Imagine buying tickets to a sporting event or concert and changing your mind because of a last-minute problem. You want give the tickets to a friend or family member but can’t because of restrictive rules.
Self-described fan advocates say a wave or rules is sweeping the nation that would require persons buying tickets to show up in person with the credit card and identification they used along with the individuals they plan to give the tickets to, even if the original ticket holder is inconvenienced.
This sort of restricted ticketing is precisely what large ticket brokers and venue operators spearheaded by Ticketmaster are doing, claims a group calling itself the Fan Freedom Project.
Andrew Langer, president of the Institute for Liberty, who is working with the Fan Freedom Project to stop Ticketmaster and its allies from passing laws that would make this the norm nationwide, told Red Alert Politics that backers are trying to get laws passed in states from coast to coast that would make paperless virtually non-transferrable tickets the norm.
Ticketmaster and its allies have been looking for backing from states such as Tennessee and Minnesota to make paperless ticketing mandatory under the law, according to Langer.
However, the company disputed Langer’s suggestion as untrue and said that paperless tickets amount to one 10th of 1 percent of all tickets sold in American, which it considers “hardly a wave.”
“It’s a huge problem,” Langer said. “We are working with the Fan Freedom Project to push back on a national basis, state by state. Our side is on the offensive sometime and theirs is sometimes.
“We successfully passed anti-restrictive ticketing legislation in Minnesota.”
Industry lobbyists succeeded in getting the Tennessee Legislature to consider requiring the use of paperless tickets, but the bill was defeated after the press got word of it, according to Langer.
Similar laws could be in the works in places like New Jersey, Michigan, North Carolina, Florida, and New York.
“Have you been enjoying cheap tickets sold by season-ticket holders?” the Fan Freedom Project warns on its website. “Kiss those great bargains good-bye. No more $1 NBA or MLB tickets.”
The idea behind this is to eliminate scalping, but Langer said that Ticketmaster in effect is scalping younger people by working to eliminate secondary ticketing marketplaces like StubHub and Craigslist where they can buy cheaper tickets.
“Tickets to concerts and sporting events already enjoy a huge amount of protection under the law,” Langer said. “People’s rights are being eroded by the practice of paperless tickets.
“This is a bit like trying to sell a car, but being required to sell it back to the same dealership that you bought it from,” Langer continued. “This is all a bunch of ticket companies and artist-management companies that want to make sure a secondary marketplace doesn’t exist.”
A Ticketmaster spokeswoman dismissed the Fan Freedom Project as a lobby for StubHub, which she claims wants to make it easier to scalp tickets.
Langer argues this practice has more to do with companies like Ticketmaster and its parent company Live Nation making larger profits and that it has very little to do with helping fans.
“Artists can select that ticketing option when they want to preserve face value tickets,” the Ticketmaster spokeswoman told Red Alert Politics. “We want to thwart scalping attempts. The credit card becomes the ticket. It needs to be swiped to gain access to the event.
“In most cases, it is not the only means of access. We have never said we want to get rid of paper tickets.”
Ticketmaster defends paperless tickets as a way to ensure the tickets end up with “real fans” rather than with scalpers.
“People who sell tickets on secondary sites aren’t doing so because they are benevolent,” the spokeswoman said. “They are making it up on the highest demand. Really for high-demand events. Where below they do sell below face value, I don’t imagine they do so for the high-demand events.
“Paperless tickets help ensure good seats for high-demand events.”
Updated: Includes information from Ticketmaster disputing The Fan Freedom Project’s claims.
