Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) has always been a madly anticipated event and tickets have been picked up within moments of them going online. But the company has been apparently pushing unsold tickets to developers, indicating a completely reverse trend for this year’s WWDC 2014.
In what could only be described as a strange turn of events, Apple Inc. has been observed to have sent out email notifications offering a chance of buying tickets to its WWDC event. The ‘lucky’ developers who have received the notification have 24 hours to book their seats by paying a steep charge of $1599.
Apple, who was confident of repeating last year’s mad rush for tickets had held a sale via a lottery system. Developers who had ‘won’ the lottery had till April 14th to confirm the seats, but it is clear that many have opted to simply forgo the chance and Apple is now left with some unsold inventory.
Though the company isn’t confirming exactly how many tickets were left unsold, it has begun to send out invites to Developers who weren’t featured in the lottery. Some have even confirmed having received phone calls from Apple, offering them a chance to buy unclaimed tickets. Interestingly, the developers who received calls were informed: “that they have been randomly selected to buy one of the tickets that winners failed to claim before the 14th.” Upon agreeing to book a slot, Apple sent out emails with a link that had a validity of just 24 hours.
Though the ticket sale has been less than spectacular, the WWDC 2014 promises to be a great show. As with each year, developers can expect to witness first–hand new software products like the next-generation iOS 8 alongside a possible sneak peek of OS X 10.10, both of which are under continual development. However, this year also brings with it more than 100 technical sessions presented by Apple engineers, over 100 hands-on labs and other sessions for developers. These sessions are supposed to be really hardcore technical and offer developers some rare one–on–one time with Apple employees who are responsible for the core functionality of the software products.
WWDC 2014 is set to start on June 2nd and the opening address dubbed “State of the Union” will be streamed live via the WWDC website.