The dates for PAX East 2017 have been announced as March 10–12, which had been rumored for months but now finally confirmed. But along with this news came a startling change — the elimination of three-day badges:
When looking over the data, we saw that people were buying 3-Day badges but not using them for the full weekend. By switching exclusively to single days, we can help ensure that every sold badge actually gets used by fans who want them and increase the individual number of fans who get to experience the show.
Individual day badges will instead sell for $52.50 each, with a sale limit of four badges per event day per household (that is, 12 one-day badges). At $157.50/person for the entire weekend, it makes for a pricey weekend compared to smaller events: $20 for the two-day RetroGameCon; $40 for the entire two-day GaymerX East; and $75 for the four-day MAGFest.
I doubt this change will do anything to prevent scalpers from grabbing as many tickets as possible. As soon as tickets go on sale, Saturday badges will sell out within minutes, followed by Friday and then Sunday. We never know when badges will drop, though — their availability is not announced in advance, ostensibly to help defeat scalpers. But that doesn't mean you have to be refreshing social media every five minutes for the next two months. A simple IFTTT recipe will alert you as soon as badges become available.
IFTTT, or If This Then That, is a free online tool that can be programmed to watch for certain triggers, then take action on those events. Since the official PAX Twitter account always announces when PAX badges go on sale, that can be our trigger that immediately sends an email to your account.
Just use the "New tweet by specific user?Send me an email" recipe, supply the @Official_PAX handle and your email address, and as long as you are conscientious about checking your email, you'll know when that all-important tweet is issued.
In the meantime, you may receive additional emails for each tweet @Official_PAX sends in response to followers and fans. But once badge sales begin, you can disable this recipe until the next PAX.
See you in March!
