A bit like the Oyster Card system on London Transport? A way to store information about pre-bought tickets and possibly make payments as you entered the venue if there's late availability?

One concern is whether the technology could be rolled out cheaply enough to gain enough take up - particularly problematic with temporary Fringe venues. Maybe other festivals, particular venues (or groups of venues) could try it.

How does it cut costs? It would mean a massive roll-out of technology to many odd temporary venues, and as I've argued in other places, the failure rate of that would probably be very high.

Also, the amount of very poisonous chemicals it takes to make computers and associated technology means you can't assume that replacing paper tickets with tech is greener. It may be, but need to check.

Getting into shows fast without having to visit the box office would be great tho.
I posted
http://ideas.edinburghfestivals.co.uk/submissions/4290-what-if-venues-had-someone-standing-at-the-door-of-each-show-with-a-handful-of-tickets-and-change-for-really-last-minute-sales
which I still stand by as being simpler and less likely to fail :-)

A lot of the technology is already in place, it just needs to be adapted and rolled out to the temporary venues. We're only talking about a very small card reading machine that downloads information. Chip and pin use it to good use, Edinburgh University have a similar system for victualling, enrolling and even going to the gym. It's proven and widely used technology. It's convenient and over time it will be cost effective.

All new projects cost more when they start up, just look at renewable energy as a positive project with large short term costs. It would start off as a pilot project and move forward slowly as more people become integrated and interested in its use. If the transport companies of the world, as well as many other industries, can use it, then so can the Fringe.

For previous discussion and some kinda duplicate ideas see:
http://ideas.edinburghfestivals.co.uk/submissions/4272-what-if-each-attendee-had-a-unique-qr-code-which-they-could-use-to-access-events-rather-than-tickets
http://ideas.edinburghfestivals.co.uk/submissions/4261-what-if-we-had-a-really-simple-paperless-ticket-scheme-staff-just-have-a-list-of-names-at-the-door-and-you-show-id-see-1st-comment
http://ideas.edinburghfestivals.co.uk/submissions/4215-what-if-you-get-a-barcode-and-every-time-you-buy-tickets-they-are-linked-to-ur-barcode-and-it-s-scanned-as-u-go-into-shows-instead-of-paper-tickets

Yes, I'm happy with the idea that it will cost more to start with. But given the temporary nature of many fringe venues and the short duration of it, it will take much longer to pay it back, if at all. Again, can't assume. (And ppl already complain bitterly the fringe is to expensive.)

And it won't just take a card reading machine, it'll take a whole back office infastructure and data connections everywhere which is the main point I'm arguing on other ideas - given the nature of some fringe venues and the fringe in general this is much more likely to fail. Its a completely different situation to transport companies.

Also, remember the fringe is a loose collection of productions with many different ticketing systems in place. Even in London they had problems rolling our universal Oyster because some over-land train companies just refused - and thats in an tightly controlled environment where they have lawyers and contracts the size of phone books. How is this going to be organised across disparate venues?

@JamesB: I agree on all those points. Running a temporary Fringe venue must be stressful enough at times without another potentially weak link in the chain.

My initial comment had those thoughts in mind, but wondered if there were elements of Edinburgh's Festivals that could make it worthwhile, where the investment might be more viable. Permanent venues (used by EIF, Science Festival, Storytelling Festival, Jazz and Blues, etc.) might be able to make it work. Some of the larger Fringe venues might decide it's in their interests to roll it out as part of their cross-selling activities.

But you wouldn't be able to move away from paper tickets for a long time, if ever, so all venues would have to maintain capacity for receiving them at the door. (For an analogy, just this week there's been more opposition to the idea of phasing out cheques: some people are very attached to this form of payment.)

All the positive examples above (Oyster, library, gym, etc.) are centred around one person, one card, one service user. Yet group bookings are very common at the festivals – would the card contain multiple 'tickets'? Maybe you can add ticket credit to other people's cards, but what if you don't know who's going to attend because they're a friend of a friend?

I noted in one of the discussions linked to above that the next set of Edinburgh ticketing innovations will probably focus on making ticket buying easier: a single online point of sale for multiple festivals, for example. Alongside that, better ways of printing and distributing paper tickets, from where the tried and tested front of house operation can continue to work.

Those ideas are similar, but not the same. Most of them would suffer from the same problems mine would. How do you get a list of names at a small venue with no connection to the Fringe servers? They would need access too. Emails could work, but that would be more hour-to-hour work by back office staff ensuring those small venues got the correct information on time - hundreds of performances every hour that need lists of PAPER! The idea fails when the main Fringe office closes - they sell tickets on behalf of all venues as well as their own box office. The list would never be complete. The idea is a devolution of the ticketing system.

The whole back office infrastructure is already in place with an already very advanced system that has scope to be adapted - i know this, I've seen it and worked with it. It can be done with just a card reading machine, because the evidence is all across the Edinburgh University campus in a variety of places.

Oyster cards are a similar idea - they are a top-up card that allows access into a system at various points. You're being a bit picky saying it's totally different - nothing is the same as Fringe and the potential problems it would face if this idea were real, but there are similar ideas.

The biggest problem it would face would be convincing the venues to use the idea, not the production companies, but that's, of course part of the challenge of an idea - nobody ever came up with a perfect idea. This competition is about advancing a simple 1 dimensional idea based upon 160 characters that can be brought forward, not so you can endlessly pick holes in it.

True, some use different ticketing systems and the idea only covers one month a year, so the challenge would be how to make it worthwhile. Possibly a card that has use outside of the Fringe in the same way people use a nectar, for example. I repeat, for example.

Thanks David J. I agree with your analysis of the idea, it's potential and obvious downsides. I agree that tickets will never be phased out, but a card has some potential with other festivals and events.

I doubt a card is the future for the Fringe as a whole, but like you said the larger venues could use it as an option. Incentives and deals could keep people coming back to your venue by using the card.

@ChristopherH As you say the venues are key to a new system such as this. On a slightly more abstract note, festivals and events are by their nature intangible: suddenly a card gives you something to hold in your hand, proclaiming your branded loyalty to a particular experience. (We all love a lanyard after all.)

Following the 'Those ideas are similar...' post above, it's worth noting that back in 2006 the Fringe box office rolled out a well used system of online reporting mechanisms. Depending on your status as a performer, venue or promoter you got access to different reports and different information. (Sales at each price point, by day, length of time between sale and performance, etc.)

One of the venue reports did indeed include the surname of the ticket buyer, against the quantity of tickets, method of delivery and whether they had been printed or not. So, if someone turned up to your venue shortly before a performance claiming to have booked but not collected the tickets, you could look it up if you wanted. The reports were available for real time download if you were logged into the system and could also be set up for automatic emailing whenever you wanted, delivered as a pdf. The 'linked' venues wouldn't have needed this as they had access to the system itself, but for some others it became very useful and cut out their need to ring the Fringe box office for the information.

...maybe they still do this with the current system; I'm not in the loop any more!

Think some of your comments are about this idea I posted, have replied there
http://ideas.edinburghfestivals.co.uk/submissions/4261-what-if-we-had-a-really-simple-paperless-ticket-scheme-staff-just-have-a-list-of-names-at-the-door-and-you-show-id-see-1st-comment

"nothing is the same as Fringe and the potential problems it would face if this idea were real, but there are similar ideas." Yeah, I do accept that Oyster and Edi Uni access cards are similar (and they work great) but I think the differences between them and the festivals are big enough that we need to explore them.

As for larger venues adopting this first, I can see that happening, I personally think that would be a shame. The big 4 venues already squeeze the small venues enough - all the little shows in random places are what makes the festival. I would prefer to see the festivals roll out what ever scheme they decide on to any venues that want in.

Personally I think this competition should be about exploring ideas that are practical and achievable, so I'm all up for discussion ... :-)