Many were disappointed when the court case against Ticketmaster was dismissed. In case you missed it, the event ticketing site has a bit of a monopoly, and it’s gotten out of hand. Now they are saying that they’ll be more transparent for customers looking to buy tickets. According to Billboard, CEO of Live Nation, Michal Rapnio, said in an investor call, “We’ve got to now go out and do a much better job, so policymakers and consumers understand how the business operates. We’ve historically not had a big incentive to shout out loud that venues are charging high service fees… Read more »
It was quite the week for Taylor Swift and Ticketmaster as her Midnights Tour had a disaster of a presale rollout. We all know what happened by now – the webstie crashing, fans being locked out from accessing tickets, waiting in virtual lines for hours only to get error messages and plenty more. Music manager and insider Randy Nichols joined The Gunz Show to explain what happened, what may happen in the future and who is to blame – is it the scalpers, Ticketmaster, promoters, or the artist themselves? This interview is AMAZING and I guarantee you will learn… Read more »
Today we talk about U.S. Senators going after Ticketmaster, Matty Healy’s latest fan interaction, and people in China protesting COVID restrictions. — Ticketmaster vs. U.S. Senators The debacle over getting Taylor Swift tickets through Ticketmaster has gained the attention of U.S. Senators. The ticket selling site basically has a monopoly of concert tickets and Senators Amy Klobuchar and Mike Lee have formed a subcommittee to challenge that. Not having any true competitors has allowed the site to make insane fees and gives them the freedom to let their bots roam free, without any repercussions. They blame the Taylor Swift chaos… Read more »
Concert promoter Live Nation and ticket-seller Ticketmaster consummated their merger on Monday after the U.S. Justice Department approved it with conditions meant to lower ticket prices for consumers.
Bruce Springsteen’s “Working On A Dream” topped the weekly album charts with 224,000 first week sales according to Nielson Soundscan. But his concert fans were at the center of a controversy sparked by a Ticketmaster campaign pointing buyers to higher priced seats at their own resales broker TicketsNow even while regular seats were still available. The fans and Springsteen camp cried fowl. “Some artists or managers may not perceive there to be a conflict between having the distributor of their tickets in effect ‘scalping’ those same tickets through a secondary company like TicketsNow – we do,” the boss and his… Read more »
LOS ANGELES — Concert promoter Live Nation Inc and ticketing giant Ticketmaster Entertainment Inc. confirmed their merger plans Tuesday and got right to work addressing antitrust concerns that have taken center stage Ticketmaster Chairman Barry Diller to be chairman of the new company – which would be called Live Nation Entertainment – sought to dispel the notion that the deal would lead to higher ticket prices. “Ticketmaster does not set prices. Live Nation does not set ticket prices. Artists set the prices,” he said, without mentioning the ticket surcharges Ticketmaster relies on for much of its revenue. Under the deal… Read more »
The world’s largest concert promoter Live Nation Inc plans to buy Ticketmaster Entertainment Inc for about $400 million in stock in a bid to create a company with dominant holdings inconcert promotion and ticket sales. But shares of both companies fell on Tuesday, amid concerns the acquisition would be blocked by U.S. antitrust regulators under the new Obama administration. U.S. Senator Charles Schumer slammed the deal ahead of its formal announcement on Tuesday, calling for a federal probe into Ticketmaster, the top U.S. ticket vendor. “This merger would give a giant, new entity unrivaled power over concert-goers and the prices… Read more »
Bruce Springsteen has castigated Ticketmaster after it encouraged US fans to buy tickets online for one of his gigs at inflated prices. The Boss also put the boot in about any possible merger between Ticketmaster and concert promoter Live Nation, declaring that such a move would “make the current ticket situation even worse for the fan”. Springsteen, his manager Jon Landau and the entire Springsteen tour team claimed on the Brucemeister’s website that such a move would lead to “a near monopoly situation in music ticketing”. Officials in Connecticut and New Jersey are launching investigations into Ticketmaster’s sales practices, following… Read more »
Amid an uproar over the huge demand for seats to pop idol Hannah Montana’s tour, a U.S. federal judge on Monday barred the use of automated software to make mass ticket purchases from the leading box-office service Ticketmaster. U.S. District Court Judge Audrey Collins issued a preliminary injunction against Pittsburgh-based software maker RMG Technologies, whose computer programs, Ticketmaster says, have enabled scalpers to gain rapid, repeated access to its online retail system. The court order stems from a lawsuit brought against RMG by Ticketmaster, a unit of IAC/InterActiveCorp, in April, before tickets for the 54-date Hannah Montana concert tour went… Read more »
Ticketmaster, the world’s leading ticketing and access company, announced today that Briggs Ferguson has been appointed to the position of president of Citysearch. Ferguson will assume responsibility for all aspects of the Citysearch business including the overall management and strategic direction of Ticketmaster’s national and international city guide business. Ferguson will report to John Pleasants, Ticketmaster’s president and chief executive officer. An experienced industry veteran, Ferguson joins Ticketmaster following his tenure as executive vice president, marketing and product strategy for Launch, the music division of Yahoo! Inc. In this role, Ferguson was responsible for several operating divisions including Launch.com, Warped… Read more »
