[mttourpro]

Nothing wrong with the thread, IMO.

BTW, heard the Springstien story differently... When a show was "sold out" TM used to have a box right next to the sold out frame that directed you to TN. After the Springstien debacle that was removed.

Right. When I wrote see above, I was referring to....

Exactly---TicketsNow is owned by TicketBastard.
They're simply artificailly inflating prices via TicketsNow. Assuming they don't sell on TN at inflated prices, they'll eventually be sold for a lot less/face value.

Which, is why I think there'll be lots of tix left day of show.

[tigerstrat]

Pete, you are going! Awesome. I'll meet you over in the Gorge thread

[amyjared]

strumminsix wrote:
Nothing wrong with the thread, IMO.

BTW, heard the Springstien story differently... When a show was "sold out" TM used to have a box right next to the sold out frame that directed you to TN. After the Springstien debacle that was removed.


Right. When I wrote see above, I was referring to....

Exactly---TicketsNow is owned by TicketBastard.
They're simply artificailly inflating prices via TicketsNow. Assuming they don't sell on TN at inflated prices, they'll eventually be sold for a lot less/face value.

Which, is why I think there'll be lots of tix left day of show.

Sorry if I got the Springsteen story wrong, here's the actual apology from ticketbastard:
An Open Letter of Apology to Bruce Springsteen, Jon Landau and the entire Springsteen Tour Team:

While we were genuinely trying to do the right thing for fans in providing more choices when the tickets they requested from the primary on-sale were not available, we clearly missed the mark. Fans are confused and angry, which is the opposite of what we hoped to accomplish. We sincerely apologize to Bruce, his organization and, above all, his fans.

We recognize that we need to change our course. We have committed to Bruce and state publicly here that we have taken down all links for Bruce's shows directing fans from Ticketmaster to TicketsNow. This redirection only occurred as a choice when we could not satisfy fans' specific search request for primary ticket inventory, but to make sure there is no misunderstanding in the future, we also publicly state that we will never again link to TicketsNow in a manner that can possibly create any confusion during a high-demand on-sale. Specifically, we will not present an option to go to TicketsNow from Ticketmaster without the consent of the artist and the venue, both of whom work together to bring the joy of live entertainment to millions of fans.

If any fans inadvertently purchased tickets in the resale marketplace believing in error they were purchasing from the initial on-sale, we will refund the difference between the actual purchase price and the face price of the ticket. (Please don't abuse this good faith gesture – we did not give brokers any preferential access to tickets.)

We are committed to helping deliver the most transparent and best live entertainment experience to fans. We will do better going forward.

Sincerely,

Irving Azoff, CEO, Ticketmaster Entertainment

Looks like they're doing nothing but taking the little box off their site, but since they merged, it might be back!

[High Peaks]

I knew TN was purchased by TM but that doesn't make them the same.

C'mon. Really?? Thats just sarcasm right??

[Rev_Roach]

MSG for 109? PLEASE PM ASAP!

[strumminsix]

I knew TN was purchased by TM but that doesn't make them the same.

C'mon. Really?? Thats just sarcasm right??

Not in the business world. When there is a parent company the children companies traditionally are fairly autonomous unless the aforementioned parent is simple a conglomerate. TN would have its own stakeholder, stock, legal responsibilities, etc from which TM would be shielded from. In fact most parent companies choose to keep their children companies fairly autonomous except at the high levels as needed so they can sell them off one day if need be. I've been dealing with these scenarios at my job now for 12 years...

[amyjared]

Ticketbastard settles Springsteen problem:

http://www.1010wins.com/Ticketmaster-Se ... ns/3900917

[Mister Charlie]

I was surprised so many people were against this post.

I recall that during my days of following shows (80s and 90s) it was the rule not to sell tickets to other dead heads for more than face. So dead heads took care of dead heads. I am not talking about the scalpers in the parking lot who were clearly not dead heads. They are in it for profit, fair enough. But, dead heads should stick to what the tickets costs in buying and selling tickets to each other. Don't others remember it to be this way?

Plus, don't forget to give away a miracle or two to the sweet flower girls

[Tennessee Jedi]

Plus, don't forget to give away a miracle or two to the sweet flower girls

Guess I will throw this out there -
I NEED A MIRACLE
I got no money but I got some time to see a show ...
its a little easier to give someone a $10.00 mail order tic than a $97.50 tic I know but what the heck

[tigerstrat]

I was surprised so many people were against this post.

I recall that during my days of following shows (80s and 90s) it was the rule not to sell tickets to other dead heads for more than face. So dead heads took care of dead heads. I am not talking about the scalpers in the parking lot who were clearly not dead heads. They are in it for profit, fair enough. But, dead heads should stick to what the tickets costs in buying and selling tickets to each other. Don't others remember it to be this way?

+1

[astroman99]

I was surprised so many people were against this post.

I recall that during my days of following shows (80s and 90s) it was the rule not to sell tickets to other dead heads for more than face. So dead heads took care of dead heads. I am not talking about the scalpers in the parking lot who were clearly not dead heads. They are in it for profit, fair enough. But, dead heads should stick to what the tickets costs in buying and selling tickets to each other. Don't others remember it to be this way?

+1

I don't know about anyiine else I have had plenty of friends even who wouldn't even give me list, I don't know why, but hey I just wanted to get rid of the ticket, I mean , they would give me less, I guess they were heads.

[TemporarySaint]

I knew TN was purchased by TM but that doesn't make them the same.

C'mon. Really?? Thats just sarcasm right??

The issue between TM and TN is that the primary seller(TM) is funneling tickets to the secondary market(legal???scalping) in the form of TN. TN is owned by TM. If that's not a conflict of interests I don't know what is.

And as someone mentioned in this thread TM has been hoarding the best seats for years and the general public never get's a fair shot at them. For these reasons and others I am done with them. I'll go to the Beacon on Monday the 9th for ABB and wait until some hapless scalper has to dump his tickets for $20. With the economy the way it is it might be a good time for some cheap seats.

Time to scalp the scalpers.

[mttourpro]

more on the subject from Trent Rezner of NIN

As we approach on-sale dates for the upcoming tour, I've noticed lots of you are curious / concerned / outraged at the plethora of tickets that somehow appear on all these reseller sites at inflated prices - even before the pre-sale dates. I'll do my best to explain the situation as I see it, as well as clarify my organization's stance in the matter.

NIN decides to tour this summer. We arrive at the conclusion outdoor amphitheaters are the right venue for this outing, for a variety of reasons we've throughly considered*. In the past, NIN would sell the shows in each market to local promoters, who then "buy" the show from us to sell to you. Live Nation happens to own all the amphitheaters and bought most of the local promoters - so if you want to play those venues, you're being promoted by Live Nation. Live Nation has had an exclusive deal with TicketMaster that has just expired, so Live Nation launched their own ticketing service. Most of the dates on this tour are through Live Nation, some are through TicketMaster - this is determined by the promoter (Live Nation), not us.
Now we get into the issue of secondary markets for tickets, which is the hot issue here. The ticketing marketplace for rock concerts shows a real lack of sophistication, meaning this: the true market value of some tickets for some concerts is much higher than what the act wants to be perceived as charging. For example, there are some people who would be willing to pay $1,000 and up to be in the best seats for various shows, but MOST acts in the rock / pop world don't want to come off as greedy pricks asking that much, even though the market says its value is that high. The acts know this, the venue knows this, the promoters know this, the ticketing company knows this and the scalpers really know this. So...

The venue, the promoter, the ticketing agency and often the artist camp (artist, management and agent) take tickets from the pool of available seats and feed them directly to the re-seller (which from this point on will be referred to by their true name: SCALPER). I am not saying every one of the above entities all do this, nor am I saying they do it for all shows but this is a very common practice that happens more often than not. There is money to be made and they feel they should participate in it. There are a number of scams they employ to pull this off which is beyond the scope of this note.

StubHub.com is an example of a re-seller / scalper. So is TicketsNow.com.

Here's the rub: TicketMaster has essentially been a monopoly for many years - certainly up until Live Nation's exclusive deal ran out. They could have (and can right now) stop the secondary market dead in its tracks by doing the following: limit the amount of sales per customer, print names on the tickets and require ID / ticket matches at the venue. We know this works because we do it for our pre-sales. Why don't THEY do it? It's obvious - they make a lot of money fueling the secondary market. TicketMaster even bought a re-seller site and often bounces you over to that site to buy tickets (TicketsNow.com)!

NIN gets 10% of the available seats for our own pre-sale. We won a tough (and I mean TOUGH) battle to get the best seats. We require you to sign up at our site (for free) to get tickets. We limit the amount you can buy, we print your name on the tickets and we have our own person let you in a separate entrance where we check your ID to match the ticket. We charge you a surcharge that has been less than TicketMaster's or Live Nation's in all cases so far to pay for the costs of doing this - it's not a profit center for us. We have essentially stopped scalping by doing these things - because we want true fans to be able to get great seats and not get ripped off by these parasites.

I assure you nobody in the NIN camp supplies or supports the practice of supplying tickets to these re-sellers because it's not something we morally feel is the right thing to do. We are leaving money on the table here but it's not always about money.
Being completely honest, it IS something I've had to consider. If people are willing to pay a lot of money to sit up front AND ARE GOING TO ANYWAY thanks to the rigged system, why let that money go into the hands of the scalpers? I'm the one busting my ass up there every night. The conclusion really came down to it not feeling like the right thing to do - simple as that.

My guess as to what will eventually happen if / when Live Nation and TicketMaster merges is that they'll move to an auction or market-based pricing scheme - which will simply mean it will cost a lot more to get a good seat for a hot show. They will simply BECOME the scalper, eliminating them from the mix.

Nothing's going to change until the ticketing entity gets serious about stopping the problem - which of course they don't see as a problem. The ultimate way to hurt scalpers is to not support them. Leave them holding the merchandise. If this subject interests you, check out the following links. Don't buy from scalpers, and be suspect of artists singing the praises of the Live Nation / TicketMaster merger. What's in it for them?

[strumminsix]

awesome article!

[amyjared]

awesome article!

Agreed. NIN just went up in my opinion of them...they came up with a solution!

On a related note, Clapton showed up at the Beacon to play with the Allman bros last night (and tonight) and scalpers were asking and getting $1,000 per ticket for last night's show (even when the Clapton guest was just rumor). Good show indeed, but not worth supporting an evil entity like a scalper.