Stu Posted September 1, 2017 Share Posted September 1, 2017 (edited) 15 minutes ago, cixelsyd said: How many jellybeans in the jar? I said 388. You said 450. Therefore, all drum corps attendance numbers are completely baseless. (Except the ones from 1997 on are absolutely exact, because my hearsay is reliable and yours is not.) Does that accurately summarize this thread now? Pre Electronic Scanning: Number of tickets sold; actually known. Number of people entering the stadium; estimated by eye-balling and not officially counted one-by-one because of tearing of tickets, comps, wrist-bands, and other ways to by-pass the gate ticket takers. Percentage of variance in numbers is higher. Post Electronic Scanning: Number of tickets sold; actually known. Number of people entering the stadium with paid tickets; actually known due to scanning. Number of people actually in stadium; again a guesstamate because there are still some who in some manner manage to get in without tickets, but the percentage of variance in numbers is is smaller. This is likely why DCI is now only counting 'paid' tickets sold and scanned as the official count. Edited September 1, 2017 by Stu 1 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StunnedMonkey Posted September 1, 2017 Share Posted September 1, 2017 22 hours ago, Stu said: You have to be aware that back then there were a plethora of comps, wrist-bands, and other ways to get through the gate which were all 'counted' in the attendence number figures; not 'just' paid tickets were in those figures. Or are you going to continue to be in denial? How do you know? I'd wager to say the reverse is probably true. I was in the crowd in 79 and 80 in Birmingham, and in 81 in Montreal. I can tell you that it was a different sort of audience back then. Drum Corp fandom today is very deep, but not wide. Forty years ago it was wide, but probably not as deep, that is to say there were many more casual fans in those days including those with zero connection to anyone in a corps or any history with the marching arts at all. Basically, a lot more "regular folk" turned out for corps shows in the golden age. Not sure why people feel the need to discredit the idea that DCI had a large following in the late 70's early 80's. They did. And it wasn't all educators and music majors. DCI finals in 1978 in Mile High: 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stu Posted September 1, 2017 Share Posted September 1, 2017 11 minutes ago, StunnedMonkey said: How do you know? A) I have been in direct contact with someone who was on the DCI team back then and can substantiate, not just a person in the audience who was there like you. 'That' is how I know. B) Please look carefully at that photo, and you provide us with an accurate number of 'paid' attendance sitting in those stands. Not just attendence of those sitting there, but those with 'paid' attendance. Can't be done. So the count has to be done the same way DCI did back then which was an estimate of all there, including comps and wrist-band entries as well as paid tickets. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StunnedMonkey Posted September 1, 2017 Share Posted September 1, 2017 4 minutes ago, Stu said: A) I have been in direct contact with someone who was on the DCI team back then and can substantiate, not just a person in the audience who was there like you. 'That' is how I know. B) Please look carefully at that photo, and you provide us with an accurate number of 'paid' attendance sitting in those stands. Not just attendence of those sitting there, but those with 'paid' attendance. Can't be done. So the count has to be done the same way DCI did back then which was an estimate of all there, including comps and wrist-band entries as well as paid tickets. I don't claim to know the paid attendance. I don't claim to know the comp'd attendance. You claim those things. And I call BS on it unless you have some evidence beyond "a guy on the DCI team back then" as your proof. My own experience with these things is that comp'd attendance, passes (wrist bands didn't exist in 1979) weren't nearly as common then as they are today. Remember, it didn't cost $80 a seat to attend finals in Denver. You could probably have had a seat for $8. My point is that these are apples and oranges. DCI has always bee a niche product, but it was far more likely for a regular Jane to attend back then. The appeal is extremely narrow now. A casual fan willing to drop $10 on a seat in Philly in '76 isn't dropping $100 a seat today. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stu Posted September 1, 2017 Share Posted September 1, 2017 3 minutes ago, StunnedMonkey said: I don't claim to know the paid attendance. I don't claim to know the comp'd attendance. You claim those things. And I call BS on it unless you have some evidence beyond "a guy on the DCI team back then" as your proof. My own experience with these things is that comp'd attendance, passes (wrist bands didn't exist in 1979) weren't nearly as common then as they are today. Remember, it didn't cost $80 a seat to attend finals in Denver. You could probably have had a seat for $8. My point is that these are apples and oranges. DCI has always bee a niche product, but it was far more likely for a regular Jane to attend back then. The appeal is extremely narrow now. A casual fan willing to drop $10 on a seat in Philly in '76 isn't dropping $100 a seat today. It is against DCP policy for me to post third party emails, and the person I am in contact with does not want to have a name plastered on this site, for good reason!! Suffice it to say I trust this person who was indeed part of DCI during that time period. I do not claim that I know the actual attendance of any year. My only point, my only claim, is that 'Accurate' counting of paid and other non-paid entries into the stadium was just not done at DCI Finals pre mid-nineties, and all numbers for those years are DCI's 'best guess' at counting all butts in seats. But you are certainly free to believe what you want. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stu Posted September 1, 2017 Share Posted September 1, 2017 (edited) 43 minutes ago, StunnedMonkey said: My own experience with these things And many times people's own experiences are not that accurate either! Edited September 1, 2017 by Stu Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cixelsyd Posted September 1, 2017 Share Posted September 1, 2017 4 hours ago, Stu said: Pre Electronic Scanning: Number of tickets sold; actually known. Number of people entering the stadium; estimated by eye-balling and not officially counted one-by-one because of tearing of tickets, comps, wrist-bands, and other ways to by-pass the gate ticket takers. Percentage of variance in numbers is higher. Post Electronic Scanning: Number of tickets sold; actually known. Number of people entering the stadium with paid tickets; actually known due to scanning. Number of people actually in stadium; again a guesstamate because there are still some who in some manner manage to get in without tickets, but the percentage of variance in numbers is is smaller. This is likely why DCI is now only counting 'paid' tickets sold and scanned as the official count. False. DCI also gives out complementary tickets. At times, the "official count" includes those unpaid tickets, as the DCI press release from 2015 stated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeff Ream Posted September 1, 2017 Share Posted September 1, 2017 8 hours ago, Lead said: It has nothing to do with whatever you're calling fictional entertainment (FYI, nearly all forms of entertainment are fictional entertainment, save for music and sports). It has to do with proper reporting and oversight to things like your state's Board of Accounts. Recordkeeping has greatly improved in just the last few years. Whereas to find accurate records you used to have to sift through boxes of paper files, stubs, and whatever, now you open a spreadsheet and CTRL-F to locate something. It's not rocket science to think that the accuracy of these things for whatever event is highly suspect the farther we go back in years. #### you using logic Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeff Ream Posted September 1, 2017 Share Posted September 1, 2017 7 hours ago, cixelsyd said: Please. These are public events, attended by tens of thousands of people. It is not hard to estimate attendance visually to within 10% accuracy. If someone tries to exaggerate reported attendance by more than 10%, as in the WWE example, there are tens of thousands of witnesses that can call their bluff. To my knowledge, no such dispute ever took place over the announced attendance figure for the 1981 DCI finals. Until this thread, the only related debate was over whether the number represented paid or total attendance. Even now, no one is specifically objecting - only casting general aspersions as if to preclude any acknowledgement of past successes by DCI. I was at many of the shows listed and several of those numbers are inflated 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeff Ream Posted September 1, 2017 Share Posted September 1, 2017 5 hours ago, cixelsyd said: How many jellybeans in the jar? I said 388. You said 450. Therefore, all drum corps attendance numbers are completely baseless. (Except the ones from 1997 on are absolutely exact, because my hearsay is reliable and yours is not.) Does that accurately summarize this thread now? Hearsay from people that deal with it daily. You know people that see the paperwork Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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