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A scalper who used bots to buy millions of tickets, now wants to stop them

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Re: A scalper who used bots to buy millions of tickets, now wants to stop them

#91

Post by conjectures »

itchyouch wrote: post #19
conjectures wrote: post #10

I'm still trying to understand why they don't just auction tickets.

Because it is about being equitable to middle and lower-income fans. Otherwise, only the richest fans would outbid everyone else and the artists don't want to alienate a large majority of their fan base by making their shows unavailable to only but the folks with the means.

So start a mailing list when you're a small band. Email your oldest fans a promo code with priority booking and/or first tranche auction option. Give people with an academic email address early options. Give people who like you on social media early options. Include a promo code in sales of online merchandise for future gigs. There are lots of potential ways to do it, while undermining the scalpers.

Also gigs seem pretty unaffordable already.

Re: A scalper who used bots to buy millions of tickets, now wants to stop them

#92

Post by matwood »

mattnewton wrote: post #69
jstanley wrote: post #8

> The scourge of ticket bots and the immorality of the shady ticket scalpers using them is conventional wisdom I very much disagree. If I am willing to pay the asking price for tickets, I should be able to buy them. If you're offering them so cheaply that I will happily buy all of the tickets then you're offering them too cheap and you can't really complain if I buy them. If it weren't for ticket-scalpers, die-hard f…

Ticket scalping hurts artist exposure by finding an equilibrium point on price alone, where many artists may really want to maximize audience size and not earnings from tickets. Concerts are like promotional events for their brand and many people buy albums, swag, post on social media about the event, and that's all beneficial to the artist. Ticket scalping removes the ability of the artist to maximize attendance (an…

> where many artists may really want to maximize audience size and not earnings from tickets.

Then get a bigger venue or how about stay in a location doing shows each night until they do not sell out. The artist can absolutely change the supply to meet the demand if they so chose.

Re: A scalper who used bots to buy millions of tickets, now wants to stop them

#93

Post by mturmon »

jstanley wrote: post #23
NLips wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is incorrect. There's a false equivalence between the fans who want to see the gig the most and the fans who are willing to spend the most. The current system means that people with lots of money who aren't super interested will out compete raging fans on low incomes. I'm not suggesting that basing it on first come, first served is ideal, but I think it's probably fairer. If an event organiser/ticketer wants to…

> There's a false equivalence between the fans who want to see the gig the most and the fans who are willing to spend the most. This is how scarce resources are allocated. There is no fairer way to decide who wants something the most than to ask who is willing to give up the most to acquire it. > If an event organiser/ticketer wants to use dynamic pricing, that's up to them. Absolutely. And if a third party wants to…

"...There is no fairer way to decide..."

Now, this seems unimaginative. Surely, especially given all the feedback and critique on this thread, you can come up with other factors besides price that should influence fairness in this transaction?

We may decide that introducing other factors (like band loyalty or degree of enthusiasm for the show) is difficult, impractical, or threatens entrenched interests, but that's another issue.

We can't let enthusiasm for the allocation properties of markets ("it's Pareto optimal!") bleed over into value judgements about the outcome ("...so we all agree it's most fair!").

Re: A scalper who used bots to buy millions of tickets, now wants to stop them

#94

Post by mattnewton »

ikeboy wrote: post #85
mattnewton wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ticket scalping hurts artist exposure by finding an equilibrium point on price alone, where many artists may really want to maximize audience size and not earnings from tickets. Concerts are like promotional events for their brand and many people buy albums, swag, post on social media about the event, and that's all beneficial to the artist. Ticket scalping removes the ability of the artist to maximize attendance (an…

Maximize audience size by renting a large enough place to meet demand at the price you want to sell at.

That's a better solution imo, but that assumes a perfectly flexible supply of venue space that often isn't there in practice. When it is, I also imagine the price is free to scale exponentially with venue size.

Also, say there simply aren't enough teenagers to make it reach an equilibrium point on price alone. This method still ignores the fact that the artist might want to optimize for something other than ticket revenue. A sold out venue of trendy twenty-something's is can be worth much more than a handful of rich die hard fans willing to pay tenfold.

Finally, it requires a really good handle on what that expected audience is going to be, not just what they can pay, which is hard to do.

Re: A scalper who used bots to buy millions of tickets, now wants to stop them

#95

Post by Shivetya »

simonsarris wrote: post #35
jstanley wrote: post #8

> The scourge of ticket bots and the immorality of the shady ticket scalpers using them is conventional wisdom I very much disagree. If I am willing to pay the asking price for tickets, I should be able to buy them. If you're offering them so cheaply that I will happily buy all of the tickets then you're offering them too cheap and you can't really complain if I buy them. If it weren't for ticket-scalpers, die-hard f…

You reasoning is a pretty good example of why the median person should be very wary of anyone saying that free markets and their "efficiency" are a good thing, or will result in good outcomes for them. They will result in good outcomes for the richest, sure. We can agree to that. You are conflating die-hard fans with die-hard wealthy fans which is a little silly. Not all fans have the same marginal value of pocket ch…

No real market can ever be built on the idea of guaranteed sale. The idea that someone wants something is not sufficient to mean they can have it. Concert tickets are limited in number by venue and artist.

I disagree with the assertion that result is good outcomes for the richest. Many concerts, store sales, and such, also have people camp out for access.

Online systems have no person to person interaction requirement which makes it ideal for automated systems. So the real result is, when up against a machine bidding for a service or item you want of limited supply you will lose.

To prevent that might require limits based on some form of personally identifying the buyer and then restricting use to only that person. A bit privacy invading but it could be done. The only way it will get done is for the artist involved to force it.

Re: A scalper who used bots to buy millions of tickets, now wants to stop them

#96

Post by [deleted] »

itchyouch wrote: post #19
conjectures wrote: post #10

I'm still trying to understand why they don't just auction tickets.

Because it is about being equitable to middle and lower-income fans. Otherwise, only the richest fans would outbid everyone else and the artists don't want to alienate a large majority of their fan base by making their shows unavailable to only but the folks with the means.

[deleted]

Re: A scalper who used bots to buy millions of tickets, now wants to stop them

#97

Post by knodi123 »

ikeboy wrote: post #90
knodi123 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This really feels like treating the invisible hand like a religion. At all costs, price controls must be avoided! The will of the merchant is irrelevant! The only thing that matters is maximizing profit- any other solution would commit the heresy of denying power to wealth! Seriously - either background checks, or rent out yankee stadium? No solutions in between?

What will of the merchant here is being thwarted? The question was how to fulfil the merchant's desires, and I gave several possible answers. As long as there's more demand than supply, some mechanism will allocate the scarce supply to the buyers who want it most in the sense of being willing to pay the most for it. Any other system cannot be pareto-optimal.

> What will of the merchant here is being thwarted?

Allowing poor fans the opportunity to get in to a show.

> I gave several possible answers

No, you gave two. And the background check one was so ludicrous that you probably should have kept it to yourself. And you missed the most obvious, don't allow ticket resale. No need for hundreds of expensive financial investigations, and you don't have to rent out a stadium. Dedicated fans can still get a ticket, regardless of their wealth. Mission accomplished.

Re: A scalper who used bots to buy millions of tickets, now wants to stop them

#98

Post by ikeboy »

mattnewton wrote: post #94
ikeboy wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maximize audience size by renting a large enough place to meet demand at the price you want to sell at.

That's a better solution imo, but that assumes a perfectly flexible supply of venue space that often isn't there in practice. When it is, I also imagine the price is free to scale exponentially with venue size. Also, say there simply aren't enough teenagers to make it reach an equilibrium point on price alone. This method still ignores the fact that the artist might want to optimize for something other than ticket re…

>Also, say there simply aren't enough teenagers to make it reach an equilibrium point on price alone.

If there are scalpers, that means there are more people who want to come than seats available. If the price is, say, $50, then there's a certain number of people who would buy at $50. If that number of seats is made available, then the scalper incentive disappears.

>A sold out venue of trendy twenty-something's is can be worth much more than a handful of rich die hard fans willing to pay tenfold

I mean, if you want younger people, just make age restrictions. But you can have both by just getting a larger venue.

>Finally, it requires a really good handle on what that expected audience is going to be, not just what they can pay, which is hard to do.

Well that's where scalpers make the market more efficient, by having a lot of experience knowing what the expected audience will be.

Re: A scalper who used bots to buy millions of tickets, now wants to stop them

#99

Post by hackermailman »

kalleboo wrote: post #76

Here in Japan it's quite common to have ticket lotteries and ID checks for certain popular/easily oversold artists. Better odds are given to early-bird applicants and fanclub members. Why is that so hard to implement?

Live Nation and its ticket distributor Ticketmaster consistently promote scarcity by diverting the majority of tickets into the hands of resellers like TicketsNow, which is a Ticketmaster subsidiary so they can get the full demand rate in the secondary market. The artist gets a cut of this, it's all a scheme and nobody at Ticketmaster cares about the bots who fight over the tiny amount of released tickets.

Artists know they can charge much more for tickets, but can't do so overtly because everybody will cry in the media about them locking out their "true fans", so hence we have this scheme where bands like U2 scalp their own tickets to get paid what they are worth.

Re: A scalper who used bots to buy millions of tickets, now wants to stop them

#100

Post by ikeboy »

knodi123 wrote: post #97
ikeboy wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What will of the merchant here is being thwarted? The question was how to fulfil the merchant's desires, and I gave several possible answers. As long as there's more demand than supply, some mechanism will allocate the scarce supply to the buyers who want it most in the sense of being willing to pay the most for it. Any other system cannot be pareto-optimal.

> What will of the merchant here is being thwarted? Allowing poor fans the opportunity to get in to a show. > I gave several possible answers No, you gave two. And the background check one was so ludicrous that you probably should have kept it to yourself. And you missed the most obvious, don't allow ticket resale . No need for hundreds of expensive financial investigations, and you don't have to rent out a stadium.…

Why can't they meet the demand by renting a larger venue?

Banning ticket resale is also expensive at scale.

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