ROTR Boarding group issues resolution thoughts

[pokee99]

I didn’t say they all got a BG. I said they all got into the park.

No one is guaranteed a BG. Obviously...

With my brilliant alternative EVERYONE would be guaranteed a BG if they got there at rope drop!

 

[Ladyslug]

I'm from Canada, and don't have a data roaming plan. So I'm going to have to change my plan, pay extra cash just for the CHANCE to WIN. Will my 2 year old phone be fast enough? Will data roaming slow me down so much that ONE MINUTE window I have won't be enough time?

I was under the impression Disneyland had wifi, so a data plan would not be "required." There was just someone earlier on the ROTR BG thread that mentioned they used a kind of old smartphone (like an iPhone 5 or something) and the Disneyland wifi and still got a guaranteed boarding group.

If they still have BGs when we go in October, I just might bring my decommissioned iPhone 6 and let my son try using the wifi -- might as well maximize our chances!

 

[Skyegirl1999]

But it's not really an option if they're all gone in ONE MINUTE by the people with cell phones. That's my point.

I mean, that’s why I said you have to be one of the first people at a machine...

I feel like you’re talking in circles, so I’ll cease trying to clarify things.

 

[Skyegirl1999]

I was under the impression Disneyland had wifi, so a data plan would not be "required." There was just someone earlier on the ROTR BG thread that mentioned they used a kind of old smartphone (like an iPhone 5 or something) and the Disneyland wifi and still got a guaranteed boarding group.

If they still have BGs when we go in October, I just might bring my decommissioned iPhone 6 and let my son try using the wifi -- might as well maximize our chances!

Yup, several people have reported their Wi-Fi phones getting through first.

I’ve had terrible luck with Disney’s Wi-Fi in general; however, bringing an old phone and trying it out certainly can’t hurt!

 

[SirBill]

So, if that's the case, multiple single-day / multi-day ticket holders would be lumped into the AP group, where a single ride per time period, per person would apply. That would require more sophisticated programming to detect guests with multiple tickets during a time period, but it's totally doable.

Given the large number of ways people can buy a single day Disneyland ticket, I honestly cannot see how that would ever work. Even Disney World there are a few ways I can think of to bypass any checks pretty easily. One could easily buy multiple day tickets each registered to a different address. Even if Disney started to try to add facial scanning (which since they cannot even allow Magic Bands in CS, good luck with that!!) there are ways to bypass that. Anyone with extra money would be able to easily grab some primo BGs.

The intent with this idea is to auto-generate the BG for interested, first time riders (or riders that haven't ridden in 30+ days) upon entry scan... then it's truly a first-come, first served system - and prioritizing new riders.

I admire the spirit of the attempt but it's way too easy to work around, since Disney does not really treat a ticket as seriously as an ID (nor as I said, as that even an option in CA really). It is also way too complex a system as right off the bat, half the guests would miss the question about boarding groups and be really, really mad. Adding complexity to a system like this is inviting chaos.

 

[pokee99]

I mean, that’s why I said you have to be one of the first people at a machine...

I feel like you’re talking in circles, so I’ll cease trying to clarify things.

Haha, I was about say the same thing!

 

[SirBill]

With my brilliant alternative EVERYONE would be guaranteed a BG if they got there at rope drop!

If there are more people there at rope drop than the ride can take that day, it does not matter how fancy your plan is - some of those people are not going to ride. All plans run afoul of the basic problem of overloaded demand, no plan can give everyone a BG that wishes to have one, not even when you start filtering out some people based on criterial like "has ridden this month".

 

[pokee99]

Yup, several people have reported their Wi-Fi phones getting through first.

I’ve had terrible luck with Disney’s Wi-Fi in general; however, bringing an old phone and trying it out certainly can’t hurt!

I'd like to try the WiFi option too, especially as an option for my son who has an older phone. It just hasn't been recommended as a viable option on the blogs/tips pages i've read.

 

[ZJ5/9D47]

Do you think THIS would be a fair solution, or do you think it would make rope drop even more of a gong show:

Visitors buy their tickets. When they "activate" their ticket, they answer a question: Would you like to request a ROTR BG? Those who select YES, are flagged.

Once everyone scans into the park, they are AUTOMATICALLY assigned a boarding group (same BG for linked tickets) until all available BGs are allocated.

This solution makes BG assignment truly first come, first served. Assignment of a boarding group would "unflag" each ticket holder (APs would have to wait 1 month to "flag" again).

Single day ticket holders would get an automatic flag, so theoretically they could be repeat riders, but they'd have to spend an excessive amount of money on single day tickets. So technically, you're not excluding anyone who can't afford a certain type of ticket, but you're allowing loophole for repeat rides for those crazy fans that are willing to fork over the cash.

I'm sure my idea is flawed in some way, but I'm trying to think of solutions that would allow those without a phone or the non-tech savvy person to play the game.

This is about as close as first come first served you can get without waiting in a 3 hour ride line.

It still doesn't solve the problem for people that can't arrive prior to rope drop...

I’m an out-of-state AP so your proposed plan would not be fair to me or any others who come for a week and are not locals who are just day visitors and can come every month.

 

[Malcon10t]

I'm sure my idea is flawed in some way, but I'm trying to think of solutions that would allow those without a phone or the non-tech savvy person to play the game.

This is about as close as first come first served you can get without waiting in a 3 hour ride line.

This will not solve the problem but actually cause a bigger problem as we go back to people camping at the gates again. Were you there for the 50th anniversary in 2005? People camped out early enough they actually created lines in DCA so you could camp all night, and you were wrist banded so you couldn't have people join you at 6am, when others had been there since midnight. Just imagine the nightmare if you were only guaranteed a BG if you were first thru the gate, and imagine how hard it would be on anyone not wanting to ride Rise, just wanting to enter the park.

We entered the park at 730 on Friday and Saturday. At 8am on Friday, there were 2 people trying for 4 of us and we got group 59. On Sat, we had 4 trying for a party of 8, we got group 13. It was fun to listen to the silence at 7:59, and the cheers that started at 8am.

 

[sjmac42]

Ultimately the ride has limited capacity that is far exceeded by the number of people in the park on any given day. That’s really the bottom line and no sort of alternative plan is going to resolve the basic issue, more people want to ride it on any given day than it has capacity to allow. That’s the exact same situation in any park with a very popular new ride.

RSR still gets over 2 hour standby waits regularly with FP gone by late morning, early afternoon. Should an alternate plan be put in for people who don’t want to get to DCA until the afternoon so they can ride RSR? I know it has single rider but people always want to ride together so there are still complaints.

Of course not.

In the end, those who are there now have a chance to ride. Those of us who organised trips prior to the opening date (despite what Disney had previously promised) didn’t. Any chance is better than no chance and anyone can increase their chances by doing some research.

Same as they should with any destination.

 

[CaliforniaGirl09]

I was under the impression Disneyland had wifi, so a data plan would not be "required." There was just someone earlier on the ROTR BG thread that mentioned they used a kind of old smartphone (like an iPhone 5 or something) and the Disneyland wifi and still got a guaranteed boarding group.

If they still have BGs when we go in October, I just might bring my decommissioned iPhone 6 and let my son try using the wifi -- might as well maximize our chances!

I'd like to try the WiFi option too, especially as an option for my son who has an older phone. It just hasn't been recommended as a viable option on the blogs/tips pages i've read.

I was one of the ones who was successful on Saturday with an old iPhone on WiFi. We had five phones going, two of which were old and no longer had data plans. The other three were newer iPhones on at&t (11, x, and 8). The winner in our case was the oldest phone—a 6 on WiFi.

 

[pokee99]

I was one of the ones who was successful on Saturday with an old iPhone on WiFi. We had five phones going, two of which were old and no longer had data plans. The other three were newer iPhones on at&t (11, x, and 8). The winner in our case was the oldest phone—a 6 on WiFi.

Great data point - thanks! Is there a spot near the entrance that has good wifi, in addition to having a good cell signal - so your family can be together while you try them all?

 

[CaliforniaGirl09]

We sat in the back by small world to be away from the masses. I just kept teasing speeds and sat where it seemed best. Good luck and may small crowds be with you!

 

[VandVsmama]

Great data point - thanks! Is there a spot near the entrance that has good wifi, in addition to having a good cell signal - so your family can be together while you try them all?

No.
WiFi at DL is spotty. People have reported tending to get good WiFi reception in Tomorrowland.

 

[VandVsmama]

Do you think THIS would be a fair solution, or do you think it would make rope drop even more of a gong show:

Visitors buy their tickets. When they "activate" their ticket, they answer a question: Would you like to request a ROTR BG? Those who select YES, are flagged.

Once everyone scans into the park, they are AUTOMATICALLY assigned a boarding group (same BG for linked tickets) until all available BGs are allocated.

This solution makes BG assignment truly first come, first served. Assignment of a boarding group would "unflag" each ticket holder (APs would have to wait 1 month to "flag" again).

Single day ticket holders would get an automatic flag, so theoretically they could be repeat riders, but they'd have to spend an excessive amount of money on single day tickets. So technically, you're not excluding anyone who can't afford a certain type of ticket, but you're allowing loophole for repeat rides for those crazy fans that are willing to fork over the cash.

I'm sure my idea is flawed in some way, but I'm trying to think of solutions that would allow those without a phone or the non-tech savvy person to play the game.

This is about as close as first come first served you can get without waiting in a 3 hour ride line.

It still doesn't solve the problem for people that can't arrive prior to rope drop...

This wouldn't work because of the programming logic for the single day ticket holders. What would the "automatic flag" rule be? To not give them a boarding group? It would also basically favor AP holders over single day ticket holders or multi-day ticket holders.

There is no solution for people who can't arrive prior to rope drop. If you can't get to the park prior to rope drop, then you are not getting a boarding group. And Disney gave no guarantees or promises of giving out boarding groups in that sort of situation. Look at HS out in WDW. People get to the park at 5-5:30 am just to have a chance to get a boarding group. It essentially IS a lottery but on the other hand, it's not. The computer system doesn't randomly pick people and assign them boarding groups. It's more likely based on the order in which the thousands of requests come into the server.

And you bet your bottom dollar that Disney IT probably ran multiple simulated tests to test out performance load on those servers, getting tens of thousands of requests hitting those servers all at once in under a minute. Can you imagine what a disaster this all would have been had they not done that? The line out of City Hall would be even more insane.

I think that boarding groups will be here until summer. Weekends through Memorial Day weekend will be the busiest in terms of getting a boarding group. Once summer begins, maybe they'll switch to a standby line, but if that happens, you'll see it at WDW first before DL.

I think that you should email or call Disney and provide them with your suggestion. Maybe they considered an idea similar to that when they were going through the development work for boarding groups. On the other hand, maybe they didn't consider an idea like that.

 

[NorthernCalMom]

I guess this challenging problem of fairly distributing a very limited resource (rides on ROTR) to a huge group of highly motivated individuals could be a great tool for a political philosophy teacher to use for explaining different political systems.

(1.) Avoid any element of randomness but create a pure “first-come-first-serve” system by letting highly motivated individuals camp out overnight (and exerting the necessary cast member resources to prohibit line cutting & other ways of bypassing the rules), or award slots not based on random selection but some kind of measurable achievement, such as an essay writing contest with the topic “Why I ought to be permitted to ride ROTR” (though the latter of course raises the problematic issue of having to find unbiased, incorruptible judges to grade those essays): MERITOCRACY—The decision of who gets to ride is purely based on merit, raising of course the age old question of privilege (since any way of measuring merit will suit people with certain strengths and weaknesses while disadvantaging others).

(2.) Auction each of the slots off to the highest bidder: CAPITALISM (This may be the easiest yet for most of us, myself included, most distasteful way of solving this problem of high interest colliding with limited access—I’m glad Disney isn’t going down that route, though their shareholders would probably love it.)

(3.) Raffle each slot out ahead of time (with people who do not have a computer being able to join the raffle by entering themselves through traditional “snail” mail): COMMUNISM. Each person would have exactly the same (very, small) chance (assuming the flow of information informing people of this process would reach every single interested person).

It seems to me that the current BG policies combine elements of all three of the above: it is MERITOCRATIC in that it favors those willing to do the research over those who just come and hope for the best; it is CAPITALIST in that your chances increase if you have a fancy, lightning fast phone and the ability to practice by staying more days in a row; it is COMMUNIST in that there is still an element of chance that applies evenly to all, the seemingly deserving and undeserving, the relatively rich and the relatively poor.

If you look at most dictionary definitions of the term “fair,” you will find that, if conducted with appropriate transparency, each of the further above described extremes can be considered “fair.” A “fair” process is merely one, which clearly communicates its rules and applies the same rules to all of the participants. The term “fairness” does by itself NOT imply a process that makes people happy or is considered morally or ethically superior to other selection methods.

I notice in many discussions about this that people seem to often say “fair,” when they actually mean “ethically” or “morally good” (I’m only considering caring, relatively selfless hypothetical people here, not those who simply define “fair” as “what serves me”).

Generations of philosophers have argued about what “morally good” means. Is it a process that maximizes the collective good (and how do you measure such “good”)? Is it a process that honors and celebrates certain abstract ideals (and which of those ideals ought to be celebrated)?

Those are great and hard to answer questions.

 

[ckb_nc]

I find most the conversation centers around the inability for AP to be able to walk in DL later in the day and ride. all of the ideas to allow that require that Disney restrict the access to guests who arrive earlier or allow stand-by. Even stand-by would in no way guarantee later arriving guests a chance to ride as we know Star Wars fans are more than willing to camp out. The ride on both coasts is less than 2 months old. Everyone relax and revisit this topic in say August...

 

[Skyegirl1999]

I find most the conversation centers around the inability for AP to be able to walk in DL later in the day and ride. all of the ideas to allow that require that Disney restrict the access to guests who arrive earlier or allow stand-by. Even stand-by would in no way guarantee later arriving guests a chance to ride as we know Star Wars fans are more than willing to camp out. The ride on both coasts is less than 2 months old. Everyone relax and revisit this topic in say August...

Huh. I don’t find much of the conversation to center around that at all. I find most of it to center on the inability for infrequent visitors to ensure they’ll be able to ride, no matter how early they get there or how hard they try. The fact that no amount of desire, effort, or dedication can get you on the ride freaks people out.

I have friends from the Midwest who were planning to come out for Spring Break and spend two days at the parks, mainly on account of ROTR. They're reconsidering their trip entirely because of the chance that they’d come all this way and be unable to ride. I can’t say I blame them - it’s a lot to hang on your phone not freezing up.

I don’t personally know of any APs who are upset they can’t waltz in later in the day and ride...

 

[Etonduf]

I guess this challenging problem of fairly distributing a very limited resource (rides on ROTR) to a huge group of highly motivated individuals could be a great tool for a political philosophy teacher to use for explaining different political systems.

(1.) Avoid any element of randomness but create a pure “first-come-first-serve” system by letting highly motivated individuals camp out overnight (and exerting the necessary cast member resources to prohibit line cutting & other ways of bypassing the rules), or award slots not based on random selection but some kind of measurable achievement, such as an essay writing context with the topic “Why I ought to be permitted to ride ROTR” (though the latter of course raises the problematic issue of having to find unbiased, incorruptible judges to grade those essays): MERITOCRACY—The decision of who gets to ride is purely based on merit, raising of course the age old question of privilege (since any way of measuring merit will suit people with certain strengths and weaknesses while disadvantaging others).

(2.) Auction each of the slots off to the highest bidder: CAPITALISM (This may be the easiest yet for most of us, myself included, most distasteful way of solving this problem of high interest colliding with limited access—I’m glad Disney isn’t going down that route, though their shareholders would probably love it.)

(3.) Raffle each slot out ahead of time (with people who do not have a computer being able to join the raffle by entering themselves through traditional “snail” mail): COMMUNISM. Each person would have exactly the same (very, small) chance (assuming the flow of information informing people of this process would reach every single interested person).

It seems to me that the current BG policies combine elements of all three of the above: it is MERITOCRATIC in that it favors those willing to do the research over those who just come and hope for the best; it is CAPITALIST in that your chances increase if you have a fancy, lightning fast phone and the ability to practice by staying more days in a row; it is COMMUNIST in that there is still an element of chance that applies evenly to all, the seemingly deserving and undeserving, the relatively rich and the relatively poor.

If you look at most dictionary definitions of the term “fair,” you will find that, if conducted with appropriate transparency, each of the further above described extremes can be considered “fair.” A “fair” process is merely one, which clearly communicates its rules and applies the same rules to all of the participants. The term “fairness” does by itself NOT imply a process that makes people happy or is considered morally or ethically superior to other selection methods.

I notice in many discussions about this that people seem to often say “fair,” when they actually mean “ethically” or “morally good” (I’m only considering caring, relatively selfless hypothetical people here, not those who simply define “fair” as “what serves me”).

Generations of philosophers have argued about what “morally good” means. Is it a process that maximizes the collective good (and how do you measure such “good”)? Is it a process that honors and celebrates certain abstract ideals (and which of those ideals ought to be celebrated)?

Those are great and hard to answer questions.

I tried to say much the same thing the other day, but you have expressed it much more eloquently. I agree that is a really interesting issue.

Incidentally, I was largely railroaded (in the thread and in conversation) by people who vehemently disagree and insist that there's only one "fair" way. Their way, of course.