed. BOCOG reportedly received an average of 200,000 submissions per minute from 9-11am, when the system stopped accepting ticket requests (see last week's tbjblog for more details).

The phase was supposed to be first-come, first-serve, so the volume of requests wasn’t surprising – what was surprising was BOCOG’s lack of preparation. In any case, they appear to have learned from their mistakes – the second phase will resume on December 10 and will now be a lottery system, just like the first round held this summer. Ticket applications will be accepted from December 10-30. Those who registered on October 30 at Bank of China branches and through the calling center will be given priority in purchasing tickets, although exact details have yet to be released.

In other Olympic news:

- The winners of the Lenovo-China Daily contest to select eight foreign torch bearers have been announced; all are foreigners resident in China.

- IOC Chief Jacques Rogge announces that daily pollution tests will be held to determine if the Olympics need to be postponed, and claims that when Beijing was selected pollution was much less severe.

- There are no special pigs being raised for the Olympics.

Links and Sources
Official Ticketing Website
New Frontier China Blog: Image
www.newfrontierchina.com/blog