Ticketmaster-Live Nation: A sour note

Figure it out people. The rich get richer (though less than what they’d like). The poor get poorer. The middle class gets squeezed till there is no middle class.
It’s happening in Mexico. It’s happening in California. Sweden has the fewest people making less than the median income and they’re thriving in comparison. Maybe it’s time to wake up?

Should they be allowed? What a joke, they didn’t get tarp, tax payer money or government loans. This is, at least I think, still is a capitalist country. It is hilarious that people think the government should interfere with businesses at all. How about letting them do whatever they think is best for them. At the end of the day they know more about ticket prices than any of us. They certainly know there is more demand than supply, that is why they make money. Anybody disagreeing with this is just proof of how the the population has become a child of the nanny state. Good Luck

Ali From Canada

Boycott is the only way to keep the money out of their hands…because its not going to the bands anymore. Ticketmaster is now scalping the good seats and selling the face value tickets behind the stage. I’m done done done!

Monopolies suck.

I can’t stand Ticketmaster and I think they have the marked rigged even without Live Nation. When the NHL held the Winter Classic in Buffalo, NY on New Year’s Day 2008, the tickets sold out in roughly 30-40 minutes. Somehow, miraculously, less than 30 min. after they were supposedly sold out, there were hundreds of tickets for sale on Ticketmaster’s own resale portion of their website for up to 10 times the face value! I don’t doubt that in many cases it was people buying tickets and trying to resell them, but I think Ticketmaster is sheisty and had a lot to do with it as well. All the extra fees they charge are shameful as well… I ended up spending close to $30 for an AHL ticket that was supposedly $15! The only reason they can keep this up is because we don’t have any other options and are forced to accept their outlandish practices.

No more Live Nation concerts for me.
I thought Ticketmaster was a ripoff, here’s what Live Nation is doing:
Additional charges of $14 dollars for each ticket. Next thing I know I am receiving Rolling Stone Magazine. I called to verify (thought a friend had gifted me a subscription) It was given by Live Nation ( so they can pad their subscription numbers to fetch higher advertising revenues for this magazine I wouldn’t have subscribed to. They’re also selling my name and address to businesses. I should write to the BBB about these tacky practices. Boycott these 2 companies now.

Wow, talk about a bunch of whiny Americans!

You guys are talking about tickets to concerts, people! Grow up! We have an economic crisis on our hands, global warming, housing meltdown, and you guys are trying to get the government involved in MUSIC CONCERTS?!

Sheesh. Apparently life isn’t treating you that bad if you guys can still afford to pay money to go to concerts and WHINE ABOUT IT.

Some of us are dealing with being unemployed and freezing cold winter storms.

I echo Jamie’s comments below – if the ticket prices are some huge injustice to you DON’T GO. Believe me, your favorite artists will get the message and lower their prices. Don’t blame Ticketmaster – they don’t set the prices, the artists do. Have you tried buying the back row at the Hollywood Bowl? Yeah, it’s $6.

$6 friggin dollars. Concert prices are set by the venue and the Artist. If you want to complain to anyone, complain to Bruce Springsteen, who seems to be trying to turn his personal money making tour into a giant political referendum. That guy used to stand for the working man, but now all he stands for is the greedy mega-artist.

Ticketmaster’s charges are outrageous, and government agencies are willing to turn a blind eye to their antics in the concert industry. I think a goal of TM is to break Exxon/Mobil’s profit record at the expense of concertgoers.

For those of you whining about ticket prices and ticketmaster – just don’t go. That’s the reason ticket prices are so high – it’s because enough of you are willing to pay the high prices that WHOLE STADIUMS FILL UP.

If you all stopped filling up the stadium, prices would fall. Do you honestly think that anyone would try to sell tickets for that much money if it was truly too much?

You want scary? How about doing what Artists would love, which is to sell all their tickets on eBay where you all have to BID up on prices? Then only the richest people get to go.

Right now at least some of you have a random chance of getting through the massively popular ticket sale and getting something for close to face value of the ticket.

The real answer is just support your local artist who’s singing on the corner. He’s doing it every day for free. Give him more than the $5 you normally throw in his guitar case. Then decide if you really want to go hear a live concert by Bruce $pring$teen.

I stopped going to ticketmaster events years ago. Whenever I see their name, I can’t help but think of the song “money for nothin’”! There’s a lot of good music out there to be heard without supporting those scam artists.

Thought about going to see Fleetwood Mac until I saw the price. Saw Buckingham the last two shows at Humphrey’s in San Diego. Well worth the price.
Without Christine McVie, it’s just 1/2 Mac. Price doesn’t translate.

I will make ANY effort to avoid Ticketmaster…!

Such nonsense. The companies’ responsibilities are to their owners. They are supposed to make as much money for them as possible. As long as the fans continue to pay, the companies will continue to charge. Fans, of course, have the option to stay away, but, as long as they don’t stay away, they really have little right to complain about how the companies make money for their owners. We still have a capitalist economy, and supply and demand still rule.

It was wrong to have ticketmaster be the only service to sell tickets. now it’s even more wrong.

They suck the fees and costs are outrageous. And the funny thing is, whenever they are on the news they complain about how they aren’t making hardly any money, the performers complain they aren’t making any money, the promoters say they aren’t making any money and the label owners say they aren’t making any money, if we’re paying all this money for a concert, and no one is making any money, what the heck is the point?

I have not, and will not, attend a concert that Ticketmaster is any part of.

$2.50 to print my own tickets using my own paper, printer and ink? No! I refuse to use ticketmaster anymore and simply will not attend any concert that does not offer an alternative method of purchasing tickets.

Okay so Ticketmaster buys the tickets from the concert hall or stadium or whatever. Then sells them for 10 or 25 times face value…right? How is this even legal. You go to the Box office, wait in line and buy tickets for you and the wife. Wife gets sick so you go to the event and try to sell them to someone and get arrested for Scalping

A new world is dawning.

And in this new world, a lot of folks are broke.

Ticket Master and Live Nation may think they have some monopoly that will allow them to continue to milk music fans in every more egregious ways.

But, a new world is dawning and in this world, a lot of folks are broke.

Prices for live shows will come down, or a bunch of little concerts will take over because too many people will simply forgo a concert as paying 300$ for tickets simply isn’t an option.

I don’t have a problem paying fees – it is the way way that they make money. I am a big believer in user fees – paying for what you use. However, I think that the $6 fee is steep – I would rather see them charge a percentage rate vs a flat fee. 2-3% rate seems more reasonable vs a 10-15% charge.

I used to go to concerts regularly, but now can’t afford or justify it. Typical situation… am considering Morrissey tickets in Chicago. As a student, wouldn’t have worried about the costs, and saw him several times. As a mother of two, I have so many other priorities that it’s now out of my price range to go down to Chicago for a 50$ ticket plus all the other expenses involved.
Why can’t it go back to the way it used to be when I was in high school… line up at the mall to buy directly, or phone in an order (if you could get through). Sure, there were scalpers in line, but that was a part of life. The true fans were usually awarded with decent seats by getting there early. These fees are out of control, and hurt fans.

But I also place the blame primarily on the artists. When I lived in London (music heaven), you could regularly see people for 20 pounds or under. In the late nineties I saw Bowie, REM, and the Cure at that price (last minute, fan club gigs and such). Very rarely, big names would require much more, but that was primarily at arenas which I’ve long since stopped doing. Since coming back to the US, I’ve been horrified at the ‘acceptable’ ticket pricing artists will set. Paying 100 or more for a Madonna concert is just not ok. They should look at Opera and how exclusive it is… many artists will have woefully empty arenas if they’re not careful.

Ticketmaster is leaglised scalping. I do not have access to purchase the same tickets at the same venue for the same price as does ticketmaster. The venue gives privaledge to ticketmaster for the best seats and blocks of seats. I wish our legal system would not be persuaded by this company in keeping within the letter of the law instead of it’s intent. To provide access to tickets at a convienience.

I especially love that $6 per ticket charge for me to order online. They call it a “Convenience” fee. It is only more convenient because they don’t offer box office purchase accept at very limited locations, and limited hours. And who is this more convenient for? Seems like they are paying a lot fewer box office attendents and customer service people, so why are they charging me more for their convenience? I avoid Ticket-Bastard charges, and will go out of my way to purchase from the box office. But now, I see it only getting worse.

Ticketmaster is evil. I just hope that they spend as much time reviewing this merger as they did with the Sirius/XM deal – at least this merger would create a legitimate monopoly. But then again the FCC and Justice Department don’t seem to care if Howard Stern isn’t involved in some capacity.

Yeah! to new ‘convenience’ fees and charges!! Hopefully, Congress will award them some bailout money too.

Many have said it but I will reiterate – they are pricing themselves out of business. I’ll take the local bands, bar bands, jazz shows etc over the overpriced, over-hyped crap from corporate scum.

I do find it funy how many “rebel” rock and rollers from yesteryear have turned totally corporate sell outs in their old age.

I guess ideals are only for the young and integrity only for the poor!

I go to a LOT of concerts, at least 50 a year. I am generally laid back and realize we live in a capitalist society and that eventually, most bands/promoters/ticket agencies will charge whatever the fans are willing to pay.
However, the lack of competition keeps ticketing fees outrageous. A $40 concert typically has over $10 in fees from ticketmaster. There are plenty of concerts that I havent attended because of this. Currently, I am sitting out the Fleetwood Mac tour for that reason. If fees were more reasonable (say, about 10% of the ticket price, with a $15 maximum), I would be going to even more concerts.

I usually buy my tickets at the box office whenever possible.

Let them merge, I say. This is not like energy or food or even health care. We can live without concerts. I don’t go anymore because the prices are outrageous already. Ultimately they will price themselves out of existence.

I think what everyone here needs to realize is that you all PAID the price to see the venue. This is then the set market price. You are not forced to go. The only thing you should be mad at is the fact you make less money and can afford less then the other guy who does willing pay the ticket price. The only way to solve this is to help yourself and make more money

I went on Ticketmaster for 2 events recently at the time tickets went on sale and was told that they were sold out, but that tickets were available at another site, which said it was “a Ticketmaster company”, at prices several times face value. It looks like Ticketmaster is using it’s access to hoard tickets up front and sell them at inflated prices. I’d like to know if anyone has any idea of what’s going on here.

Try to buy Allman Brothers tickets for Beacon Theatre in NYC ans see what comes up. Tickets are supposed to be from $60 to $150. Ticketmaster says nothing is available, then directs you to look on TicketsNow (“A Ticketmaster company”). Lots of tickets there. They start at $150 for upper balcony and go up to $700 for orchestra). What’s wrong with this picture? I’m done with concerts, I guess.

Sporting events and concerts are a joke. They are sold out before tickets go on-sale. Yet anyone can get a ticket, for the right price.

TicketMonster could not be more difficult, expensive or technologically-backward if they tried. How can it possibly cost $2.50 to email tickets and zilch to mail them? Can I charge TicketMonster a “handling” and “printing” fee for producing their tix on my printer? This merger is absurd.

What happened to standing in line and getting tickets at face value. Now there are charges and charges and then you get the ticket price. The convienence charge is a crock. They make nothing convienient about your experience. Thenyou have to pay big bucks if you want to pay with a credit card. So when you pay online and there is no way to pay cash or check you are screwed because it isnt reall convient and then you have to pay extra to give them money. I understand that the credit card processors charge a fee but it is a small percentage not 5 bucks on a $30 order. Ticketmaster is the root of all evil in the music world. When $30 concert ends up costing $120 for 2 people there is a problem. And it is not like you can avoid using Ticketmaster either. Going to the box office is not always an option and even at the box office you have to pay the TicketBastard fees because it is a Ticketmaster show. TICKETMASTER IS KILLING THE CONCERT AND RUINING THE EXPERIENCE FOR US ALL. AND THERE IS NOTHING WE CAN DO ABOUT IT. ROCK ON PEARL JAM

Shawn – have you actually tried to buy one of said tickets through Stubhub? The deal is, most of these tickets are “for sale” because Stubhub thinks they can get the ticket. Someone promised it to them (a reliable scalper) and they put it on their inventory. In reality, they don’t have the ticket yet.

When you actually try to buy the ticket, in the rare event they were unsuccessful at getting the ticket from one of their network of scalpers, they will simply lie to you and say “sorry, it just got sold”.

Ticketmaster is the sole reason why I refuse to attend any live music or most live sporting events. As a taxpayer who has helped pay for the stadiums that make Ticketmaster millions, I am appalled that they are even allowed to be in business. Ticket sales should be NON PROFIT only — and held accountable by we, the tax payers. Without our millions to build the stadiums and venues Ticketmaster sells tickets for, there wouldn’t BE any Ticketmaster.

Ticketmaster and Live Nation should learn from the troubles in other parts of the music business – and stop treating musicans and music fans as if we were cash cows and the product was a mere commodity to be traded like so many barrels of oil.

Music – first and foremost – is a form of art. It’s true value comes from its accessibility, which allows a visceral connection between the musician and the fans. Like other forms, music is best when it transcends the boundries that divide us, instead uniting the listeners in a shared experience.

But the runaway inflation seen in ticket prices is effectively pricing more and more fans out of the market. The current price levels are killing the proverbial goose laying the golden eggs.

For example, my friends and I are old time Deadheads – we’ve gone to every show since our college days in the ’70’s. But we are all sitting out this current tour – simply because the ticket prices have crossed a psychological threshold. We’re all professionals and could afford these tickets. But we collectively hit that point where enough-is-enough.

Whether it comes as the result of a well executed anti-trust suit, or just a normal market reaction to over-inflated ticket prices, I expect that these two companies are in for a major shock to their bottomlines.

I recently purchased tickets from Ticketmaster’s sister company by mistake. Ticketmaster’s website redirected me to TicketsNow 5 minutes after tickets went on sale for The Eagles Concert. I paid 80% over face value without knowing until I went online the following day for more tickets and found them a lot cheaper. I reported both to the BBB with no resolve. I enjoyed the concert but I don’t think I can afford another big name head-liner. I sure hope this merger doesn’t happen, the current monopoly on tickets is bad enough.

I hate this monopolistic company. Besides their unrealistic fees. They are partnered with Tickets Now which is an online ticket scalping website. I’ve seen tickets for sale at ridiculous prices on Tickets Now that weren’t even for sale yet anywhere else. Then when they are for sale and you jump on your computer right before sale time and they are sold out. The next thing you see is an advertisement for Tickets Now and they have plenty of tickets. This couldn’t be people selling their tickets that they just bought. Ticketmaster is a scam. I despise them and everything they stand for.FUTM

Tim from NY is 100% right. While people believe that Ticketmaster is receiving 100% of the convenience fee, they are not even close to that. The fee is distributed to resources that support the concert or show including the employees and technology. Blame the promoters and artists, not Ticketmaster for increased ticket prices. While this merger doesn’t sit well with many people, only time will tell what it will do to the market.

I find TicketMaster’s charges so outrageous that, often, if they’re the only provider, I just won’t go to the event…I look for the possibility of buying directly, including “will call” at box offices. Interestingly, it seems, some venues are using the high TicketMaster “add-ons” to justify ever-increasing “fees” for ordering through the box office/ordering directly whether picked up there or mailed. For me, this will likely mean less participation at venues that institute such practices – I believe they’re just too greedy, and “it just ain’t right.” things have just got to change!!

I can not believe fans support these activities. Performers, promoters, agents and these service companies are all make too much MONEY.

Why would anyone support this kind of extortion? Just so these performers can buy 4 houses and 15 cars and you can watch them on MTV show it all off and you can get more pissed.

Americans will soon wake up to the fact that NO ONE is worth paying the current prices to see live acts. They will be forced to wake up someday (unemployment, affordability or priced out of the market) or they will realize it when hits them in the face like a ton of bricks. Then they will be sitting around broke and wishing they had that $1000 dollars back they paid to sit in the front row of a Miley concert because they did not want to upset their needy little kid.

Back in the day, I used to work as a ticket scalper. I know, Boo, hiss.

What I can tell is that we regularly competed against other ticket scalpers to get tickets with automated computer systems. We all set our clocks to 10 am on Saturday mornings and bought as many tickets as we could. We enlisted the help of college students on campuses around the country so Ticketmaster couldn’t trace us, and they all used different credit card numbers. The sad fact is that for a few popular concerts, tickets are woefully UNDERPRICED. I know this, because we never bothered with most tickets and left them alone on Ticketmaster because nobody wanted them even at face value.

We’d sell on places like ticketsNow, StubHub etc., and believe me, Ticketmaster does NOT need to do anything to help the flow of popular tickets to these organizations. If we didn’t do it, someone else did. It’s one of the easiest ways to make money. That price you see on ticketsNow? It’s already been inflated by people like scalpers, so ticketsNow is NOT getting the full profit on ticket.

The only real answer is to let tickets get bid like on eBay. Because scalpers HATE to pay over for a ticket. They lose big money whenever they do this. Sometimes events really are worth extra money – there are only so many good seats at the Superbowl. Nobody’s crying about not being able to buy those at list price and screaming Monopoly to the NFL!

An email to Representative Bill Pascrell of New Jersey:

Congressman Pascrell,

I read with great interest the story about your intention to look into Ticketmaster practices relating to Bruce Springsteen concert tickets that went on sale this past Monday morning. I agree with everything that was pointed out about how they gave a link to the website of a subsidiary offering tickets for much more than face value.

I would also like to point out one more thing that you might not be aware of. If you have purchased tickets from Ticketmaster previously for a similar concert they send an email reminder a few days before tickets go on sale telling you when Bruce Springsteen tickets for upcoming concerts will be going on sale. The email that they sent out stated that tickets would be going on sale on Monday February 2 at 10:00 AM when in fact tickets went on sale at 9:00 AM. So when thousands of people went to the Ticketmaster website to purchase tickets we had no chance of getting tickets because they had been selling them, probably to their subsidiary, for at least an hour.

Combine that with the fact that there were tickets being offered on Stubhub, another popular ticket reseller on Sunday evening and I would say that your suspicions about Ticketmaster are correct. On the Stubhub website you list tickets by the section and row that the tickets are located in. How could you possibly have that information before the tickets go on sale?

Regarding the fees:

You have nobody to blame but the artists and the artist’s management. Ticketmaster does not get 100% of the fee it collects, nor does it even got 20% of the fee it collects. The artists often have contracts that say “we get 100% of the face value of the ticket”. So what, everyone then works for free?!

So the concert promoter, everyone else, including Ticketmaster, have to make their money somewhere. The concert promoters (including Live Nation) LOVE Ticketmaster because they are the whipping boy – Ticketmaster collects the fee, then dutifully doles out the bits to everyone else.

If you want an example of artists who bucked this trend, look at the recent Eagles concerts. They went for “All In Pricing” which means the ticket fee is hidden in the price of the ticket. Ticketmaster has been lobbying, for years, unsuccessfully for this to happen. What changed? Ticketmaster got Frontline Management, who manages the Eagles. They talked some sense into them. Now everyone gets paid, and the concert goer doesn’t feel screwed over, like clearly a whole bunch of you here feel.

Lee from NY got it right can you say MONOPOLY!!! The whole thing needs to be looked at TicketMaster needs to be stripped of its reselling arm. That is the real in justice here!!! I’ve hated TicketMaster since day one. It is all a big Sham when you can not easily buy tickets at any venue now directly. Even the Theater is sucked in!! What’s next museums? L:ike another comment said they need to be broken up.

HORRIBLE! SEC needs to be all over this one.

Concerts are already over priced as it is then to combine these two will only hit the consumer harder. The article points out how Ticketmaster also owns ticketsNow. Last fall I got tickets to AC/DC and wondered why the tickets had not gone on sale at the time ( on Ticketmaster) yet ticketsNow a ticketmaster company was already selling tickets (at a much higher price) Maybe if it was another reseller you could say it was someone was misinformed but this was ticketmasters OWN company listing this.
I on the other hand had to wait until 10am on the Sat morning the sale started and repeatedly keep searching for tickets until finally I got some decent ones. Something is not right and the loyal fan and consumer gets the short end and a much harder (and possibly more expensive) way to get tickets
I notified the Texas attorney general with web page links (prior to the on sale date on ticketmaster). It makes you wonder how much worse they can get when ticketmaster gets bigger. It would be nice if every fan boycotted every show (sold on ticketmaster) for a year but that is just not reasonable and the fans and artist would suffer too. I think a small service fee from ticketmaster is acceptable but most tickets are usually 20% or more then the face value after they add the fees. I supported what Peral Jam did back in the 90’s but the big business of Concert tickets had way to much money and lobbist for it to make a difference. I hope before anyone approves this merger they take a good look at this. Maybe take 18 months looking at it like they did to Sirius/XM

At some point we should learn that anti-trust laws are not a joke, that they’re not an infringement on anybody’s rights, and that their proper application prevents the kind of de facto nationalization that happens when a business becomes economically indispensable.

Ticketmaster shouldn’t be merging with anybody, they should get broken up, because what they’re fighting for is to kill competition.

Absolutely NO. They will screw the fans even more then they already are. Too many Fees. They will feed the best seats to there secondary outlets just to make mo money. Obama don’t let this happen!!!!!

NO! They have already screwed up the industry enough. I almost don’t want to tell anyone about bands I like, because once they get popular I have to go to some arena w/ 40,000 people and pay $100 to see them.

These 2 companies are trying to create a monopoly on the music and ticketing industry. If they merge it will only give them more power to control the market and dictate high fees. Both of them have had technical difficulties on a fairly regular basis as well. The interesting thing is there are all of these smaller ticketing software companies competing for market share and some of them have great customizable products that require much lower fees to cover the costs. It is only a matter of time before venue owners and promoters recognize these options are better solutions for their businesses.