MSU Red Cedar Message Board

Thinking I saw a $25 "convenience fee" as part of the total price. Perhaps that should be refunded to everyone for using a system that I in no way would consider convenient.

Section 16
Row 32

That new big screen is going to look so nice right above me!

Okay. I caved and bought. We are buying with my nephew and niece who are in Germany, and we were trying to sort this out through Facebook. We went up top. Last row in the upper deck. Decided we didn't want anyone behind us and with the wall there, it would protect us from nasty wind. Plus, no seat license. I know bathrooms will be a hike, so I'll just pee over the wall. Better watch out if you're filling the tank....

Yeah but if you were arbitrarily the last to pick, you would then be pissed about that.

If you want a chance at the best seats, fight it out at midnight. Otherwise, just wait until morning. Better yet, donate next time. :)

Devils advocate argument. The season ticket seat would likely get sold one way or another (see attendance over the past 25 years). Moreover the sale of tickets is not donating money to the u, it represents a sale of a good (when I buy msu ice cream I'm not donating). Whereas someone who donates straight up gives money (granted spartan fund members get something but it's certainly not fair market value).

That being said spartan fund members are compensated too highly with points versus season ticket holders, moreover we get to double up with spartan fund donation points and the donation to the ad.

I'm not saying that season ticket holders should jump donors in priority. I'm saying that longstanding season ticket holders should be rewarded for their loyalty and renewing every year by getting to select their seats before those that just bought tickets 2 months ago. That's how every other system works.

It's also how MSU has apparently seen the issue as well since they've factored longevity into their Spartan Points system but for whatever reason that point system was not used for this selection process or at least it wasn't used when differentiating between 1st year ticket holders and longtime ticket holders.

Consecutive Years as a Season Ticket Holder 3 points per year, per sport
Consecutive Years as a Spartan Fund Member 2 points per year
Lifetime Giving to Athletics 1 point per $100
Lifetime Giving to University 1 point per $1000
Irrevocable Planned Gift to Athletics 1 point per $1000 (based on allowable charitable deduction)

And this is coming from someone who has only had actual season tickets for 1 year. I've had student tickets since 2004 and last year was my first year of non-student tickets so it's not even like I'm advocating for myself to be further ahead in line. Fair is fair and I don't think it's right that I get to pick seats at the same time as someone who has been buying season tickets in Spartan Stadium for 10 years.

And in any event, KC_SPARTAN's suggestion merely tries to find a way to handle all the traffic. No one would have had a problem with duking it out at midnight if the system actually worked and was able to handle that traffic. It obviously wasn't and crashed. Leading some people to not get seats they wanted, forcing them to wait until morning, etc. Staggering the time slots based on point levels could have alleviated much of the problems.

EDIT: From the Seat Selection process handout, it looks like they did assign non-donors and new ticket holders a date and time based on consecutive years of season ticket purchases. Unfortunately, it seemed that too may people had the same time slot. Hence the reason why KC_SPARTAN's suggestion may have been a good way to go. They simply needed more staggering than they already had.

Wow. That's horrible. If that's the case, why not do more staggering rather than releasing the masses on the system at one time?

I was talking about an ideal world. The spartan fund points seen miscalculated. No one seemed to get points for more than one year of ticket holding. But I think we're more or less in agreement.

And I got in a day before you with only 50 to the ad 150 to the u, spartan funny member, and first year season ticket.

Seat backs and parking pass ordered. Is it game time yet

Not a ton of seats left over. A lot of singles or three seats together (of which you cannot purchase just two). Upper endzones and sides of the upper deck.

I just looked at the 3d model, there are still a lot of open seats in the lower endzones and uppers

My dad moved our seats that we've had since I can remember from section 22 row 55 to section 9 (not sure what rows but about the same).

I'll miss being behind MSU's bench, but we couldn't pass up being on the 45 yard line. Plus we couldn't stand some of the people we were around.