PJ Reference in Reznor/Scalper Piece

Firecloud

After reading Trent Reznor's piece on scalpers early Sunday, I did some digging and found myself inspired/enraged enough for a full-throated rant on the issue, with a closer look/sharper indictment of the Ticketmaster/Live Nation merger. Putting the damn thing together killed my whole night, but it was worth it - just went up at Antiquiet.

In addition to covering recent stands on the issue by Billy Corgan, Trent Reznor, Bob Lefsetz and Gene Simmons, I made sure to make a proper reference to Pearl Jam and their fight with Ticketmaster all those years ago. Check it out if you're interested:

http://www.antiquiet.com/editorials/2009/03/trent-reznor-ticketmaster-live-nation/

Thanks for reading!

Fifthelement

Nice article :geek:

Live Nation telling Ticketmaster to reduce prices and stop treating customers like shit isn’t a far cry from O.J. telling Chris Brown to “ease up on the girl.”

Priceless

South of Seattle

Nice piece Firecloud. Always enjoy the blog.

LukinFan

Fifthelement wrote:

Nice article :geek:

Live Nation telling Ticketmaster to reduce prices and stop treating customers like shit isn’t a far cry from O.J. telling Chris Brown to “ease up on the girl.”

Priceless

not to get off topic, but did anyone see Family Guy last night (made had been a repeat, not sure) where Peter as hanging out with OJ?

arq

I love it, very nice article! I tool the time too to see the simmons lefsetz debate.

wma11

LukinFan wrote:

Fifthelement wrote:

Nice article :geek:

Live Nation telling Ticketmaster to reduce prices and stop treating customers like shit isn’t a far cry from O.J. telling Chris Brown to “ease up on the girl.”

Priceless

not to get off topic, but did anyone see Family Guy last night (made had been a repeat, not sure) where Peter as hanging out with OJ?

Yeah, I saw it, was a new episode, a good one, love the OJ reference, it was from March '07, but was 'new' to the public...

Porters Dad

LukinFan wrote:

Fifthelement wrote:

Nice article :geek:

Live Nation telling Ticketmaster to reduce prices and stop treating customers like shit isn’t a far cry from O.J. telling Chris Brown to “ease up on the girl.”

Priceless

not to get off topic, but did anyone see Family Guy last night (made had been a repeat, not sure) where Peter as hanging out with OJ?

It was a new episode, but I thougt it was complete junk...

The writing was horrid and the animation even looked weird...

Huge fan, but I thought last nights episode was terrible.

Firecloud

arq wrote:

I love it, very nice article! I tool the time too to see the simmons lefsetz debate.

Thanks! Much appreciated. The Lefsetz/Gene Simmons debate is a classic example of the old model vs. the new, and was a big inspiration for the piece.

Eduardo Veduardo

That was a great article. I've never found any fault with the low level scalpers / brokers...they are just taking advantage of a severely busted system and I have no real problem with that. I have huge issue with the system that facilitates it, though. TM and LiveNation are a disgrace.

I don't see the auction style system working either, though. It's good press for a band for the tickets to be reasonably priced, and for it to sell out quickly. Unfortunately both of those things mean scalpers will exist.

If a show sells out in two minutes, it's priced way, way too low - even though the hysteria is good for the band's image. The Michael Jackson system was an intersting one...50 shows sold out of the normal tickets almost immediately, but you can still buy the "Thriller Hospitality Package" for most shows. The package includes a ticket in rows D-K of the center section, a bunch of crap like a glass of champagne when you arrive, a goody bag, red carpet, pre-party, etc. Those packages cost around $1100 for each ticket. They are still available, but are slowly selling out, and no scalpers are going to buy them, because it's too much risk for not enough reward. It's the best of both world's for Michael Jackson. He gets the perception of selling out quickly (all the rest of the tickets are about $110 each), and gets to sell several hundred tickets at their actual value.

Whatever they do, I hope they adopt some new system to get more $$$ in the artists hands...

Firecloud

Eduardo Veduardo wrote:

If a show sells out in two minutes, it's priced way, way too low - even though the hysteria is good for the band's image.

Thanks for reading and for the compliment. It truly means a lot to me, so understand that I ask the following question with love and respect: are you out of your mind? That's a ridiculous standard to suggest gauging ticket prices by. If you put Rolling Stones tickets on sale at $500 a pop, it would sell out - maybe not immediately, but certainly faster than you'd think. There are always people out there who will rush to pay the premium. That's the exact opposite of the point I was trying to make.

Eduardo Veduardo

Firecloud wrote:

Eduardo Veduardo wrote:

If a show sells out in two minutes, it's priced way, way too low - even though the hysteria is good for the band's image.

Thanks for reading and for the compliment. It truly means a lot to me, so understand that I ask the following question with love and respect: are you out of your mind? That's a ridiculous standard to suggest gauging ticket prices by. If you put Rolling Stones tickets on sale at $500 a pop, it would sell out - maybe not immediately, but certainly faster than you'd think. There are always people out there who will rush to pay the premium. That's the exact opposite of the point I was trying to make.

Haha, no worries...I'm not suggesting that I would be in favor of any band charging the max they can. God, I hope they don't or I'll never see a concert in a good seat again. But from a strictly business perspective - if you take away image, fan base, all the extraneous emotional factors involved and talk about tickets as a product - if they are selling them out super quickly, no matter the price point, they are pricing it too low. And if RS tickets are on sale at $500 a pop and selling out quickly, then maybe they should put them at $750...That just makes good business sense.

Thankfully all those other factors are involved, and bands have to take into consideration whether or not they are alienating their fans when they make ticket pricing decisions. What I really hate, and your article helps illuminate, is the shadiness involved. I wasn't meaning to condone Michael Jackson's $1100 ticket prices, those prices are completely absurd. What I like is that it's out in the open, not a deal made behind closed doors to secretly force the fans to pay more for premium seats. If you're going to gauge, at least do it in the open.

Fortunately, the my favorite bands (PJ, NIN) feel as I do, that concerts should be accessible to everyone, not just the wealthy. Trent's ticket system is even better than PJs, IMO, and actually works. You know in advance what tickets you are getting, so you can decide to buy or not. Then when you pick up tickets, they do an ID check, and you and your friend have to go immediately inside. Plus the tickets have cool art and your name printed on them, which rocks. Just my opinions on the matter, feel free to disagree, I can take it.

Firecloud

Amen! Cheers to healthy debate.