Comic-Con, the mecca for all things nerdy, has reached a new milestone in 2011: all attendance badges for the July event have sold out in one day. That means there are 100,000+ fans out there who are very happy today, while many others will have to scour sites like eBay to find passes. This year looks to be every bit as crowded as 2010, as even the Preview Night badges had sold out before last year’s convention had even closed.

Comic-Con has seen a steady growth in attendance every year of its 42-year run, but has absolutely exploded in popularity over the last 5 years. While it’s great for fans and businesses in the San Diego area, the influx of that much nerdery has its share of complications. Already, Comic-Con 2011 has hit a stumbling block as the registration company TicketLeap suffered technical difficulties when their system got swamped with requests.

For a brief history of Comic-Con and a look at the meltdown of TicketLeap, hit the jump.

In 2006, overcrowding became an issue for the convention and many speculated the event was growing too large for the San Diego Convention Center. Some of the 123,000 attendees that year were turned away at the gates for a brief period of time to alleviate the congestion.

2007’s convention saw similar numbers, but tickets sold out for the first time ever.

In 2008, Comic-Con did away with on-site registration and still managed to sell out over 126,000 badges weeks ahead of the July event.

2009 again saw similar attendance but sold out tickets months in advance.

Finally, 2010’s attendance swelled to 130,000+ while selling out Preview Night in October, 2009. The convention itself was sold out by March.

Which brings us to 2011, and a convention that almost wasn’t, due to TicketLeap’s near breakdown:

Timeline from Twitter user @ticketleap

@Comic_Con fans, if you see an over capacity message hit refresh. We are under heavy load right now and it should smooth out. #sdcc (21 hours ago)

Hey @Comic_Con, @ticketleap is seeing lots of transactions going through. Keep trying! (19 hours ago)

Hey #sdcc keep trying. We apologize for the over capacity pages. Stick with it, you'll get through (19 hours ago)

#SDCC fans continue to refresh if you see over capacity pages. If you submit billing info and get an error, REFRESH don't hit back button. (19 hours ago)

All @Comic_Con badges are sold out. If you didn't receive a confirmation email on Saturday, we are sending the rest out on Monday. #sdcc (15 minutes ago)

Though the crowds in the convention center will be near capacity, and hotel space will come at a premium, Comic-Con announced they would be staying in San Diego through 2015. Those of you who survived the TicketLeap debacle now have the melee of hotel reservations to look forward to. Good luck!

Though Comic-Con has yet to post any programming notes, you can follow their updates through all sorts of social media here.