Hi Paul,
Look, we've actually got about a dozen people mailing us, sending us messages on facebook and eventbrite, tweeting at us, and so on, asking for tickets because they left it till the week before the conference to book. And unsurprisingly, almost all of them are saying things like "can I have first option if tickets free up". So, if we give first option to everybody who asks for it, that puts us back where we started: first come first served.
I'm really sorry you didn't get tickets, but you must understand that we have spent the last three months putting literally all our time and energy into organizing this thing, and working out plans and logistics and numbers and budgets and venue capacities. We can't just change all that now because a bunch of people are mailing us demanding special dispensation. I'm sorry to be like this, but even having to reply to all these emails begging for tickets is taking up time that I would rather spend trying to work out what the hell I'm going to say in my talk (which I am also incredibly nervous about).
There will be more conferences. People will put their slides on the net. We'll try video the talks. It'll be fine. In the meantime, I suggest you read through the following blogs - they are excellent, and where I learned a lot of the stuff I know about scaling. You will probably benefit from them just as much as, if not more than you would from the talks:
http://codeascraft.etsy.com/ http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/ http://techblog.netflix.com/ https://github.com/blog/ http://dev2ops.org/
Subscribe to the DevOps Weekly mailing list: http://devopsweekly.com/ - read the articles it links to, learn about the technologies it talks about.
That's how I learned everything I know, and it's from reading and learning about this stuff that Duncan and I got excited enough about it to decide to hold a conference.
If you'd like to talk more about this stuff, or just say hi, do at least come along to the Wednesday pre-conference drinks at Wakame in Mouille Point - it's open to everybody, and it would be good to meet you.
Cheers, -Jonathan