Tears on my Ticketmaster Account
Monopolies, or business ventures with complete control over certain areas of the economy, are among the greatest enemies of the free market. In terms of monopolistic control, the ticket vendor company Ticketmaster is comparable to the likes of business giants Amazon, Standard Oil and AT&T (Investopedia). This was recently exposed once again to the general public after the poor ticket sale process for the upcoming Taylor Swift’s “Eras” tour. There were reports of resale tickets selling for ten times the original price and complaints of never receiving their tickets due to faulty transaction processing algorithms (Business Insider). Many were quick to blame Ticketmaster for these problems, a sentiment well documented on Twitter and various other social media websites. The backlash soon led to widespread calls for reform and breaking up of the Ticketmaster monopoly. However, some members of the local community and experts do not agree with the rigorous criticism toward the company.
In the book “Ticket Masters: The Rise of the Concert Industry and How the Public Got Scalped,” authors Dean Budnick and Josh Baron lay out the argument that, while still partly responsible, Ticketmaster is just one part of a bigger, overall problem of the music industry. They claim that artists are incentivized to sell tickets for their events at well below market value and leave it to Ticketmaster to inflate the price up to industry standards, so that Ticketmaster acts as a scapegoat shielding music creators and publishers from backlash. Questions of Ticketmaster’s accountability were also expressed by sophomore Landon Seidel, a devoted Swift fan who had trouble acquiring presale tickets for the tour.
“If Ticketmaster is dissolved, another company much like it will just replace it,” Seidel said. “Of course I believe some ticket prices were quite insane, but for how big of a name Swift is, the tickets are obviously going to be expensive. Since Swift [was] performing in the new SoFi stadium in Los Angeles, I am not surprised to see a bump up in prices, considering how expensive the new venue [was].”
Another reason for Ticketmaster’s infamy and solid foundation in the industry is their willingness to work with ticket resellers, a fact supported by a 2016 undercover investigation conducted by reporters from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and the Toronto Star into an international ticket scalping convention held in Las Vegas named Ticket Summit. The investigators found officials from Ticketmaster attending, and the subsequent report suggests that Ticketmaster was violating its own terms of service for the benefit of a specific minority of mass ticket resellers who were earning outrageous amounts of profit. Junior Charlotte Flusser, however, claims that the company does try to fight against scalping, with mixed results of success.
“I think that Ticketmaster tried to manage the amount of ticket resellers by allowing fans to apply for their verified fan [presale], but [did not] execute this plan well,” Flusser said. “Anyone who applied for the [presale] and was randomly chosen by Ticketmaster was able to buy up to six tickets for that show. This was a mistake because many people bought all six tickets even if they [did not] need them all and re-sold the extras after.”
On the other hand, many online critics believe that Ticketmaster is an inherently evil business incapable of committing actions solely from goodwill. Wired has released an article titled “Everyone Hates Ticketmaster – But No One Can Take It Down” that claims Ticketmaster is despised, vile and unstoppable. In addition, the article claimed that Ticketmaster’s business practices are built on inimitable foundations that are years in the making, leading to their system being practically impossible to be replicated by competitors. Junior Ivana Bilicic condemns allegations of the corporate giant’s shady business practices.
“Personally, I [do not] like Ticketmaster’s approval of resellers,” Bilicic said. “Tons of these resellers buy semi-affordable tickets from the real fans, only to sell them at insane amounts. This deprives so many true fans of getting to experience their favorite artists in concerts and [it is] honestly quite sad.”
