“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.
It didn’t matter until a billionaire was pissed and her millions of fans were also pissed.
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.
For the last 30 years, monopolies could only be broken up if the corporation bought other companies "without the intention of of forming a “monopoly.”
With the intention of forming a monopoly?
I hope one day we can go back to buying from the box office without fees.
I just had to pay $17 to buy 2 tickets to a show at a random small venue for my kid.
These service fees are out of control.
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. 😩
I cannot believe it required Taylor Swift fans getting screwed over for this to finally be looked at, but it’s about goddamn time!
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.
Fuck ticketmaster
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
I get this probably wasn’t your main intent, but no internet also meant that if you didn’t live in a large-ish city with physical access to those tickets, you either took hours/days out of your life or were just SOL.
Internet ticket sales aren’t really the problem, it’s automated and sanctioned/coordinated scalping for resale. (To be fair, that is largely enabled by internet sales…) There’s certainly no technical reason all tickets to a popular show couldn’t be sold at the same price and/or to those who had virtually queued up. It’s just those aspects that make a better fan experience are generally directly opposed to making the most money.
Now do the banks and grocery stores and airlines and car companies and farming and…
