What is wrong with Ticketmaster?

I revised this on May 14. Neither are well written. I get that way when I rant. Sorry. It's just a blog that no one reads. Except maybe Colin. (Thanks.)

http://www.slate.com/id/2141425/fr/rss/

In response to the above...


Yeah, that's tough. It seems that the industry is always subject to
scalpers.

Back in the day when it was queuing, there were always scalpers there in
line. In Cincinnati there was a pharmacy in the suburbs. The many times I
arrived at 5:30 a.m. (for a 10 a.m. on sale) and some dude is there in the
parking lot. Gets out of the car goes to the door as I pull in.
Fortunately I beat him for the '95 Phish Nutter Center show. Got great
seats for that.

But even then we fought against those who got to call in their orders.

Would temporary online and phoneline blocks work? Again, the scalpers will
just get in line. This begets the "line lottery" issue where it is random.
Again, the hardcore fan is screwed.

Could they go to exclusive will call? Maybe. That could be a cluster fuck
at larger venues, or the requirement that the venue employ a lot of people
for a short time to distribute tickets.

Maybe do all internet and do all print your own tickets but deliver the
tickets the morning of the event. Makes people less reluctant to buy on
ebay if they don't get hard tickets.

The thing about it is that we are smart as are the scalpers. Every time I
find a way to get to the front of the line they find a way to reduce my
chances of that. It seems that tiered pricing works pretty good on those
high end events. But for a small club show or GA event you can't work the
tiered pricing so well.

I guess it isn't all TicketMaster's fault. They are the easy target. I so
welcomed online sales. As an out-of-towner willing to travel to see a show
I'm very happy to have access to it. I grudgingly pay convenience fees.

That's the bigger outrage, I think. There is so much market power there it
isn't funny. They cannot justify charging different convenience fees for
different events or for different priced tickets for the same event. Any
justification for a convenience fee would be to cover the average total cost
per ticket sale. And I cannot be convinced the marginal cost of selling one
more ticket is more than a buck. Even when you have to have a person sell
it to you that time is valued less than a buck.

Any other ideas?

Full disclosure. I have purchased tickets that I've resold. Sometimes at a loss. Sometimes at a profit. If I fee guilty I take comfort that at least two mutually advantageous exchanges were made. I was just an unauthorized middleman.