Ok. Everyone knows ticketmaster sucks testes. Everyone knows the fees are ridiculous. I just bought some tickets and had to vent.

Tickets $45. Facility charge $3.25. Convenience charge $9.60. Order processing fee $4.30. Print the ticket yourself fee $2.50.

That's $19.65 of add ons for a $45 ticket.

Can you imagine any other business getting away with this crap? How much is that shirt? $40. Great I'll take it. Will that be cash or charge? Cash. Ok there's a $4 cash fee. OK charge then. That fee is also $4. Isn't the shirt $44 then? No sir, the shirt is $40. Ok, I'll just charge it. Fine sir, are you going to carry the shirt out? I was planning to. Well it's another $6.25 to take it with you....

You get the idea. Where the hell will this end?

 

They are quite unfair about the actual pricing - ripoff

They need some competition. They are a monopoly and act like it. If someone else came along with straight up pricing they would have to adjust, but no one has yet.

 

Why is there no competition?

 

wow that's a lot, i was charged like 6.95 for each of the last tickets i bought because i had to call in because their website wasn't taking my card....convenience charge.

 

I know you can do tickets on ebay and classifieds but I dont think there is a proper outlet to buy tickets from (at least in Canada)

 

Wouldnt you love to answer the phone when the bank or some other business that nickels and dimes you and say "this call is being recorded and by continuing to talk with me you agree to all charges, fees and costs associated with this caller" then ask them to say "yes" and then send a bill to them for:

-pick up fee
-base call fee (min 2 min.)
-line maintenance fee
-off hours fee

Just to see what they say......

 

Seriously I'm baffled. You'd think the $9+ convenience charge would cover it. An extra $2.50 to print the tickets on my computer?!? Another $4.30 processing fee?!? What the hell was the convenience charge for? Because it's convenient for them to rape us!

4 separate charges beyond the ticket price. Holy hell it pisses me off.

 

Partly because ticketbastard bought them out.

 

Even worse...
Ticketbastard (as dubbed by PearlJam) is attempting to get new legislation passed that dictates that if a ticket is resold on the secondary market for over face value, then they are entitled to a portion of the profits.

 

Now I'm curious, tickets for what?

 

Classic example of allowing gov't the power to write economic interventionist laws - which then are written by the highest bidder. If we just let the free market be, the big corporations would have to actually compete on a level playing field, producing something people are willing to pay for, just like the little guys.

If Ticketmaster's business is so profitable, it should be ripe for competing startups to get in and get a piece of the action, driving prices down. I wouldn't be surprised if the reason this isn't happening, is that TM either has got some stupid legislation already in place that increases the cost for such a startup competitor, or TM has bribed some gov't officials somewhere.

 

To maintain even the slightest amount of dignity on this board I can't say. It's on my 23rd wedding anniversary, it's a broadway musical, my wife is a big disco fan and fan of the horrible movie it's based on. That's as close as I can come to spelling it out. That and it rhymes with spam-ado.

The crap we'll do and indignity we put up with to get laid. Sheesh.

 

 

The worst thing about Ticketbastards pricing is that as technology has made it easier for them to do their business the costs to the consumer has increased greatly. I remember not too many years ago the only way to get concert tickets was to go to a ticketmaster outlet and buy them in person from a ticketmaster employee. The add on then was something like $2.50. Now it's all online, vastly reducing overhead for them. Hell, they don't even have printing costs yet they charge an extra $2.50 so you can print them yourself. Of course you pay that since it's cheaper than having them ship them to you.

Ticketmaster finished 2nd last year to AIG in Forbes "worst companies in America". It's a monopoly and they are taking advantage of us because of that. Should be a prime candidate for the gov't stepping in and spanking their pee pee.

 

Anybody remember the tax levied upon the sale of blank audiocassettes, which was disbursed to the music industry? Still exists, actually. It's imposed on CD-Rs labeled for audio use (which are rare) and on CD recorders.

The motion picture industry has labored (unsuccessfully) for years to impose a similar levy on videotapes and now DVD-Rs.

Face it. Anything having to do with money and the entertainment industry is corrupt. Always has been, always will be.

 

That's the wrong solution - the legislators will be lobbied into passing favorable laws. The original meaning of the word "monopoly" was actually "government licensed monopoly". I wouldn't be surprised if it is government itself that is creating the TM monopoly. Government is the reason companies like AIG and Goldman Sachs exist. Take away the financial risk of failure (government bailouts galore), add Federal Reserve enforced/government licensed leverage, and we get AIG and GS.

The reason the RIAA and MPAA and the entertainment industry can screw us is PRECISELY because of the copyright laws that they lobbied gov't to pass. If government had no authority to write economic interventionist laws, they couldn't screw us.

We need to get the government out of the protection racket.

 

So you're saying artists shouldn't be protected from ripoff artists stealing their work?

 

That's a tough question. I'm assuming you are talking about downloading music.
I've seen arguments on both sides - there are compelling arguments that IP isn't real property. However I have not seen a good argument on how artists and inventors can be rewarded for creating their work.
Though I have voluntarily bought CDs of artists whose albums are my favorites. I'd prefer giving a "tip" directly to the artist, instead of the recording co getting 95% of the revenue. (There used to be an artist "tip jar" website, which I have used).

But OTOH, the way the RIAA thinks, they would have you believe that each song you share = $1,000 of lost revenue, which everyone knows it total and utter bullshit.

I am leaning towards the side that IP isn't real property - if B copies a song from A, it doesn't mean A can't have the song anymore, unlike say, if B stole a car from A. And I am of this opinion, even though I have several patents to my name...

 

I love the gov't.

 

I'd quote a Pearl Jam song here, but they don't really have lyrics.