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Louis C.K. sees ticket scalping drop over 96% by selling tickets himself

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Re: Louis C.K. sees ticket scalping drop over 96% by selling tickets himself

#81

Post by jbooth »

fusiongyro wrote: post #72
Androsynth wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Leaving money on the table does no one any favors. If people are willing to pay $150 for tickets and hes charging $50 (or whatever it is), he's only doing himself a disservice. If people are willing to pay that much and he delivers a show that is up to his normal standard, they won't hate him for charging them that much; quite the opposite actually. It's only the price gauging and poor service of monopolies that peop…

> he's only doing himself a disservice. How precisely is the scalper, by increasing costs and adding _no value_ doing us a service?

By increasing liquidity!!

Re: Louis C.K. sees ticket scalping drop over 96% by selling tickets himself

#82

Post by joezydeco »

masklinn wrote: post #73
joezydeco wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do say it as a bad thing. In my example, the 1000 fans and the artist would have been perfectly happy with the arrangement. Of course this is never the case. So the scalpers are profiting from the mismatch in supply and demand and making the show less accessible to the fans. From a scalper POV, that's capitalism. God bless America. From the fans's POV, it just sucks. And I could swap Louis CK for oil, and scalpers…

> From the fans's POV And the artist's POV as well, his fans are now poorer and there's no value into it: they don't enjoy it more, they don't get more merch, they don't keep their money to see the next show, they don't get to buy a nice dinner for their SO, etc...

That's an interesting angle. Internet piracy of content was supposed to be okay because the artist should be able to profit from concerts and related merchandise. But it seems that isn't entirely possible either.

Re: Louis C.K. sees ticket scalping drop over 96% by selling tickets himself

#83

Post by joezydeco »

pyoung wrote: post #65
Androsynth wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yeah I'm confused, isn't scalping a necessary side effect of the process? It seems natural if you sell tickets at a constant price over time and don't adjust that for higher demand (as event gets closer in time) or lower supply (as tickets are sold). Also, is scalping a bad thing? It seems to me that they are making the market more efficient.

The SF Giants use a variable ticket pricing scheme that seems to be pretty successful. It adjusts the price of tickets based on projected demand. This probably does a pretty good job at eating into scalpers profits (although not entirely). Of course baseball ticket demand is a lot more predictable due to the fact that their are ~80 home games a season. It would be interesting to see if there was any way to implement…

Trent Reznor had some thoughts on that:

"My guess as to what will eventually happen if / when Live Nation and TicketMaster merges is that they'll move to an auction or market-based pricing scheme - which will simply mean it will cost a lot more to get a good seat for a hot show. They will simply BECOME the scalper, eliminating them from the mix."

http://forum.nin.com/bb/read.php?59,548515

Re: Louis C.K. sees ticket scalping drop over 96% by selling tickets himself

#84

Post by sambe »

Androsynth wrote: post #66
sambe wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is there artificial demand? The scalpers aren't buying tickets for fun - there has to be someone to flip them TO. These people are fans and they create the demand, as stated in the grandparent. Edit: a common "rebuttal" in this thread (see diek, potch, drivingmenuts) seems to be that there is an assumption of correct market price being the aim. That isn't the assumption or the point. The point is that excess dema…

Re: Correct Market Pricing 1-This is inherently a class-based argument. It assumes that someone with more money than you isn't a 'real fan' and that his true fans are the squeezed middle class (or whatever class-bracket you happen to be in). 2-The world doesn't owe you anything. Thinking this is unfair because you can't afford tickets to a stand-up comedy show is the epitome of a First-World problem. edit: this isn't…

An odd comment - I didn't say either of these things.

However, other people are saying them and I'm with you - both are fallacies. Particularly on the first, I'd suggest to "real fans" that they consider whether they prefer paying more than face value or not going at all (just in terms of their utility, not as a point of principle). If the latter, then consider the option of refusing the higher price - same result, you don't go! There are no easy solutions.

The perceived issue - I guess - is when a very high percentage of tickets become resold and you don't agree with this method. I'd say your very small chance of getting a face value ticket is still representative of a world without scalpers as they are, as always, acting as a proxy for real demand, which would otherwise be competing with you for face value tickets directly.

Re: Louis C.K. sees ticket scalping drop over 96% by selling tickets himself

#85

Post by ebrenes »

roc wrote: post #25
erpa1119 wrote: post #12

Sounds like ticketing is ripe for re-invention, how about electronic tickets via smart phone?

Ticketing has long been ripe for re-invention. The big problem is that TicketMaster has anti-competitive contracts with most popular venues. Louis CK, in trying to do his own thing, is facing largely the same troubles Pearl Jam did in their own effort to end-run Ticketmaster: they're forced to play, in many cases, massively smaller venues. And that winds up excluding more fans than TicketMasters' fees and scalper's a…

I like the ideas.

Personally, I would set it up as follows:

1. Have a fixed price for non-transferrable tickets, which are identified by ID/CC or sent to a specific mobile device with a QR code or something. These tickets will be refundable.

2. Have a variable price for transferrable tickets, and use an auction type system. These tickets can be transferred but the user must go through the auction and there's a sufficiently long auction period to purchase them. These tickets are not refundable.

Re: Louis C.K. sees ticket scalping drop over 96% by selling tickets himself

#86

Post by alxp »

Androsynth wrote: post #66
sambe wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is there artificial demand? The scalpers aren't buying tickets for fun - there has to be someone to flip them TO. These people are fans and they create the demand, as stated in the grandparent. Edit: a common "rebuttal" in this thread (see diek, potch, drivingmenuts) seems to be that there is an assumption of correct market price being the aim. That isn't the assumption or the point. The point is that excess dema…

Re: Correct Market Pricing 1-This is inherently a class-based argument. It assumes that someone with more money than you isn't a 'real fan' and that his true fans are the squeezed middle class (or whatever class-bracket you happen to be in). 2-The world doesn't owe you anything. Thinking this is unfair because you can't afford tickets to a stand-up comedy show is the epitome of a First-World problem. edit: this isn't…

Performers now know that they lose good will when a fan has to pay a scalper to see them. Louis C.K. is earning tons of good will by doing this, and the only person who loses out is the scalper. Wealthier fans have always been able to work the system to get extra tickets, back stage access, etc.

Re: Louis C.K. sees ticket scalping drop over 96% by selling tickets himself

#87

Post by Androsynth »

fusiongyro wrote: post #72
Androsynth wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Leaving money on the table does no one any favors. If people are willing to pay $150 for tickets and hes charging $50 (or whatever it is), he's only doing himself a disservice. If people are willing to pay that much and he delivers a show that is up to his normal standard, they won't hate him for charging them that much; quite the opposite actually. It's only the price gauging and poor service of monopolies that peop…

> he's only doing himself a disservice. How precisely is the scalper, by increasing costs and adding _no value_ doing us a service?

Just because he is doing himself a disservice doesn't mean the scalpers are doing us a service.

Re: Louis C.K. sees ticket scalping drop over 96% by selling tickets himself

#88

Post by nooneelse »

Androsynth wrote: post #66
sambe wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is there artificial demand? The scalpers aren't buying tickets for fun - there has to be someone to flip them TO. These people are fans and they create the demand, as stated in the grandparent. Edit: a common "rebuttal" in this thread (see diek, potch, drivingmenuts) seems to be that there is an assumption of correct market price being the aim. That isn't the assumption or the point. The point is that excess dema…

Re: Correct Market Pricing 1-This is inherently a class-based argument. It assumes that someone with more money than you isn't a 'real fan' and that his true fans are the squeezed middle class (or whatever class-bracket you happen to be in). 2-The world doesn't owe you anything. Thinking this is unfair because you can't afford tickets to a stand-up comedy show is the epitome of a First-World problem. edit: this isn't…

How is your second point at all relevant? No one is talking about being owed anything. This situation isn't the consumers pushing against scalpers, it is the performer/artist himself.

You seem to be against Louis C.K. having the freedom to sell his product how and at the price he chooses (for whatever reasons he thinks are of merit). Why?

Re: Louis C.K. sees ticket scalping drop over 96% by selling tickets himself

#89

Post by ghshephard »

mhartl wrote: post #15

For his shows, C.K. saw scalping rates as high as 25%, driving up the price of his shows for people who wanted to attend, by those who didn’t. The only people driving up the price of the shows are people who want to attend. How could it be otherwise? People who don't want to go to the show certainly don't raise prices. If scalpers can profit, it means you aren't charging market price. Policies like the one described…

I didn't really understand BMORG's response to a ticket shortage - Lotteries play right into the scalper strength - the ability to file lots and lots of requests with different credit cards. I only had three active credit cards, so I could only enter the lottery three times (I didn't get a ticket this year) - but scalpers have a whole catalogue of credit cards and addresses to purchase tickets with. They must have been chuckling with glee when they saw the system this year.

Re: Louis C.K. sees ticket scalping drop over 96% by selling tickets himself

#90

Post by fusiongyro »

Androsynth wrote: post #87
fusiongyro wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> he's only doing himself a disservice. How precisely is the scalper, by increasing costs and adding _no value_ doing us a service?

Just because he is doing himself a disservice doesn't mean the scalpers are doing us a service.

As worded it is implied that the scalper is doing _somebody_ a service, and I disagree with that.
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