I want to begin by saying this is not a complaint that the system doesn't work for me. I got 182 this year and got all the events I wanted, including buying True Dungeon tickets for my entire group and getting in a 7th Sea second edition game. I was at my computer, verifying the accuracy of my countdown clock, credit card ready, continuously clicking over a greyed-out button on those last few seconds, and reloading the page through new tabs rather than the refresh button. I did everything right and it worked out.
But... why?
To be fair, the countdown to clicking the button gives an illusion of control, but what I did was no different than what thousands of other attendees were doing. I just got lucky and got a good number.
Wouldn't it make more sense to have wish lists process automatically? Everybody who has a wish list in the system by 12:00 noon on May 15 has their list submitted to Gen Con and they're all processed in a random order. It takes away the illusion of control but it does away with the 503 errors and the problems of people losing their place. It does away with the need to take time off work (I work nights and weekends and gave up paid hours to do this). It does away with browser errors. It takes what's already a random process and makes it officially random.
I know a lot of people screamed and hollered when housing went to a lottery system and we'll get the same screaming and hollering if event tickets do to, but we're getting screaming and hollering already due to the technical errors of the current system.
What is the benefit of clicking that button yourself? Why wouldn't you want it automated?