<story><title>Ticketmaster recruits pros for secret scalper program</title><url>https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/a-public-relations-nightmare-ticketmaster-recruits-pros-for-secret-scalper-program-1.4828535</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>chongli</author><text>Ticketmaster provides a valuable service for the associated acts:&lt;p&gt;Reputation shield&lt;p&gt;If artists started charging fair market prices for their tickets the fans would go ballistic and the artists&amp;#x27; reputations would be severely damaged. By ostensibly selling the tickets below, even if normal people never get to buy them at face value, they outsource the reputation damage to Ticketmaster. Since Ticketmaster already has a detestable reputation, they are well-equipped to provide this service with minimal damage to their brand. In exchange, Ticketmaster pays a portion of their revenues to the promoters and their associated acts. It&amp;#x27;s a win win: artists get more money without damaging their credibility with their fans.</text></item><item><author>ageitgey</author><text>This is super sleezy and I think Ticketmaster is one of the most awful companies in the world. But given the ridiculous levels of scalping that goes on every day (including all the companies that attempt to normalize it, like StubHub), doesn&amp;#x27;t it all imply that the fair market price of a lot of tickets is way higher than what they sell for? Obviously demand is way outstripping supply or people wouldn&amp;#x27;t pay $500-$1000 for $100 tickets on a daily basis.&lt;p&gt;By making all event tickets available at exactly the same time for an effectively-lower-than-market price, of course professional scalpers are going to snap up almost all of them and normal people without scripts won&amp;#x27;t be able to compete. I wonder what would happen if tickets went on sale for a really high price (like $500 each) and then the prices kept dropping automatically every hour until they were all sold. That would kill a lot of advantage that the scalpers have.&lt;p&gt;I guess customers would hate it and promoters would hate it, but I wonder if there isn&amp;#x27;t some other kind of sales model that would make this kind of sleezy self-scalping less profitable. Because with market forces this strong, companies are going to do anything that is legal-ish to get a piece of it. If Ticketmaster doesn&amp;#x27;t figure out a way to get a piece of the massive resell market, they are essentially just giving away free money to StubHub (from their point of view).</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>mehrdadn</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m confused, so like an artist would be paying 80% of his potential revenue ($100 vs. $500) in return for reputation shield? That&amp;#x27;s how valuable this service is?</text></comment>
<story><title>Ticketmaster recruits pros for secret scalper program</title><url>https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/a-public-relations-nightmare-ticketmaster-recruits-pros-for-secret-scalper-program-1.4828535</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>chongli</author><text>Ticketmaster provides a valuable service for the associated acts:&lt;p&gt;Reputation shield&lt;p&gt;If artists started charging fair market prices for their tickets the fans would go ballistic and the artists&amp;#x27; reputations would be severely damaged. By ostensibly selling the tickets below, even if normal people never get to buy them at face value, they outsource the reputation damage to Ticketmaster. Since Ticketmaster already has a detestable reputation, they are well-equipped to provide this service with minimal damage to their brand. In exchange, Ticketmaster pays a portion of their revenues to the promoters and their associated acts. It&amp;#x27;s a win win: artists get more money without damaging their credibility with their fans.</text></item><item><author>ageitgey</author><text>This is super sleezy and I think Ticketmaster is one of the most awful companies in the world. But given the ridiculous levels of scalping that goes on every day (including all the companies that attempt to normalize it, like StubHub), doesn&amp;#x27;t it all imply that the fair market price of a lot of tickets is way higher than what they sell for? Obviously demand is way outstripping supply or people wouldn&amp;#x27;t pay $500-$1000 for $100 tickets on a daily basis.&lt;p&gt;By making all event tickets available at exactly the same time for an effectively-lower-than-market price, of course professional scalpers are going to snap up almost all of them and normal people without scripts won&amp;#x27;t be able to compete. I wonder what would happen if tickets went on sale for a really high price (like $500 each) and then the prices kept dropping automatically every hour until they were all sold. That would kill a lot of advantage that the scalpers have.&lt;p&gt;I guess customers would hate it and promoters would hate it, but I wonder if there isn&amp;#x27;t some other kind of sales model that would make this kind of sleezy self-scalping less profitable. Because with market forces this strong, companies are going to do anything that is legal-ish to get a piece of it. If Ticketmaster doesn&amp;#x27;t figure out a way to get a piece of the massive resell market, they are essentially just giving away free money to StubHub (from their point of view).</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>hashkb</author><text>Before Ticketmaster, you could go to or call the box office and reliably get tickets to shows in your own city.  Now I have to buy them from scalpers in Canada.  Ticketmaster artificially expanded the market and used its leverage to force venues into exclusive deals.  It&amp;#x27;s got nothing to do with &amp;quot;market price&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;Edit: Also artists get a cut of the bar and to sell their merch.  Also also, there is a massive range of costs of tickets already.  It&amp;#x27;s really not a market price issue for tickets.</text></comment>