Sparkfun Free Day - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: DBaron
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: January 10, 2012, 10:39:49 pm
content: I looked, but didn't find an existing topic. Sparkfun free day is tomorrow, January 11, starting at 9:00 AM MST and running all day.http://www.sparkfun.com/news/780No quiz this year, just pure random luck. YMMV, but I've had good luck the past few years getting something (I took the easy money last year, instead of pushing my luck with the non-functional quiz).

author: 8086
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 10, 2012, 10:41:54 pm
content: 4PM GMT For anyone in the UK

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 10, 2012, 10:50:22 pm
content: I got some stuff on the first free day.I dunno if this will help forthis yearsfreeday, but a good tip is... "The F5 key wont help you navigate a site under heavy load!"Seriously, F5 refreshes the current page.If you click a button and a page doesn't load so you hit F5 you are reloading a page your already had, not the new page you want.So when a pagedoesload, switch the browser to offline mode and copy/paste the url to 10 new tabs then go back to online mode.Now you have 10 buttons to try and get to the next page.Then repeat..(At least, that's what i did in firefox for freeday 1 and it worked well)

author: DavidDLC
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 10, 2012, 11:47:05 pm
content: Quote from: Psi on January 10, 2012, 10:50:22 pmDang it, I rather pay for the stuff.

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 12:22:13 am
content: It wasn't that bad, free day 2010 was over in 1hour 24minutes.But free day 2012 looks to be random $100 off coupons given over 7 hours.So yeah.

author: 8086
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 04:02:55 pm
content: Well, its been 3 minutes. So far:Looks like it's going to be a long day for them

author: larrwill
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 04:19:47 pm
content: Well Free Day is a nice idea / marketing gimmick, and I am a firm believer that you cannot complain to much about something free... but I wasted some time on this last year and only came away with frustration. I decided my time is more valuable to ever consider participating in free Day again. Need to plan regular orders not to be on Free day also.In general I think SparkFun is really great. They want to portray this non-stop nerd frat party image that does make me jealous when I get to my stuffy corporate job but I think it's marketing more than anything these days.

author: The_Penguin
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 05:04:43 pm
content: After about 5 captchas, I decided that it'll take more than $100.00 worth of my time to win, if at all, so I'm out.I can't imagine Google is too happy about the extra re-captcha load is must be generating.

author: ndictu
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 05:12:51 pm
content: Quote from: The_Penguin on January 11, 2012, 05:04:43 pmTrust me, that is just a drop in the ocean compared to all the recaptcha traffic they are getting... In fact I think they are happy for a little extra book digitalization help.

author: slateraptor
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 05:52:56 pm
content: Any winners yet? No go so far...back to the grind.

author: PedroDiogo
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 05:55:06 pm
content: Quote from: slateraptor on January 11, 2012, 05:52:56 pmI won a $100 coupon after 15 minutes trying

author: slateraptor
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 06:03:52 pm
content: Quote from: PedroDiogo on January 11, 2012, 05:55:06 pmPic or it didn't happen

author: vis1-0n
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 06:05:23 pm
content: I gave up ( for now) and went on ebay and lucked onto a decent deal.Um, also I fail their human test

author: PedroDiogo
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 06:11:29 pm
content: Quote from: slateraptor on January 11, 2012, 06:03:52 pmSure!Had to delete the code for obvious reasons

author: slateraptor
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 06:14:02 pm
content: Fair enough.What kind of nonsense was SF talking about geiger counters determining rate of distribution?!

author: Dagon
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 06:54:13 pm
content: Just got one to! Took about an hour an a half, on and off. Luckily I'm on a late shift at work with time to kill. Wasn't far off giving up though.

author: ndictu
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 08:06:05 pm
content: Quote from: slateraptor on January 11, 2012, 06:14:02 pmSomewhere in comments they said that if it detects something during your request you win. Not sure how sensitive it is, how long the request window is etc... I wish someone would walk around with U-238 in their pocket...I've been trying on-and-off for a while now, watching a movie on the other monitor but no luck so far.

author: Chet T16
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 08:25:13 pm
content: WinnerWell that took f'in hours!

author: kripton2035
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 08:36:00 pm
content: sparkfun is really not fun ..; that soooo boring...I really prefered last year with quizyou feeled like somewhat more intelligent after itbut this year ... baaah.

author: ndictu
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 11, 2012, 09:23:59 pm
content: Quote from: kripton2035 on January 11, 2012, 08:36:00 pmYup. I would like to do a quiz, at any point today (but only one chance per account, also you need to have an order on that account or provide CC number or something to prevent people from making many accounts). After that the winners are chosen randomly, but each correct answer increases your chance. It's fair, random, simple and much less frustrating...

author: gregariz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 12, 2012, 12:01:10 am
content: Quote from: ndictu on January 11, 2012, 09:23:59 pmA random draw would of been nice. I just checked now after its over.... there are so many comments from pissed people... who spent 6 hours typing characters. Kind of Hilarious in a way... but somehow I don't think its the outcome they were hoping for.

author: 8086
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 12, 2012, 12:04:18 am
content: Every year there's a load of pissed off people that didn't get anything for trying all that time. I've been participating since they did the first one 3 years ago, and it's been frustrating every single time. I think they had a good idea last time, with the quiz, but their servers couldn't handle the load, so it became a lottery. This time I think they should have beefed up the servers and gone with another quiz or something similar, but not a random draw. Maybe next time...

author: Hypernova
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 12, 2012, 02:03:18 am
content: 3rd year of nothing for me. Gave it half an hour before I gave up, it was almost 1:30AM so staying up and look like shit at work in the morning simply wasn't an option.

author: george graves
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 12, 2012, 03:23:39 am
content: I *hate* CAPTCHAs. I would have liked to see them use something(anything) else...

author: slateraptor
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 12, 2012, 04:15:35 am
content: After ~6 hours of trying with a quick 15 minute break for lunch, I officially called it quits at $174k.That's the first and last time I'll ever participate in Free Day.

author: gregariz
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 12, 2012, 04:31:07 am
content: There's a link on one of the comments to the statistics. Apparently people typed the captchas 6.5 million times during the contest? (around 6 hours?) of which 2000 people were successful so that means that on average people had to type about 3250 of them to win so you'd have to do around 9 per minute for the whole 6 hours to win. Must be some kind of record I'd imagine.

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 12, 2012, 04:59:51 am
content: i started at around $140,000 and was going until the end, didn't win though.But that's ok, i won in free day 2010.

author: BravoV
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 12, 2012, 05:06:43 am
content: Quote from: gregariz on January 12, 2012, 04:31:07 amWhen the luck is kicking in, any statistic will become meaningless.

author: mobbarley
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 12, 2012, 10:29:40 am
content: Crap... I knew I forgot something

author: AlphZeta
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 12, 2012, 03:16:13 pm
content: I suspect that this is a really clever marketing campaign as I am sure it will significantly boost their web ranking due to the surge in traffic.

author: benemorius
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 12, 2012, 04:32:00 pm
content: Quote from: AlphZeta on January 12, 2012, 03:16:13 pmYes, it's that plus a good load test on their servers. They did it once, then did it again the next year, and it seems to have turned in to a tradition now. They've been doing it for a few years and every time they improve their software efficiency, although last year I think they got it right so I'm not sure if there was as much left to improve this time.How did they handle the load this year? Last year you were lucky to get one page request through in five minutes for the first few hours, then they fixed what was likely a small oversight somewhere and it was all over in seconds.