— A lot of people lost a lot of respect for them. Unfortunately, they appeared to be on the leading edge of a trend. Still, I can’t say I regret a nickel of the $45 I paid for that U2 show, and I don’t think I would have been disappointed at $130.—
Sounds like there’s some disconnect between the whole of fandom here: many people are more than willing to pay that much… but others are griping that they shouldn’t have to. I’m not quite sure what would resolve the problem.
I opened this thread because I couldn’t imagine any good arguments against scalping, and I still haven’t seen any that are halfway convincing (to me). SHAKES’ argument seems like it would work the other way. A true die hard fan can always get good tickets when there are scalpers - it’s just that they would have to pay market price. What you seem to be arguing is that fans can’t get good seats at below-market prices, even if they are willing to camp out in a ticket line. So? I guess I don’t see why it should be their expectation to do so.
im not comfortable with the whole “morality” issue. its a business transaction. you have a choice in the matter. you can decide if you want to buy the ticket or not. the scalper is just trying to make a few bucks. morality has nothing to do with it!
i lived in vegas for a number of years and saw both sides of the issue. i scalped and bought for agencys and also bought tickets for my own use from scalpers.
SHAKES is right. first in line meant you were probably coldest and tiredest and had the first chance to buy shitty seats. the slick behind the glass always had some good answer why front row was not available, invariably involving some “computer program that selects blah blah blah”. they all went to some agency long ago, dude, while you sat on a urine-soaked sidewalk in sub-freezing weather.
flip-side: i saw Paul Bleeding McCartny for $4! He played the Silver Bowl and scalpers took a HUGE bath on that show. i grabbed mine about 2 minutes before showtime on the sidewalk in front of my house. Scalper offered me one for $100! and i told him i would give him a beer for one (he probably had around 200 to unload)
i occupied $1200 worth of seats at the MGM when the Stones played on Steel Wheels tour. No one was paying the $200/seat for a ticket. My woman worked there and i got in for free. I had my ass in one seat, MC helmet on another, jacket on a third, legs on two and my tank bag on one also. The $200 seat section was virtually empty and no different from the guys accross the isle who paid $100.
simple answer: don’t pay any more for tickets than you are willing to. if you REALLY NEED to see Band X, you need to decide if it is worth your time to buy a ticket that is available or if it is worth the “stick it” fee a scalper charges.
what the hell am i talking about? my train of thought derailed about 2 miles back…sorry! carry on!
How do you respond to my argument above (or the “teenages buy more records” one)? I am assuming that for the most part tickets are sold on the condition that they are not to be resold (as they usually are here). If that is the case then it is not correct to call the black market price “the market price”, nor is it correct to suppose that ticket resale between willing participants is a positive-sum transaction - the rest of the crowd are not indifferent. To put it economic jargon, scalpers and their customers reduce the extent of gains to a network externality internalised by prohibiting resale. If bands or sporting teams maximise profit in a monopolistically competitive market over consumer demand which is a function of price and quality endogenously determined by crowd demographics, scalping would partially dissipate the surplus shared by consumers and producers.