I agree, Warren. GeorgeC and others sounded the alarm early on, and it looks like they called it right. It seems like this is one of those ideas that sounds good in theory but is not so good in practice. Simply converting existing balls to more expensive advanced reservation balls without any net new capacity just moves the race for the last ball at Cooper from a physical one mid-afternoon to a cyber one at 6:59am. And, other than Cooper and maybe Great Harbour, JVD, the destinations have good anchoring options for late-comers.

I'm having a hard time understanding who benefits. The price of a ball is $10 higher, BB takes their cut, the holders of the sea bed leases still have to send out staff to check reservations and play enforcer, there's no additional capacity, and I doubt the BB guys are seeing much return. And, the table is set for additional price increases to solve the problem that BB created. I can imagine it now:

"Commit to a minimum of five balls a week at $50 each and get advanced reservation access. No refunds for changed plans."