"We allege that Live Nation relies on unlawful, anticompetitive conduct to exercise its monopolistic control over the live events industry in the United States at the cost of fans, artists, smaller promoters, and venue operators," said Attorney General Merrick Garland in a statement. "The result is that fans pay more in fees, artists have fewer opportunities to play concerts, smaller promoters get squeezed out, and venues have fewer real choices for ticketing services. It is time to break up Live Nation-Ticketmaster."
Oh look, they finally discovered the thing anyone with more than two brain cells to rub together knew 20 years ago.
Stop fucking approving corporate mergers and acquisitions you utter fucking dumbasses.
This is not the result of a prolonged investigation. It's the result of shifting precedent from a neoliberal, Chicago School, interpretation to a more "new deal" era interpretation of monopoly laws. For the last 30 years, monopolies could only be broken up if the corporation bought other companies "with the intention of of forming a "monopoly." We literally had to get rid of all the followers of the Chicago School from the government and replace them with people that aren't as friendly to corporations.
Basically, think of companies forming monopolies as drunk driving. If a court of law were to determine drunk driving manslaughter cases like they've been determining monopoly cases, you'd have to prove that the drunk driver left his house with the intention of killing someone inna drunk driving accident. So they'd always be able to say, "well I didn't leave the house thinking I'd kill someone!" And get away of it. That's how companies and the judicial system have been treating monopoly laws.
I had to pay sales tax to purchase two tickets from a Ticketmaster subsidiary in a state where we have no sales tax. I even went through the hassle of contacting them and they just blew me off with "it's to cover state and local taxes" which are nonexistant in reality.
I wish more musicians had joined Pearl Jam back in the day, but instead they were left to stand up for fans alone. And now Ticketmaster has only gotten bigger/worse since. 😩
Back in the day, you would camp out or arrive early....stand in line...wait for the record store to open to buy tickets.
All tickets were same price
No Internet meant 1st person in line had a real chance to get front row seats
Tickets were 30.00 maybe....I paid 40 to see van Halen with Alice in Chains open.
Nowadays, seats are priced at a premium
Venues add an upcharge for seats on top of Ticketmaster
Fees are almost as much as a ticket
Front row doesn't go to fans that camp out, they are sold at a huge markup.
No more paper tickets means ticketmaster gets to double dip on fees for a resale...if they even allow resale of your ticket.
Imagine having a golden goose like this and literally strangling it with your own greed.
If I was one of those people making outrageous amounts of money off this thing for decades, I would be screaming for the flesh to be stripped clean off the executives managing that business.
Live Nation said Thursday it doesn’t benefit from monopoly pricing, saying that Ticketmaster service charges “are no higher than elsewhere, and frequently lower.” The company noted its overall net profit margin is at the low end of S&P 500 companies.
How do they not make a killing? What are they spending their money on? I can't remember how many years ago it's been since I got a physical ticket besides the ones I had to pay them for to print myself.
Who sets the ticket price?
Artists, promoters, sports leagues, or teams decide how they want to sell their tickets on Ticketmaster. That includes setting the face value prices, determining how many tickets to sell, and when to put them on sale.
How much money does Ticketmaster make from a ticket?
Ticketmaster doesn’t keep anything from the face value cost of a ticket. We take a portion of the fees added to the ticket. As a ticketing vendor selected by the venue, Ticketmaster’s portion covers the costs of the technology, people, and resources needed to provide a safe and secure ticket-buying experience. It also covers the equipment and support we provide venues with, helping them to manage their box office and seamlessly get everyone into the venue on event day.
What are service fees?
Service fees are an essential cost of putting on a show. The venue sets the service fee rate card and keeps most of the service fees, sharing a portion with Ticketmaster, sports teams, leagues, promoters, and other parties who have a hand in making live events happen.
Can you tell me how many tickets have been sold for an event?
For all inquiries on pricing and sales you must reach out to the event organizer directly.
As the world’s largest live entertainment company, Live Nation is the one-stop solution for all your event needs. From corporate events to private live concerts, to social gatherings, our event specialists provide seamless execution, including event planning, experiential marketing, state-of-the-art equipment, live entertainment and more.
And also:
With over 150 venues across North America, we offer unique event spaces, state-of-the-art production and branding capabilities, as well as an experienced staff ready to exceed your guests' expectations.
So while plenty of money is leaving Ticketmaster, a very large chunk of that is likely going right back into several of their other pockets.
The LWT piece also goes into how only a minority of tickets actually go to sale to the public, leaving the rest up for resale, which they also have the potential to get a slice of as well, and they have seemingly done nothing to combat resllers or bots.
So LiveNation I can understand having slimmer margins since they seem to be providing actual services and have overhead on their physical ownings and staff, but Ticketmaster itself still seems to mainly by an app and marketing department.
Not sure how to feel about TS; on the one hand she can bring positive change on small economic issues related to entertainment like this, on the other hand her carbon footprint is inexcusable and she's as much if not more of a blight on the environment as any other billionaire I can think of.
Have you considered that it might not be necessary to feel one way or another about the whole of a person? You can limit yourself to having opinions on individual things they do, and these don't have to be reconciled.