My experience with the test run the night before was positive. It seemed to me that it went very smooth. It stopped after about six moves (really don't remember how many moves were played) and I just figured the test was over. The trouble with events like this is that they don't happen very often and I really doubt we will get the chance for something like this again for a few more years - if ever. This was obviously a promotion for G Star Raw and now that fifty-thousand people have been exposed to G Star Raw it is unlikely they will want to sponsor another event.
And I'm sure everyone got paid; Magnus got paid for playing, the three GMs got paid for what they did, Kasparov got paid for disagreeing with everything Ashely got paid for saying, Liv Tyler probably got paid more than anyone just for being there and chess.com got paid for luring fifty-thousand people to G Star Raw. So everyone got paid and nobody got hurt - except us. We didn't really get to participate in a chess game with Magnus Carlsson. We only got to watch him play a game in which we could not always tell what was happening. The only part I enjoyed was when he played Nb6. He wanted to play it but he knew it was risky but oh what the heck he played it anyway. Glad I'm not the only one who does that. 
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Thanks for taking a stab at this, chess.com, even if with short time and small budget. This type of event is definitely a great idea to go after.
My user experience happened to be quite disheartening, even using refresh sparingly, and I missed moves several times, so I concluded I had set my expectations too high (hey, the rest of the chess.com site is so good that I'm spoiled :)
Nevertheless, I'm sure you've worked hard at setting this up in time, and I do appreciate that it did go live. We were many participating, and many enjoyed. Well done, way to go. I'm sure the next one will be a huge success.
That's spot on!