DCI World Championships Finals - Paid Attendance Figures

[BRASSO]

48 minutes ago, Stu said:

I have been in email contact with someone in the know; for obvious reasons and third party communication policy I cannot mention the person's name nor post the emails. But it was confirmed that the attendence figures posted here from at least the mid nineties on back were not necessarily just the 'paid' attendence, and there was no official set methodology to get an exact accurate count on butts in the seats numbers let alone those who had specifically  'paid' to enter the gate. Now there is a set methodology, but then nope.

 I was present at several of these DCI Championships. So " I am in the know ". I was present, for example at the Montreal DCI Championships in 82, and know that the DCI paid attendance numbers released to the public was not " made up numbers ", nor " estimated numbers ", The IRS does not want " estimated numbers " They want to know real paid numbers, gross receipts, ticket sales. The DCI championship was a TWO day prelims for world Class level Corps, not a THREE day. The Finals Night PAID Attendance ( for just one season as an example ) was far larger in 1982 than any of the recent PAID attendance Finals Night PAID attendance. I don't need any anonymous email from someone to you to tell me what I know on this. Nobody that was present  in 1982 Finals Night will make the claim that the PAID Finals Night Attendance the last few seaaons at Indy on Finals nite is even close to the Finals Night PAID attendance at DCI Championships in 1982. There is no value to be had at attempts thru revisionisat history to discredit DCI's method of calculating its PAID attendance figures in former years as a lame attempt to prop up the present. We are on solid ground when we say that DCI has had an increase in its PAID attendance at Regionals and on Finals Night over some recent previous years. We lose credibility with folks that were PRESENT at Finals Championships, when  some anonymous person wants to imply that DCI did not know what they were doing regarding Finals Night PAID attendance counting in previous years. Thats ridiculous, no matter who  you supposedly got an email from. The lowest Finals Night attendance I attended  was in 1993 in Jackson, Miss. It was far lower than Indy the last few seasons as a matter of fact. On the other hand, I attended DCI Finals Night in the 80's that I KNOW were larger than Finals Night attendance in Indy the last few seasons. I don;t need anyone that was not present in the 1970's DCI Championships either ( I was present for some of them too ), or the 1980's Finals Night, 1990's, 2000;s etc, to tell me what I already know, and what I SAW and what DCI released to the public. So thats that, Stu, and people can say, believe, whatever they want. I don't care about the disbelievers, nor should I much care about them either. I personally think this topic has about run its course now, and perhaps its time to move on from it. Those that have convinced themselves that DCI somehow did not know how to accurarately count and state publically their PAID Finals Night Attendance figures in some previous DCI years are not going to be persuaded otherwise on the ridiculousness of that claim on DCI officials, so its time now to move on, imo

Edited August 31, 2017 by BRASSO

[BDCorno]

11 hours ago, Jeff Ream said:

John D posted it on someones Facebook page. I cant post it for obvious reasons as it's a private page, but if anyone would know, he would.

 

DCI released numbers. Lots of them. Given how PR works, they can be inflated. Look at Wrestlemania 3 in the Silverdome....WWE has been gloating for years that they got 93,000 people in there. Why? So they could say they broke the record. When in fact, as was revelaed later by former officials the paid attendance was about 78,000. So why the need to post the bigger number? I mean given the layout, even with comps they could not have crammed another 15,000 in there.

 

But man, 93,000 sounds good...and it's still what the company touts to this day. I believe the Montreal number was over 30,000...it was packed. But some of those other numbers...I was there. and looking at the layout of the stadiums, no way you could fit that many people in there without fans out past the end zones...and video shows that aint the case.

Yeah, you're pretty well capped at about 22,000 in Lucas with all seats sold "behind the beam". It's just not a huge venue to start with. Rose Bowl? 1/3 full for sure, and this was before the remodel and downsizing of seating, so the number was in the 33k-35k area. How much was paid? I'd posit that they'd have a hard time giving away 10,000-12,000 tickets, and there weren't that many MM's left to fill out the seats there. I hate to imply any "massaging" of the numbers,  but it would definitely be in DCI's best interest to lowball the numbers to help justify Indy as THE site, and give the "hey, attendance was the same" excuse for locking that in for a generation. I realize some of the benefits to having DCI in Indy, but in terms of growing the activity, it's not going to move the ball down that field.

 

[garfield]

13 hours ago, BRASSO said:

 Its not as complicated as you might think it is. I believe that the official DCI Finals night paid attendance figures that DCI releases to the public each and every season are the same figures they utilize in their filings with the IRS each and every season. I don't see why not... unless someone thinks DCI was cooking the paid attendance numbers numbers in any season. If they think that, then my response would be that I don't particularly share in that jaded and cynical view of DCI.

I'm still perplexed about your thinking that DCI reports their attendance figures to the IRS.

I've read a few 990's and I haven't seen that...

 

[garfield]

14 hours ago, Cappybara said:

 

1. I'm 21 years old.

Heh, I have Bostonian shoes older than you.

Now get off my lawn!

[BRASSO]

17 minutes ago, garfield said:

I'm still perplexed about your thinking that DCI reports their attendance figures to the IRS.

I've read a few 990's and I haven't seen that...

 

 Paid receipts. But like I said, this topic has about been beaten the death now. I'm out now on it. Its getting boring, tiresome for me. Listening to people tell me what rock concerts were like that I attended, but were not there themselves but " know someone that was ", and they want to tell me that my assessment, or my eyeballs on the concert attendance, or the announced PAID attendance by the Stadium that night was inflated or whatever is boring for me. I don't need to hear from these folks frankly. They wern't there. So I don't need their bogus assessments/ opinions on some alleged half baked DCI conspiratorial " cooked up numbers " on DCI's PAID attendance in any year either to be frank with you. So thats about it for me on this... and we move on.

Edited August 31, 2017 by BRASSO

[garfield]

3 minutes ago, BRASSO said:

 Paid receipts. But like I said, this topic has about been beaten the death now. I'm out now on it. Its getting boring, tiresome for me. Listening to people tell me what rock concerts were like that I attended, but were not there themselves but " know someone that was ", and they want to tell me that my assessment, or my eyeballs on the concert attendance, or the announced PAID attendance by the Stadium that night was inflated or whatever is boring for me. I don't need to hear from these folks frankly. They wern't there. So I don't need their bogus assessments/. opinions on some alleged " cooked up numbers " on PAID attendance to be frank with you. So thats about it for me on this... and we move on.

I hear ya'!  It's like everyone knows more than I do sometimes!

And I hate to burst your bubble, but DCI doesn't report "paid receipts" either.  They report revenue; I know you know that.

I understand your viewpoint (I was at those shows, too), I just don't recall the crowd size comparison of actual vs. reported.

But I do know that the IRS doesn't care one whit about "paid receipts", and pulling that number out of the reported revenue as a basis for an attendance discussion would be very difficult for almost all except Wayne Leide.

 

[Jeff Ream]

11 hours ago, BRASSO said:

 Speaking of Pennsylvania, PBS used to televise BOTH the DCI East Regionals in Pennsylvania for a few years, then in August the DCI Championships as well. Legacy fans from the 70's  on the East Coast recall these PBS  TV telecasts too.

well Allentown did. harrisburg I think once showed it on delay. It wasn't a statewide thing. Allentown also did DCA when finals were there in 77

[garfield]

Horse. Sufficiently. Beaten.

 

[Jeff Ream]

11 hours ago, BRASSO said:

 Ouch.. if you are saying DCI's announced paid attendance figures can be akin to what  Wrestlemamania does in announcing paid attendance figures, you have a much more jaded, cynical view of DCI's announced paid attendance figures than I do. I don't see DCI as anything remotely like that FAKE sport that fixes its matches, and has its officials that run it as the worst case of human fraud imaginable... some with felony records. But ok. Jeff. I trust that DCI knows how to adequately count paid attendance receipts at its shows... and give us accurate readings. Both now, and every year. If you think its more like " Wrestlemania "... well... I got nothing else as a retort to add to THAT assessment analogy as to what DCI might be like when it counts its paid receipt attendance figures, then releases that info to us,... lol

DCI never stipulated one key word Brasso, something you refuse to get or accept....PAID. They just released attendance. in any PR prior to 1997, the word PAID was never part of the total. So we have no idea if those numbers are one day, several days, how many available seats there were...nothing. They released a figure but did not specify what was paid or what wasn't. 

 

please, understand and accept this fact. You'll make yurself and most of DCP's readers happy when you do.

[Jeff Ream]

6 hours ago, cixelsyd said:

They were.  The most attended DCI finals years occurred in the PBS era.

Montreal doesnt count because it wasn't live on finals....Midwest does. and since DCi has never clarified what was paid and what wasn't prior to 1997, we really have no idea.