Pandora Acquires TicketFly for $450M • Hacker News Board

Re: Pandora Acquires TicketFly for $450M

#41

Post by ju-st » Wed, Oct 07, 2015, 9:54 PM UTC

bkeroack wrote: post #35

jandrese wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it amazing that nobody can seem to outcompete Ticketmaster. It can't really take $15 per ticket to serve up 5 webpages. Are the costs of entry really that high? It doesn't seem like selling tickets should be that hard. How can a simple middleman maintain such a massive profit margin for so long?

You aren't the customer. The venues/teams/promoters are.

Yep. If you want to outcompete Ticketmaster you have to increase your revenue by jacking up the ticket prices even more (so your real customers get more money).

Re: Pandora Acquires TicketFly for $450M

#42

Post by acgourley » Wed, Oct 07, 2015, 9:59 PM UTC

pedalpete wrote: post #40

cmurf wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are actually Live Nation which before the merger was a spin off from Clear Channel. So they have all kinds of legacy venue usage rights and exclusive contracts. It's so incredibly blatantly anti-competitive and yet the merger was allowed: Google, Microsoft , Intel, piles of companies were against the merger. So it's not amazing at all. And then it's perfect for many entertainers because they can use Ticketmaster…

To give people what the 'exclusive venue' right look like. If a venue uses ticketmaster, and breaks the contract, they can't sign with another ticket vendor for one year. That pretty much locks everybody else out of the market. Or the venue is going to have one very quiet year.

What if you sold those venues software that let them be their own vendor?

Re: Pandora Acquires TicketFly for $450M

#43

Post by MrBra » Wed, Oct 07, 2015, 10:00 PM UTC

odiroot wrote: post #17

mcintyre1994 wrote: post #5

> The Pandora app is the single most-used mobile app in the world Can this possibly be true? More used than Apple/Google/Spotify music apps maybe, but Facebook? Google search seems hard to believe too? I mean 80m users, "many on their phone" when Facebook have put up 1b users in the same day and I'm pretty sure surpassed 50%+ mobile usage?

I would actually guess Spotify is even more popular. Pandora is AFAIR not even in Europe.

I used to know it since when it worked from Europe too... and I think I liked its selection more than I do with Spotify.

Re: Pandora Acquires TicketFly for $450M

#44

Post by Retric » Wed, Oct 07, 2015, 10:06 PM UTC

pedalpete wrote: post #40

cmurf wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are actually Live Nation which before the merger was a spin off from Clear Channel. So they have all kinds of legacy venue usage rights and exclusive contracts. It's so incredibly blatantly anti-competitive and yet the merger was allowed: Google, Microsoft , Intel, piles of companies were against the merger. So it's not amazing at all. And then it's perfect for many entertainers because they can use Ticketmaster…

To give people what the 'exclusive venue' right look like. If a venue uses ticketmaster, and breaks the contract, they can't sign with another ticket vendor for one year. That pretty much locks everybody else out of the market. Or the venue is going to have one very quiet year.

That's exactly the kind of thing that anti monopoly legislation prevents. So, my guess is those terms are not enforceable unless they have a specific end date. Also, TM is probably fairly lean and kicks back a lot of there margin to any of the major players.

Re: Pandora Acquires TicketFly for $450M

#45

Post by silveira » Wed, Oct 07, 2015, 10:12 PM UTC

bmm6o wrote: post #16

Ars coverage of the story: http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2015/10/pandor...

The photo they are using to illustrate this story, without any credit, is from the upcoming Guitar Hero Live (FreeStyleGames/Activision). No relationship with Pandora or TicketFly as far as I know.

The photo: http://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Guitar...

Re: Pandora Acquires TicketFly for $450M

#46

Post by powera » Wed, Oct 07, 2015, 10:13 PM UTC

jandrese wrote: post #14

cmurf wrote: post #13

If they can destroy Ticketmaster I'll be happy. Edit: And StubHub for that matter.

I find it amazing that nobody can seem to outcompete Ticketmaster. It can't really take $15 per ticket to serve up 5 webpages. Are the costs of entry really that high? It doesn't seem like selling tickets should be that hard. How can a simple middleman maintain such a massive profit margin for so long?

A lot of the fees actually go directly to the venue, and not to Ticketmaster.

Re: Pandora Acquires TicketFly for $450M

#47

Post by samstave » Wed, Oct 07, 2015, 10:18 PM UTC

If anyone from Pandora is reading this:

* Form a partnership with Uber -- allow me to see venues with events happening on my uber map and allow me to click one button to buy a ride to the venue and a ticket at the same time!

* For the love of god -- please update the Pandora Home Screen on the website app when listening to music so that the album art and the artist title are BIG and viewable from across the room! Look at how lame this layout is: http://i.imgur.com/QEciRIj.jpg

Look at how small the album art/artist is and ALL that wasted screen real estate.... I mean the album art is the smallest visual element in that entire UI!!!

Re: Pandora Acquires TicketFly for $450M

#48

Post by anthrophuman » Wed, Oct 07, 2015, 10:19 PM UTC

hopefully now this means I won't keep hearing the same songs over and over on pandora... oh wait, already cancelled my membership

edit: the truth hurts. I used and paid for pandora one for many years but the fact is they play the same songs over and over regardless of what station I'm on. switched to slacker radio, then rdio more recently and found it to be much better. best of luck to pandora though.

Re: Pandora Acquires TicketFly for $450M

#49

Post by anthrophuman » Wed, Oct 07, 2015, 10:20 PM UTC

samstave wrote: post #47

If anyone from Pandora is reading this: * Form a partnership with Uber -- allow me to see venues with events happening on my uber map and allow me to click one button to buy a ride to the venue and a ticket at the same time! * For the love of god -- please update the Pandora Home Screen on the website app when listening to music so that the album art and the artist title are BIG and viewable from across the room! Loo…

check out rdio.com, they are crushing pandora in their app design imo

Re: Pandora Acquires TicketFly for $450M

#50

Post by RokStdy » Wed, Oct 07, 2015, 10:22 PM UTC

jonknee wrote: post #34

maccard wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also left Spotify streaming on my work computer when I left this evening. My average Spotify usage is probably 23 hours a day.

Your work computer's Spotify usage doesn't have anything to do with Pandora's claim about being the most used mobile app.

I'm not sure if you're serious or not. I think the connection that was being made is that, if you evaluate usage based purely on time, Pandora may have a ton of time in use. But, much (or at least some) of that time may be people who've left it to stream for hours after they've left.