Charles Allen's ticketing legislation

[Thousand Made-Up Loves]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2025/04/08/ticket-scalpers-dc-bill-anthem-ticketmaster/

Third party sellers are not the enemy. If venues are pricing their tickets for less than what the market will bear, i.e. charging $25 for a ticket that is going for $100 on the aftermarket, that is THEIR fault.

I support banning speculative ticketing. Third party sellers should not be able to market tickets without, get this, actually being able to provide the tickets. All this nonsense of "pay us X and we'll try to get you a ticket at that price or less, but no guarantees!" is nonsense. I do support that.

But third party sellers are not the enemy. I admire touring acts wanting to keep tickets "affordable," and there are creative ways like fan clubs to do that. But capping aftermarket ticket prices is not how a market economy works.

[Julian, Hyperpop SLUTFUCK]

It’s so funny that I was nearly banned repeatedly for close to a decade on this community about this very basic belief and defending ChokeyChicken and now all of you seem “way to the capitalistic right of ol’ Jules” with no apologies.

Fuckos, I fought this fight.

[Julian, Hyperpop SLUTFUCK]

Just guess what the realization “every ticketing convenience fee we’ve ever seen is righteous and just” will feel as it shatters your ideological hymens.

[hutch]

Yeah…that’s not capitalism….

Companies buying tickets with no interest in using them - and utilizing advantages actual consumers don’t have in getting the tickets - is not capitalism.

Or let me put it this way: non regulated capitalism is not something we want for concert tickets anymore than anything else. We have laws to combat monopoly practices in any number of sectors but ticket sales should have no regulation?


There is such a thing as consumer protection and it should extend to concert ticketing.

[grateful tagle zuppi pizzaboli]

I mean, I’d just get a job at IMP rather than pay scalper prices for ever single thing.

[Julian, Hyperpop SLUTFUCK]

Yeah…that’s not capitalism….

Yes it is. Literally the definition.

Companies buying tickets with no interest in using them - and utilizing advantages actual consumers don’t have in getting the tickets - is not capitalism.

Again, it totally is. The grocery store you go to gets a better wholesale price on asparagus than you could as a private consumer and they also have no interest in eating the asparagus themselves. Your framework throws away 98% of commerce.

Or let me put it this way: non regulated capitalism

Oh, good, you get it: this is capitalism and everything you've said so far is hogwash. Always good halfway thru a post to tell people to ignore everything you've said so far.

. . .  is not something we want for concert tickets anymore than anything else. We have laws to combat monopoly practices in any number of sectors but ticket sales should have no regulation?

I want the 2025 Toyota Prius to cost $3. It would be sweet -- what laws should we enact to make sure I get to pick how much things cost?

There is such a thing as consumer protection and it should extend to concert ticketing.

Concur. If you buy tickets for a cost you consent to and you get no tickets, that should be against the law. You let me know when that happens and I'll join you with pitchfork and torches.

[grateful tagle zuppi pizzaboli]

Generally agree with most of that, except for the grocery store analogy. Consumers more or less don't have access to the wholesale / industrial food chain until it hits the store. The correct analogy would be if someone went to the grocery store and bought all the asparagus, denying you the supply that existed at a market-driven price. They then set up a table outside the grocery store and were selling asparagus at 10x the grocery store price.

Yes, if you buy from that guy, you consent to his pricing, and the system that supports it.


tl;dr - don't buy resale tickets

[hutch]

I distinguish between unfettered capitalism and capitalism but semantics is all it is…

Because tickets to a  specific concert are a one time event you can’t have competition. There is that one chance to see Taylor Swift in DC in the Eras Tour. So whoever is promoting the event has a monopoly and within that monopoly resellers have dozens upon dozens of BOTs using the fastest internet connections known to man to gobble up tickets so as to resell them.

I think government should ensure consumers have a fair shot at buying tickets at face value.

On top of that you have concerts promoters through tix sellers using yield management systems in flex pricing schemes. Kind of like airlines. I find that obnoxious.

[hutch]

Basically the role of government- in general- should be to ensure competitive markets. A market with non competitive features and practices is not  healthy capitalism. Take the most extreme situation where someone corners the market and  buys every single ticket to a show and attempts to resell them at 10x cost.  That’s not a well functioning capitalist market.

Governments role is to regulate.

I am reminded of something I used to tell people in my work about privatization: privatization without an appropriate regulatory framework is useless. It will not benefit people.