Ticketmaster is a horrible company • Hacker News Board

Re: Ticketmaster is a horrible company

#101

Post by cosmie » Tue, Jan 03, 2017, 9:07 PM UTC

SOLAR_FIELDS wrote: post #3

Can anyone offer any evidence to confirm or dispute the rumor I frequently see online in message boards that Ticketmaster is passing most of the profit from these fees onto the venues and it's really the venues that are doing the price gouging here? The idea that is frequently floated is that Ticketmaster bears the brunt of the hate from fans in exchange for letting the performers and venues collect most of the extra…

While this is somewhat true, what it hides is that Ticketmaster is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Live Nation[1].

Live Nation is essentially the largest music promotor and owns or operates a huge number of venues. The majority of Ticketmaster-branded sales in my city are all at Live Nation operated venues, so those fees in many cases will funnel right back to Ticketmaster's holding company even if they're passed through to the venue operator. And since Live Nation is running the tours for so many acts, they just book them at Live Nation affiliated (owned or operated) venues as often as possible.

I'm curious how the fees are booked on the accounting side. For example, Live Nation won the bid to operate the Nashville Municipal Auditorium for the next three years[2]. Live Nation pays $1mm/yr to the operating fund, the city covers the rest. And Live Nation keeps all profits from the venue until over $2mm in profit is made (then it's split 50/50). That's after $2mm profit, not revenue. The venue is only projected to make $1.5mm/yr in program revenue and costs $2mm/yr to operate[3]. When the city was running the venue, that led to a $500k/yr operating deficit. But if those projections hold with this new contract, our city is on the hook to subsidize Live Nation to the tune of $1mm/yr unless bookings change dramatically. Depending on how they're accounting for those ticket fees, they very well could be shielding that fee revenue from the profit calculation and shafting our city. It's pretty darn easy for "Ticketmaster" (the subsidiary processing the tickets) to siphon off those fees and make them hide from the revenue that "Live Nation" (the promoter booking the tickets) sees. Even if one is owned by the other. Not that I know for sure this is happening, but I've been exposed to enough Fortune 500 accounting shenanigans to know there's usually a tax or liability advantage to these kind of things.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_Nation_Entertainment [2] http://www.tennessean.com/story/money/industries/music/2016/... [3] http://www.nashville.gov/Portals/0/SiteContent/Finance/docs/...

Re: Ticketmaster is a horrible company

#102

Post by zdean » Tue, Jan 03, 2017, 9:08 PM UTC

smallnamespace wrote: post #93

zdean wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"It is a testament to our weak antitrust laws that Ticketmaster has been able to gouge the public for decades with no repercussions whatsoever." Genuinely interested to know what is keeping a nimble new startup from stepping in and blowing this up.

Ticketmaster either owns or has deals with all the venues. I wouldn't be surprised if all those deals specified exclusivity. No venue will switch to a new entrant unless the new entrant can guarantee the same demand, so you have the normal chicken and egg program.

Yeah, but I would think there's a corner of the market that TM doesn't have yet...maybe the really small venues. Start with those as MVP/proof of concept and then "wow" the medium venues, repeat.

Re: Ticketmaster is a horrible company

#103

Post by johansch » Tue, Jan 03, 2017, 9:08 PM UTC

Another A/B test casualty.

Re: Ticketmaster is a horrible company

#104

Post by ksenzee » Tue, Jan 03, 2017, 9:10 PM UTC

zdean wrote: post #87

jandrese wrote: post #13

That insurance scam is only reason #8382 not to use Ticketmaster. Of course there is one reason to use Ticketmaster: you often don't get a choice anymore. The Venue box office is a joke, and Ticketmaster has an exclusive agreement for the rest so it's either them or pay even more to a scalper. This is why I go to barely any shows anymore. The ones I do go to are at the one local venue that doesn't use Ticketmaster (W…

"It is a testament to our weak antitrust laws that Ticketmaster has been able to gouge the public for decades with no repercussions whatsoever." Genuinely interested to know what is keeping a nimble new startup from stepping in and blowing this up.

No need for a new startup. Brown Paper Tickets is the obvious successor.

Re: Ticketmaster is a horrible company

#105

Post by Bartweiss » Tue, Jan 03, 2017, 9:12 PM UTC

dopamean wrote: post #70

jarjoura wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ticketmaster has exclusive contracts with venues and usually owns the venues outright, so it doesn't matter where the money goes, it's all back into their coffers. http://www.livenationentertainment.com

> usually owns the venues outright Really? "Usually?" I don't believe that.

Usually is a bit strong, yeah. Here's their ownership map: http://www.livenationentertainment.com/map/venues

They do have far more exclusive-license venues than that, though.

Re: Ticketmaster is a horrible company

#106

Post by erikj » Tue, Jan 03, 2017, 9:12 PM UTC

Am I the only person who first heard about Ticketmaster on the website of Terry Davis? He wrote an operating system for them.

Re: Ticketmaster is a horrible company

#107

Post by Bartweiss » Tue, Jan 03, 2017, 9:13 PM UTC

notwhereyouare wrote: post #100

stoic wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They charge you to print your own tickets as well.

digital tickets though. I've never had an issue pulling up the ticket on my phone and letting them scan it

"E-ticket convenience fee" still applies though, at least much of the time.

Re: Ticketmaster is a horrible company

#108

Post by wnevets » Tue, Jan 03, 2017, 9:14 PM UTC

Louis CK is really the only celebrity that I can think of that went out of their way to cut out ticketmaster. We really need attempts like this to succeed

http://www.ticketnews.com/louis-c-k-sells-tickets-for-tour-w...

Re: Ticketmaster is a horrible company

#109

Post by 67726e » Tue, Jan 03, 2017, 9:14 PM UTC

ksenzee wrote: post #104

zdean wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"It is a testament to our weak antitrust laws that Ticketmaster has been able to gouge the public for decades with no repercussions whatsoever." Genuinely interested to know what is keeping a nimble new startup from stepping in and blowing this up.

No need for a new startup. Brown Paper Tickets is the obvious successor.

I've had to use them a couple times at a local gallery that I like, and I like their general idea but that site needs a lot of work.

Re: Ticketmaster is a horrible company

#110

Post by Retric » Tue, Jan 03, 2017, 9:14 PM UTC

firloop wrote: post #22

nathancahill wrote: post #2

That "Minutes left to complete the purchase" is one of the oldest tricks in the sales book. I felt my blood pressure going up just looking at that gif, and I wasn't even buying tickets! Edit: I know why they do it, but it isn't necessary for most ticket sales. Just turn it on when there's high demand.

Not a huge Ticketmaster fan, but I actually don't have much of a problem with this as they have a complicated problem: allocate demand of a often scarce good (event tickets) in a way that's fair to non automated buyers. By placing a hold on the stock for a few minutes (rather than allocating at final checkout), it gives humans a fair chance to check out as their ability to secure the stock isn't based on how quickly…

If they are selling out fast enough that Automated buyers are a problem then the price is to low.

A 'presale' at 5x price that ticks down to normal prices over say 2 weeks would solve this problem. However, Ticketmaster makes more money getting a cut from scalpers without paying the bands their cut.