London Olympics 2012, part 1

The Olympics take place from July 27 through August 12. As you can imagine there has been incredible local demand for tickets. An estimated 6.6 million tickets to all events in 26 Olympic sports are being sold to the public, a further 2.2 million are being allocated to sponsors.

Last spring, in the first phase of sales, 22 million people applied for 3 million tickets. This has been a huge source of friction between the public and the London 2012 organizers.

It has also caused friction between the public and the computers set up to sell tickets. Yesterday it was announced, that somehow 10,000 too many tickets were sold for the synchronized swimming competition.

The organizers are contacting those among the 10,000 and offering them alternative seats. The Telegraph reports a few of those folks have been upgraded to seats at the 100 meters final. Watching Usain Bolt go under 9.5 secs in the 100 – and you know he can – strikes me as better than an upgrade to business on a transatlantic flight.

More on London's preparations for the Olympics is here.

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