Government enquiry into ticket touts - send them your views

[zero000]

It seems like Coldplay have changed their tune on touting: http://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/stop-ticket-resale-sites-ripping-off-fans-coldplay-tell-uk-government/

Maybe they've finally realised it's highly unethical for their promoter to flog tickets directly to the secondary ticketing companies. Knobheads.

[eFestivals]

4 minutes ago, zero000 said:

It seems like Coldplay have changed their tune on touting: http://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/stop-ticket-resale-sites-ripping-off-fans-coldplay-tell-uk-government/

Maybe they've finally realised it's highly unethical for their promoter to flog tickets directly to the secondary ticketing companies. Knobheads.

What you're missing is that when a band does it in collusion with the touting sites - as the facts seemed to say was the case with Coldplay - the band won't be considering it a rip-off.

What bands tend to object to is that someone is making some money off them without their permission, rather than the practice via which someone might make some money.

Cynic, me?

[russycarps]

8 minutes ago, zero000 said:

It seems like Coldplay have changed their tune on touting: http://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/stop-ticket-resale-sites-ripping-off-fans-coldplay-tell-uk-government/

Maybe they've finally realised it's highly unethical for their promoter to flog tickets directly to the secondary ticketing companies. Knobheads.

blimey have a look at the comments to that article...someone has traveled the world to see coldplay! 

mindboggling stuff.

 

[zero000]

38 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

What you're missing is that when a band does it in collusion with the touting sites - as the facts seemed to say was the case with Coldplay - the band won't be considering it a rip-off.

What bands tend to object to is that someone is making some money off them without their permission, rather than the practice via which someone might make some money.

Cynic, me?

Exactly. Maybe now Chris Martin can consciously uncouple his head from his arsehole.

[LondonTom]

6 hours ago, eFestivals said:

What you're missing is that when a band does it in collusion with the touting sites - as the facts seemed to say was the case with Coldplay - the band won't be considering it a rip-off.

What bands tend to object to is that someone is making some money off them without their permission, rather than the practice via which someone might make some money.

Cynic, me?

Yeah if its a sudden change of heart, there are plenty of ways they can stop it. Especially a band like Coldplay who would at least have some influence with promoters.

I reckon eventually they will go to a model similar to what West Ham use  with season tickets (not sure if other clubs do), where you can use their ticket trader to get £20 if you sell your "ticket" to a game, and then they sell it on for full price. (Say £50)

 

7 hours ago, tonyblair said:

the punters don't create the market, the ticket outlets do. That's like saying women are the cause of rape, or kids cause paedophilia, or any number of crimes where there's a victim

They do by buying up the spares or even in some cases buying extras to cover their costs. (People wised up to the fact they was pricing themselves out the market though I think and its not now as bad it was a few years ago for punters selling on tickets.)

Its a tough choice when you miss out but its likely if the demand is there, the act will be back. If people didn't buy off touts, they wouldn't purchase the tickets in the first place. (and again you can see it in action, with festivals that used to sell out and the touts got stung, so stopped buying up tickets and now there isn't a market).

[t8yman]

Adele tickets on getmein. £380 - £880. and bear in mind there is also another £100+ in "fees" when you click through to the next page.

http://www.getmein.com/tickets/adele-tickets/manchester-287775.html

Also bear in mind that the only people who have so far had a presale is opportunity is people who have previously been registered on adele.com

Fucking arseholes.

 

Edited December 2, 2015 by t8yman

[incident]

On 01/12/2015, 15:29:55, tonyblair said:

the punters don't create the market, the ticket outlets do. That's like saying women are the cause of rape, or kids cause paedophilia, or any number of crimes where there's a victim

Of course the punters absolutely help create the market - they're consenting to pay the inflated prices. If people weren't prepared to pay, the market would quickly cease to exist.

Speaking of consent, your analogy is just dumb.

[eFestivals]

10 minutes ago, tonyblair said:

the principle still stands though. If the outlets weren't allowed to scam the punters by putting them on secondary markets before they're even sold out, then the opportunity to buy them wouldn't arise.

But given that 'the outlets' are often doing it with the permission of the acts because the acts want a particular pot of money for their shows, the effect of banning those outlets will be increased ticket prices all-round to ensure the act the same money.

The only way around any of that is to stop market forces altogether - which is fine if that's your bag, but it's also pie in the sky for the real world.

 

[eFestivals]

13 minutes ago, tonyblair said:

I haven't read anything about the extra money being made by the outlets going to the acts.

then you're about 5 years behind everyone else on this subject.

It was as-good-as proven beyond all doubt.

[russycarps]

23 minutes ago, tonyblair said:

I haven't read anything about the extra money being made by the outlets going to the acts. It's the other way around. The bands don't know about it, and try to stop it if they can.

come on....really?

 

[eFestivals]

2 minutes ago, tonyblair said:

yes. Most of what I've seen has been acts complaining about the practice. The article posted a few days ago is precisely that.

the article where Coldplay come out against it?

That'll be the same Coldplay who were nailed - never denied, either - as being involved in passing tickets to the touting sites.

 

[eFestivals]

Just now, tonyblair said:

where were they nailed? I'm not saying they didn't do it, but I haven't read anywhere that they did

On a Despatches programme about 5 years ago.

It helps if you want to talk about an issue if you actually know what the issue is.

[eFestivals]

49 minutes ago, tonyblair said:

I've probably been to more gigs than you can imagine. I've been aware of the various touting options for decades during which time I have written to promoters about it.

You're talking about one instance, against the numerous other times when a band (Wilco, Pearl Jam, Springsteen, and there are more) or promoter (Glastonbury?) has tried to do something about the issue. 

No tony, I'm not talking about one instance. I'm talking about what has become a standard operating procedure of part of the music business.

 

49 minutes ago, tonyblair said:

 

What I've since (since you mentioned it) read about the Coldplay issue, doesn't say anything about the band themselves having anything to do with it.

If Coldplay's promoter was doing that without Coldplay's permission, I have no doubts whatsoever that Coldplay would have publicly condemned that promoter and made a clear statement that what had been happening was nothing to do with them.

Their silence was deafening,

 

[eFestivals]

51 minutes ago, tonyblair said:

well, you can come to whatever conclusion you want to. If the bands are colluding, how does that make it the punter's fault for 'allowing' it to happen

Because no one is forcing the punter to buy tickets from touting sites. As I keep saying, it takes two. It cannot work if there's just one side in the game.

One of the justifications for promoters putting tickets on touting sites coming from promoters was that tickets would end up there anyway, and that by putting direct-sourced tickets on there in number they could control the touting price to a degree, and that's certainly correctly applied theory (so probably true in practice).... but if all falls apart if there's no one buying.

For all the time there's people prepared to buy from touts there will be touts, and shutting down sites like those won't stop it. It'll just find another channel.

I want touting to stop. I'd like those sites shut down.

But that doesn't have me put my head up my arse. Footie tickets are heavily regulated, but they're still available from touts.

[eFestivals]

4 minutes ago, tonyblair said:

But they're like a cartel. There is no other option. A show goes on sale, and the tickets are sold at a certain price. Except whole chunks of them aren't. They're separated and are sold on the secondary site (which is owned by the original site). 

Basically, it's creating a 2 tier system. There's the regular tickets for the regular punter, except there aren't so many of them. Now there's an extra option for those who have enough money and probably weren't that arsed about going in the first place, and is prohibitive to people less well off. The rich couldn't care less, why should they? It's a service for them. Why would they stop buying the tickets that are available to them? 

As I say, it's done with the collusion of the acts. They want a particular fee for a show, and this is one way of them getting that fee - while the other way is to increase the price of tickets for everyone.

I'm not saying I agree with it, but it does allow cheaper gig going for large numbers of people than would otherwise be the case.

[eFestivals]

1 minute ago, tonyblair said:

So how does the poor punter have a say in stopping it?

They don't 

when have the punters ever controlled the price of the tickets they buy?

[eFestivals]

1 minute ago, tonyblair said:

Hardly ever. I'm not suggesting it's up to the punters to sort out this problem. 

Some people are

I'm merely pointing out the fact that punters are exactly half of the problem of every touted ticket.

Meanwhile, if the bands/promoters stopped feeding the touting sites tickets and put up their standard prices to make up the difference, you'd still be moaning tho about a different thing.

 

[t8yman]

one decent step would be to limit the number of tickets available to buy per credit card or address to 2. whilst I agree there are many organisations that do this on an industrial scale, there is also a major problem of people who only need 2 tickets buying 4, knowing they can make a profit on the spare two, thus reducing their cost. or using the old "we bought 4 but now 2 friends cant make it" excuse as used to be popular back in the ebay days.

I sat in the waiting room of the o2 presale for adele yesterday for 90 minutes+, and on the axs website, in the waiting room you can see the blocks selling out while you wait. "presale" is the new "on sale" - its all smoke and mirrors. 

[eFestivals]

2 minutes ago, t8yman said:

 "presale" is the new "on sale" - its all smoke and mirrors. 

Yup. Marketeers know that if you make the customer think they're getting something which is somehow special, the customer is more likely to buy.

That's how stupid us humans are.

[incident]

2 hours ago, tonyblair said:

So how does the poor punter have a say in stopping it?

They don't 

Of course they do. How are you not getting this?

People have as much control as they ever did, and ever do. Refuse to pay more than you think is reasonable. If needs be, stay at home. Go watch a band at a local venue for 10 quid instead of the 100+ that is being asked by the band playing at the Arena or wherever.

All of your arguments seem to be based around the utterly false idea that there's no choice. There's always a choice - simply don't go.

[LondonTom]

5 hours ago, tonyblair said:

I get it!

What you, and others are suggesting, is that the victims (the punters) should roll over and accept that they've been fucked over

I get it

What do you propose is actually done then? Alot of it is going to have to come from the punters and they are going to need to stick to any rules. (And yes that might mean missing on one or two gigs a year).

[scarletmist]

On 12/1/2015, 3:29:55, tonyblair said:

the punters don't create the market, the ticket outlets do. That's like saying women are the cause of rape, or kids cause paedophilia, or any number of crimes where there's a victim

Interesting and slightly provocative view!

Surely the point is that it is the the punters who create the market, because there are too many of them.

Its the law of supply and demand - there are more people wanting to go to certain events than the venues can hold. But whereas in a traditional economics model then the price of the tickets would rise to a level where only the rich could afford to go then in practice this doesn't happen, because the bands don't want to price their fans out. So they put the tickets on sale at a price which is lower than the true 'market value'. In effect then this creates a situation which is ripe for touts and others to profiteer.

The solution to this is not completely straightforward. New laws could be created to deal with it, but successive governments have refused to do this. Restrictions on ticket transfer (ie non-interchangeable tickets) would be a good solution, but it only works if the promoters themselves want it to happen. Glastonbury Festivals pioneered this, and several others have followed suit.

The Rugby Football Union have taken a firm stance on this, probably because they want rugby to remain in the hands of true fans and not get taken over by corporate ticket-holders more interested in the champagne than the match. They took Viagogo to court in order to force them to reveal the identities of touts.

Changes in the law this year require secondary sites to clearly state the seats that are being sold. In theory then this should allow promoters to identify the touts, In practice not all of them can be arsed.

 

9 hours ago, eFestivals said:

As I say, it's done with the collusion of the acts. They want a particular fee for a show, and this is one way of them getting that fee - while the other way is to increase the price of tickets for everyone.

 

 

Anyone who doubts that this happens should read the interview with StubHub in  Evolver a few years ago.

Much of the scalping problem is due to artists withholding tickets from the general public and selling them directly through auction sites such as StubHub.

says the man from StubHub. And he should know.

 

On 11/30/2015, 10:18:10, t8yman said:

Following the announcement of Adele's first tour in 4 years, I had numerous family members hassling me to "get them tickets" as if I have some kind of magic ability to get tickets, when all I do is what they could do - be online when they go on sale! Anyway, back on topic - Adele's "people" have made it very clear they "will not tolerate" people buying tickets to resell, and that they look unfavourably on touts and scalpers.

Adele is really doing her best to stop touts. She introduced pre-registration and blocked the accounts of known or suspected touts. Now her management company have threatened to invalidate tickets that appear on the secondary market. The full interview with them is in Music Business Worldwide

This is the kind of action that could really make a difference. If promoters all decided to invalidate tickets on the secondary market then the secondary market might collapse. But it takes determination on the part of the promoters, and its a time-consuming and laborious job. Adele has got the muscle to do this, maybe this will mark a seismic change in the industry.

 

[eFestivals]

15 minutes ago, tonyblair said:

Make it illegal for outlets to lie about the availability of tickets.

Because liars are honest people who'd follow instructions like that?

 

15 minutes ago, tonyblair said:

How do they end up on secondary sites before the original outlet has sold out?

Because the bands/promoters agree to that practice.

How many fucking times?

[russycarps]

2 minutes ago, tonyblair said:

I  know...!! It's no secret it's happening, yet they get away with it. It's the ticket agencies as well

the government has said it wont legislate on this, so only the bands goodwill can prevent it.

or people stop buying the tickets. But most people with plenty of money dont give a fuck, so long as they get a ticket.

 

 

[eFestivals]

1 hour ago, tonyblair said:

I  know...!! It's no secret it's happening, yet they get away with it. It's the ticket agencies as well

it was a secret to you until just yesterday.