The Madman $10 Sales that Literally Drove Everyone Mad
It all started when Madman - an Australian anime company - had a birthday sale where all the DVDs in their back catalogue would sell for a crazy $10AUD for only 10 hours. They announced it earlier in the week, and so anime forums of all shapes and sizes started to post the info and people started to get hyped up and posting what they would get and how much they would save and so on and so forth.
Other than the ungodly (but server traffic friendly) hours of starting the sale at 2200 (that reads 10PM, that's right 10 o'clock at night) and finishes at 0800 (8AM) the next day, I thought the 10 hours sale was a great idea. So I was all excited and geared up ready for the sale.
I, for one, like many others slightly IT-knowledgable people on the forums were expecting a, how should I put it, not so smooth transaction. We were expecting the server to slow due to so many people jumping on simutaneously. I was in a state of denial, thinking that Madman would have and should have anticipated the load on the upcoming "sale of a decade" and acted accordingly.
Well, how naive I was. Here was what happened:
2150: Notice the slow response time on the website
2152: Logged into my account
2200: Sales started
2215: Added 7 items into the cart
2216: Added the 8th item, then discovered the price have changed from RRP to $10
2217: Tried to remove the previous 7 items
2220: Still trying...
2230: Still trying...
2240: Still trying...
2300: Server died. Received the 1st 503 error.
2320: Server came back up again. Everything in the basket went AWOL
0000: Added 11 items into the cart (half way there)
0024: Discovered I've added Full Metal Panic: Fumoffu V2 twice.
0043: 2nd 503. Basket went AWOL for the 2nd time
0157: 3rd 503. Decided to cut down my list by half
0210: Discovered I've added Galaxy Angel A three times
0217: Basket went AWOL for the 3rd time. Getting ready to kill the cat next door.
0227: Server died again.
0321: Basket went AWOL for the 4th time. Finding my knife in the kitchen.
0325: Decided to only get those that I really wanted (4 items)
0340: Proceeded to checkout
0359: One step away from finalising the order....... 4th 503 error.
0408: Reload the last step fail again. 5th basket AWOL
0410: Tried to re-add the 4 items into the basket.
0420: Still trying...
0430: Still trying...
0440: Still trying...
0450: Basket went AWOL for the 6th time.
0500: ZOMG, managed to add 3 items in 10 minutes
0505: Added all 4 items into the cart. Got greedy and added my 2nd bare essential list.
0510: Added another 5 items. Proceeded to checkout before the basket goes AWOL again.
0524: VICTORY at last 7hr 24min to complete the order (9 items)
0540: Placed my second order
0601: All done 21min to complete the order (10 items)
0622: Logged off, went to bed... the cat survived.
All up 7hr 45min to place 2 orders while I could have done that in 2 hours max (even with the slow traffic).
To be honest I wasn't impressed. Matter of fact, I wouldn't think that anyone last night was totally satisfied by the whole experience, regardless of whether they've successfully placed an order or not.
It was horrendously slow (expected that), basket kept on dying (did NOT expect that), and general discomfort, having to keep at it all night. Not since my physics assignment did I have to stay up till the wee hours of the morning. The biggest pain in the ass is David Copperfield kept doing the disappearing magic trick on my basket. It disappeared 6 times!
If anyone must point a finger at anything, it would have to be Madman's miscalculation of the anticipated load on the server. Sure, buying a new server to cater for this "once in a decade" sale sounds ridiculous, but measures should have been taken to minimise the load.
In the end, some got what they want, some got half of what they want, and some got nothing except for sleep deprivation. It's not good for the goodwill of the business.
All in all, it should have been better managed.
And boy, look at the messages flied in the forum. The break down was 7 pages of pre-sale hype, 4 pages of "keep trying till your order goes through" during the sale and then pages after pages of disgruntled customers who spent the whole night and got nothing for it. Well, you would have expected that. The server died, the items disappearing, the ungodly hours. It was just a bad experience for all, more so for those who missed out.
Other than the ungodly (but server traffic friendly) hours of starting the sale at 2200 (that reads 10PM, that's right 10 o'clock at night) and finishes at 0800 (8AM) the next day, I thought the 10 hours sale was a great idea. So I was all excited and geared up ready for the sale.
I, for one, like many others slightly IT-knowledgable people on the forums were expecting a, how should I put it, not so smooth transaction. We were expecting the server to slow due to so many people jumping on simutaneously. I was in a state of denial, thinking that Madman would have and should have anticipated the load on the upcoming "sale of a decade" and acted accordingly.
Well, how naive I was. Here was what happened:
2150: Notice the slow response time on the website
2152: Logged into my account
2200: Sales started
2215: Added 7 items into the cart
2216: Added the 8th item, then discovered the price have changed from RRP to $10
2217: Tried to remove the previous 7 items
2220: Still trying...
2230: Still trying...
2240: Still trying...
2300: Server died. Received the 1st 503 error.
2320: Server came back up again. Everything in the basket went AWOL
0000: Added 11 items into the cart (half way there)
0024: Discovered I've added Full Metal Panic: Fumoffu V2 twice.
0043: 2nd 503. Basket went AWOL for the 2nd time
0157: 3rd 503. Decided to cut down my list by half
0210: Discovered I've added Galaxy Angel A three times
0217: Basket went AWOL for the 3rd time. Getting ready to kill the cat next door.
0227: Server died again.
0321: Basket went AWOL for the 4th time. Finding my knife in the kitchen.
0325: Decided to only get those that I really wanted (4 items)
0340: Proceeded to checkout
0359: One step away from finalising the order....... 4th 503 error.
0408: Reload the last step fail again. 5th basket AWOL
0410: Tried to re-add the 4 items into the basket.
0420: Still trying...
0430: Still trying...
0440: Still trying...
0450: Basket went AWOL for the 6th time.
0500: ZOMG, managed to add 3 items in 10 minutes
0505: Added all 4 items into the cart. Got greedy and added my 2nd bare essential list.
0510: Added another 5 items. Proceeded to checkout before the basket goes AWOL again.
0524: VICTORY at last 7hr 24min to complete the order (9 items)
0540: Placed my second order
0601: All done 21min to complete the order (10 items)
0622: Logged off, went to bed... the cat survived.
All up 7hr 45min to place 2 orders while I could have done that in 2 hours max (even with the slow traffic).
To be honest I wasn't impressed. Matter of fact, I wouldn't think that anyone last night was totally satisfied by the whole experience, regardless of whether they've successfully placed an order or not.
It was horrendously slow (expected that), basket kept on dying (did NOT expect that), and general discomfort, having to keep at it all night. Not since my physics assignment did I have to stay up till the wee hours of the morning. The biggest pain in the ass is David Copperfield kept doing the disappearing magic trick on my basket. It disappeared 6 times!
If anyone must point a finger at anything, it would have to be Madman's miscalculation of the anticipated load on the server. Sure, buying a new server to cater for this "once in a decade" sale sounds ridiculous, but measures should have been taken to minimise the load.
In the end, some got what they want, some got half of what they want, and some got nothing except for sleep deprivation. It's not good for the goodwill of the business.
All in all, it should have been better managed.
And boy, look at the messages flied in the forum. The break down was 7 pages of pre-sale hype, 4 pages of "keep trying till your order goes through" during the sale and then pages after pages of disgruntled customers who spent the whole night and got nothing for it. Well, you would have expected that. The server died, the items disappearing, the ungodly hours. It was just a bad experience for all, more so for those who missed out.
posted by Chocobahn at
12:19 pm
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