Feisty Underdog TicketMaster To Beat Scalpers At Own Game!

More ideas not broached in Hogan's piece (I don't think):

(Further) limit the number of tickets people can buy.

Sell tickets directly.

Cap the bullshit fees, or make them flat. Why the fuck should the *fees* be dynamic as well?

Anyway, the problem with that Fork piece and ones like that is that they all begin from the position that Ticketmaster actually provides a real service. But of course TM doesn't do shit, especially in this digital era. They've embedded themselves in the process like parasites.

Even if there were no Ticketmaster, i imagine most venues would still choose to contract with ticketing services, rather than try to set up and manage their own software…?

I mean, part of the problem is that many of these big venues aren't just partnered but are *owned* by Live Nation/Ticketmaster! But yeah, the venues - as individuals or as collectives - would need to have their own ticketing systems, though that would also mean (I assume) keeping more of the money, which might be an incentive.

Springsteen claimed that if he blocked dynamic pricing that non- Ticketmaster approved ticket scalpers would up the prices and make money that Springsteen said should go to he and his band. I dunno.

― curmudgeon, Friday, March 10, 2023 12:33 AM (eight hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

there's no reason to regard springsteen in this matter as anything else but a full of shit rich guy

That's more or less the exact argument the Eagles made back in 1994 or whenever when they smashed through the ticket price ceiling.

The Eagles were the first rock band to shatter the $100 ceiling for tickets. Azoff pointed out at the time that the only people who complained were journo types who got their tickets for free, and it’s true that fans didn’t balk, with Hell Freezes Over selling out every show.

Twenty-two years later, Azoff stands behind that pricing strategy. “Tickets should be priced at what the fans are willing to pay to see the performer,” Azoff explains. “The key element in breaking the $100 ceiling was that it changed the dynamic of resale (by) having the revenue generated by tickets going back to the business — promoters, artists, venues, etc.” Clearly, demand to see the Eagles live after 14 years was sky high, but, “it wasn’t just about making more money,” Azoff says. “It was also about sending the message that Eagles were America’s biggest band, and perhaps one of the biggest in the world — charging like it influenced both fans and media that we were the biggest ever.”

many of these big venues aren't just partnered but are *owned* by Live Nation/Ticketmaster!

So they’re “direct ticketing” already… haha

Statement from the Cure (#onethread):

"We want the tour to be affordable for all fans, and we have a very wide (and we think very fair) range of pricing at every show. Our ticketing partners have agreed to help us stop scalpers from getting in the way; to help minimise resale and keep prices at face value, tickets for this tour will not be transferable. If something comes up that prevents a fan from being able to use a ticket they have purchased, they will be able resell it on a face value ticket exchange."

"Unfortunately, despite our desire to protect our low ticket prices for fans, the states of NY, IL and CO make this very difficult. They actually have laws in place that protect scalpers! For shows in these states we urge fans to buy or sell tickets to one another on face value exchanges like twickets.live and cashortrade.org. Fans should avoid buying tickets that are being resold at inflated prices by scalpers, and the sites that host these scalpers should refrain from reselling tickets for our shows."

Restricting re-sale, but allowing face-value transfers, totally makes sense. More artists should do that!

When I saw the Death tribute in 2021, Tix were $50, but if you needed to sell one, you'd input your buyer's name and email on the ticketers site, which would give them a link to pay, and would void/refund your original transaction, so you broke even. I had to use it and it was a crude system but it was great.

Reselling Tix you can't use now and getting face value is very difficult otherwise, esp if you use a service that takes a cut. And Craigslist is so filled with scams, people just don't want to use it

Yeah, if you're not doing it with someone you semi-trust, like a co-worker ("Ok, the Venmo went through... I'll transfer the tickets now"), you need some kind of digital escrow system.

My best friend and I once got scammed for Lightning tickets during the Eastern Conference Finals. He seemed legit and she had actually chatted with him for a bit, I sent the money via CashApp, nothing. Since you can't mark Goods/Service, they refused to refund. She was in tears.

I decided to use a credit card and pay a majorly marked up price to acquire resale Tix on Ticketmaster. Something like $150 each. It was an expensive day but the look on her face during the game made up for it.

So yeah fuck tickets

We need to go back to the early 2000s, where I would physically meet up with some dude in an In-N-Out, and hand him a wad of cash for Strokes tickets.

Saw this going around re: The Cure (fees for each ticket exceeding the ticket price):

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FrREw7YWwAAu9Nx.jpg

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d8/Guillotine%2C_Mus%C3%A9e_de_la_R%C3%A9volution_fran%C3%A7aise.jpg

^^ rejected alternate cover for Carnage Visors

(not really)

When I got the Ticketmaster email that said I had been *waitlisted* to be a "Verified Fan," my immediate reaction was, fuck that, I'm not going to be their dancing monkey, and didn't even bother trying for tickets.

But hey, I can go on Stubhub right now, and pay $150 a pop (before fees) for nosebleed tickets for a show in June that literally only went on (pre)sale this morning.

Sounds like the Drake presale was another clusterfuck.

And Drake tickets were apparently super expensive even without fees

Not playing this three-card-monte game again. Spending my money on new bands that could use it...

it wasn’t just about making more money,” Azoff says. “It was also about sending the message that Eagles were America’s biggest band

god, what a piece of shit

Robert Smith of the Cure got Ticketmaster to offer a $10 refund on service fees to verified fan Cure ticket buyers who bought those cheapest Cure tickets ; and $5 to other verified fan ticket buyers

https://consequence.net/2023/03/robert-smith-the-cure-ticketmaster-refund/

I seem to recall that sort of outcome being the straw that broke Pearl Jam's back, that after months of fighting they were only able to shave off something like $5.

i'm not even invested in this specific instance with the cure personally, but it's very emblematic of why i stopped making big live shows a priority in life. when i think of the main "general amorphous villains" of my life, along with concepts like `people who steal` and `people who are rude to service workers`, i always think of the entity "TICKETMASTER" itself as a manifested evildoer. yes i can attend shows with no affiliations, but man. it's been over the line for years.

pure speculative pontification from this point forward, feel free to skip

wondering about 2 things:

1- rs wasn't given details about how much "fees" would be, saw results and threatened to cancel or something. that's why he referred to the refund as being done in "good faith." i'm hoping the refund will be a simple debit back to the customer's card/account. knowing those assholes, it may end up coming back to everyone in the form of like an arby's gift card that you need to take a day off from in order to simply acquire the fucking thing.
2- the whole thing's a ruse to get the crowd on the band's side, i.e. buy more tickets. tickmaster know they're heels anyway. wouldn't put it past them.

I think Robert Smith got out ahead of this early enough that no one blamed him or the band. The bigger question is, if Robert Smith of the Cure can sway Ticketmaster, even $10/$5, why can't Taylor Fucking Swift or Bruce Springsteen?

I assume they could if they wanted to

That's my assumption.

Robert still roasting them today over some other ticket screwup. You love to see it.

there's this show a buddy and I wanna go to in about 10 days (its Dan Deacon in Milwaukee). not sure when it was announced, I think it was actually a holdover from some Covid-era dates. anyway face is $20, I went to buy tickets today and holy hell the only options are on resale sites for $110 or $170 (!!!). that may even be before fees. it's nuts.

anyone got some advice on what to do here? do I keep scanning online for a better price? or just show up on the day and hope someone's trying to sell? I wanna see the show but no way am I paying 5-8x face for it. and I really doubt anyone else is willing to either.

One of those sites shows an all-in price. TickPick? Another one, maybe Stubhub, allows you to toggle it to show all-in as well, though the prices end up the same pretty much across all the sites. Sometimes it pays to wait until the day-of, but honestly this shit is so maddening and opaque, as prices don't always drop at all, which makes me think it's just an inside job.

I've had luck just waiting outside the venue and seeing if people want to sell, sometimes there are scalpers or people whose friends couldn't show up. But that's pretty risky.

Looks like a show in a very small club? I assume just one or two ppl are offering up tix (across those different sites), and they're pricing them high for whatever reason... (and yeah, maybe they'll drop at the last minute if no one bites).

I don't know if this is comparable, but there was a sold out Johnny Marr show I wanted to attend at a small venue (I think in 2018), but I didn't go for tickets because I wasn't sure I could make it in time due to prior commitments. Luckily it was on the way home, so I figured, if I can get there before he goes on, I'll see if anyone's selling. If not, l'll keep walking and go home.

I got there at like 8:50pm, and passed a guy with several tickets. He asked if I wanted one, and I asked "did Johnny go on yet?" "Nope! I'll see you one for $20!" Well below face, I took it and I got inside with maybe a few minutes to spare.

*sell you one

I have a similar story with LCD Soundsystem, show was sold out but we figured we'd just show up and see if someone wanted to sell outside the venue. I was about to give up hope but we found someone at the last second, they took the stage right as we got in. This is a much smaller show though so I'm a bit less confident.

decided to post on Reddit to see if anyone had any and within 10 minutes got 6 messages saying they had tickets available. none of the accounts had much history and they all had a bunch of numbers at the end of the usernames...safe to assume these are all scams right?

I'd say don't trust anything that transfers digital tickets without any sort of guarantee, like via credit card or PayPal. I seem to recall reading that a lot of these online scammers get cagey about those kinds of payment methods and steer you toward methods like Venmo, where they can do some sort of reverse charge. I think?

yeah they want me to use CashApp or Zelle, which I don't even have. PayPal they are pointing me towards "family and friends" which I think is the one you can't charge back. also I believe this is a 300 person venue so it seems very unlikely these are legit. think I'll just take my chances outside the venue. or maybe just sneak in somehow. there's like 10 tickets on Stubhub which after fees will be $160-200 apiece and I'll bet anything not a single one of those is gonna sell.

Don't do any CashApp. You will never see that money again if you get scammed.

Venmo or PayPal under goods and services only

well guess what. I called the box office and they had a few tickets left. even though online they said they were sold out. $44 for the 2, as opposed to $350 after fees on Stubhub. I guess the old fashioned method of "just call them and see if they can help" actually works sometimes.

Unfortunately the Junk Fee Prevention Act lacks input from musicians, and it shows. It contains provisions around “holdback transparency” that have nothing to do with fees but would be a giveaway to predatory bulk resellers; not a single musician organization supports it. https://t.co/ZXMHu4Qoiq

— Future of Music Coalition (@future_of_music) June 15, 2023

Ticketmaster's "concession" (announced 5 months ago but reiterated yesterday) to disclose their junk fees up front is an effort to stave off antitrust enforcement, writes @lukewgoldstein in today's BASED.https://t.co/LFIGGgix6U

— David Dayen (@ddayen) June 16, 2023

lol what a toothless resolution.

what a joke

It's total bullshit and not at all transparent. As far as I can tell, only Tickpick and Stubhub on secondary show all-in prices, which at least gives you an idea of what you are in for before you start jumping through hoops, but Ticketmaster's model and operation is so fucked up I can only assume it's on purpose. To what end, I don't know. I tried to buy last minute Cure tickets last week, and the entire time I felt like I was pointlessly battling bots designed to beat me to the prize. Like, why should someone else be able to snag tickets that I literally have in my shopping cart, as I attempt to check out? Because that's what kept happening, in the rare instances when I even made it through the tech morass and was able to even try. And then a few minutes later those same tickets would be live on the site again. Very Lucy with the football.

Pricing is one thing, but the entire process has become such a stressful, joyless headache. Sure, I'm getting older, and I've been lucky enough to see so many shows over the years for free. But the excitement of even favorite acts hitting the road immediately fades knowing what it will take to even get a shot at tickets, let alone how much they will cost. I just count my blessings that I've seen everyone before and try not to think that I'll likely never see some of them again.

Informative deep-dive on how scalpers exploit the "Verified Fan" ticketing system: https://www.404media.co/why-scalpers-can-get-olivia-rodrigo-tickets-and-fans-cannot/

Wow, informative article about how scalpers do it.

Multiple accounts and browsers and more

The problem with this is that normal people have one Ticketmaster account tied to one email address and can therefore enter this lottery one time for one specific show. Serious ticket scalpers have many accounts (hundreds or thousands) tied to many different email addresses, with credit cards all over the country and can enter the lottery as many times as they want

that scalpers have multiple accounts is something those geniuses at Ticketmaster never saw coming!

(most likely they did see it coming and don't give a fuck because it's beneficial to them)

Yeah, they love it.

Someone at work said they got Beyoncé tix by using 3 accounts with 3 different phone nos./credit cards, and registering for presales in 3 different cities ("I had 27 opportunities and 3 of them succeeded").

Does this help? I’m not sure this helps:
https://variety.com/2023/music/news/ticketmaster-block-olivia-rodrigo-scalpers-72-hour-1235732837/

I'm sure nothing will really help, because for decades Ticketmaster has been the constant and Ticketmaster is not operating in good faith. They're in mild CYA mode, but they've admitted in the past their role is mostly just to take the abuse while they rake in money. They're like that Eric Andre meme, of Eric Andre shooting fair ticket prices or whatever and then asking who did such a thing.

https://i.imgflip.com/805ge3.jpg

Never saw that one; I guess this recent meme sensation would also fit:

https://i.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/facebook/000/037/873/We

ain't gonna work. third-party reseller websites already make accommodations for stuff like this - Stubhub asks you if you have tickets in hand, or if not, when you will. People will frequently sell tickets they don't actually have in hand.

sometimes people sell tickets they haven't even PURCHASED yet on the open market - they'll give an estimated seating location, charge a fee upfront, and then get the ticket later, or refund the money if they can't get it.

yeah, they're called speculative tickets and you might as well pay a stranger on the street for a guarantee that you won't get cancer

that's kinda what Billy McFarlane was doing in his pre-Fyre venture, right?

*McFarland

Never saw that one

I just made it with a generator!

There's something uniquely shitty about the law in Illinois that makes it hard to thwart scalpers. For example, this was from the press release for the most recent Pearl Jam tour:

Tickets on this tour will continue to be non-transferable in all states except Illinois where it is prohibited by law. We apologize in advance to Illinois fans who may be subject to increased ticket prices on the secondary market.

And from Robert Smith's statement in his fight against scalpers:

Unfortunately, despite our desire to protect our low ticket prices for fans, the states of NY, IL and CO make this very difficult – they actually have laws in place that protect scalpers!

Tickets being non-transferable is pretty anti-consumer too tbh.

Fights scalpers but also inhibits people who can't go at the 11th hour

Which I assume is why it's pretty protected places.

Was it the Black Keys back when that tried to link tickets to the person that purchased them only to have it backfire?

Meanwhile:

https://www.wsj.com/arts-culture/music/irs-taylor-swift-eras-tickets-beyonce-lionel-messi-tax-480d346c

If you cashed in this summer by reselling tickets to Taylor Swift’s “Eras Tour” or Lionel Messi’s first games in a bubblegum-pink jersey, brace yourself to pay taxes.

A new law requires ticketing platforms like Ticketmaster and StubHub to give the Internal Revenue Service information on users who sold more than $600 worth of tickets this year.

The new requirements are taking hold amid a banner year for live events in which Swifties, soccer buffs and members of Beyoncé’s BeyHive paid sky-high prices for a chance to see their favorite stars in the flesh. That drove huge markups in the secondary ticket market—and delivered hefty profits to anyone hawking hot tickets.

The average price for Taylor Swift tickets sold in the U.S. on StubHub was $1,095, with the best seats going for thousands of dollars, according to the company, which operates an online market for people to resell and buy tickets. Averages for Beyoncé and Harry Styles clocked in at $380 and $400, respectively. After Lionel Messi joined Major League Soccer, the price of tickets to Inter Miami CF matches shot up to $255 apiece, from $30.