I've gone to I/O every year. They usually set aside presale tickets for regular attendees, so we don't get locked-out if they sell out.
We're only a week away from general sales, but I haven't seen any information about I/ON registration yet. I hope they're still giving early access to tickets for I/ONs this year.
https://developers.google.com/events/io/help#reg_ions
"I/ONs have attended at least five of the following as a paid attendee: Google I/O 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012 and the 2007 Google Developer Day in Mountain View. I/ONs receive a limited time opportunity to purchase a ticket during pre-sale registration. Eligibility as an I/ON is at Google's discretion."
I too have been to every I/O, but the only year I ever got dibs on tickets was '10. I believe that '10 attendees who solved the puzzle on the t-shirts they gave out got dibs for '11, but I know of nobody who got dibs for '12.
Hmm I've gone every year (for last three years I only) as well, and haven't gotten an opportunity to early register. Hell I'm even a Glass Explorer that went to the San Francisco Foundry.
Yeah, I was kind of hoping for some sort of early buy-in opportunity for the Glass Explorer group but I guess no such luck (unless they clue us in between now and EOD Tuesday I guess).
I'm going to be bummed if I can't get a ticket and there's a lot of Glass dev content at the conference. I didn't have the time to go to either Foundry event.
I hope they're still giving early access to tickets for I/ONs this year.
And I, and many others, hope they don't. Google I/O became a "why not" conference to go to for those in the area because the freebies outweighed the cost, and it is ridiculous that Google starts to grandfather that in.
"Before" meaning 2008. Every year after they gave out freebies. Further that is irrelevant regardless given that the pre-sales isn't to some sort of "loyal since 2008" group, but rather is whoever happened to get in the prior year. And I believe such pre-sales have only happened for the past two years.
>Further that is irrelevant regardless given that the pre-sales isn't to some sort of "loyal since 2008" group
But there is a presale aimed at exactly this group.
They've had the "I/ON" group (aka "loyal since 2008") since 2010, if I remember correctly. There was no presale but it also took 90 days for the 2010 conference to sell out, so it wasn't like you needed one. The 2010 I/ON group got priority seating at the keynote, a different T-shirt, and some other trinkets.
In 2011 they did presale for I/ONs two weeks prior to general registration, and a presale for other 2010 attendees one week prior to open registration (and only for attendees who paid full price in 2010, not academic discounted tickets).
2012 had just a presale for I/ONs, no early registration at all for 2011 attendees.
We're only a week away from general sales, but I haven't seen any information about I/ON registration yet. I hope they're still giving early access to tickets for I/ONs this year.