You excitedly click to buy a ticket for your favorite artist or sports team.
You’ve been following them for years, and you’re anxious to secure your tickets.
However, you’re met with a full queue.
Instantly, you’re hit with a new fear: Will I get tickets before a reseller?
People in search of easy cash have taken to Ticketmaster, purchasing tickets at face value and reselling them to fans.
This makes it difficult for true fans to obtain tickets at a reasonable price or at all, leaving them frustrated.
This causes it to become unfair to the artist themselves; they attempt to price their tickets reasonably, but resellers ruin it.
Resale practices must be stopped to protect fans from unfair prices.
According to Variety, a 2018 report shows that markups can range from 50% to 7,000%.
After the bots snatch the tickets, they mark them up to an astronomical price for resale.
According to the Daily Press, one example of this is the Taylor Swift Eras tour, where resale tickets ranged from $10,000 to $35,000 per ticket.
This created a controversy in the concert community, making many fans mad that they couldn’t secure tickets.
According to PBS, in 2015, StubHub sued Ticketmaster and the Golden State Warriors because Ticketmaster unfairly required fans to use Ticketmaster’s resale exchange.
It’s not just people mad at Ticketmaster; it’s also other resale sites, which is why we need a solution.
According to PBS, the US Senate has proposed possible actions to end this issue, including making tickets non-transferable.
Making tickets non-transferable could solve the problem, but it can also create new issues.
Frustration over Ticketmaster’s resellers and high resale prices is a long-standing issue among fans.
Ticketmaster argues that eliminating transferable tickets could prevent scalping, but the true solution would be getting rid of bots and limiting resale markups so that events remain affordable to all.
