Admit One: How Ticketmaster Became a Master of One 🎟️

it's been a long time coming...

it's been a long time coming...

it's been a long time coming...

It's been a long time coming.

Our story starts with love.

Overrated, amirite?

I believe that 200 million other Americans want to leave some elements of life a mystery, and right at the top of the things we don't want to know is why a man falls in love with a woman and vice versa.

So National Science Foundation – get out of the love racket. Leave such a task to Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Irving Berlin. If there is anywhere Alexander Pope was right, it was when he observed,

'If ignorance is bliss, tis folly to be wise.'

That pompous posturing was Wisconsin Senator William Proxmire.

His 1976 satirical attack was aimed at the $84,000 government-funded study researching why people fall in love. Proxmire framed his colorful commentary as a tongue-and-cheek trophy: The Golden Fleece Award.

Fifty years later, this title remains an easy buzzword for any ridiculous and irresponsible government spending. Despite its anti-intellectual arrogance – targeting seemingly frivolous research studies without understanding their purpose or methodology – the award was adopted into many political agendas to lambast any contentious use of taxpayer money.

Fast forward to 1993. California State Senator Bill Leonard used the Golden Fleece Award to ridicule three medical mills for multi-million dollar fraud. These clinics encouraged a handful of employees to file fabricated workers' compensation claims for stress-related harm under their former employer.

In retaliation, the ex-company submitted federal racketeering lawsuits against these California clinics. Leonard applauded the ex-company for standing their ground and fighting back.

However, in his praise, Leonard professed one of the most infuriatingly ironic statements of all time:

Crowning Ticketmaster as an anti-scam, corporate greed combatant is like characterizing Spotify as a benevolent, artist-supporting friendship circle.

Greed is integral (even synonymous) with Ticketmaster. Everyone has experienced or heard a Ticketmaster horror story where available seating disappeared in seconds, ticket prices abruptly spiked, or receipts were bafflingly bombarded with so many fees.

Concert fans revile these charges. The ubiquity and irrationality of service, process, facility, booking, operational, and promotional fees infuriate ticket buyers. A November 2022 U.S. poll revealed that 77% of respondents were "very concerned" (47%) or "somewhat concerned" (30%) about the cost of concert fees.

On average, these additional charges add 24% to 44% onto the face value of a ticket. In severe cases, ticket fees eclipse 75% of the original price.

When compounded by fluctuating prices, seating scarcity, server crashes, and scalping, purchasing concert tickets has indeed devolved into an immigration-level scramble for admission amidst an avalanche of ancillary charges and annoyed concertgoers.

Despite their oversaturation, these fees were once secondary streams of revenue for ticket companies. In the primitive stages of third-party ticketing, venues were reluctant to surrender their ticket inventory to an unpromising industry.

Hardware bugs were rampant. Security measures were fragile. The earliest operational systems were marred by slow response times, tanking investor confidence and venue commitment. The lack of trust and inventory forced ticketers to price ticket fees below one dollar!

As Charlie Ryan, a Memphis ticketer in the 1970s, recalled:

“Tickets were always an afterthought. They were just a mechanism.

To galvanize the industry, a ticketer needed a vision. A vision that positions their company to dominate the supply chain and appease the entire sector.

A vision that centers on aggressive negotiation, power consolidation, and the formation of formidable allies. A vision that borrows the calling cards of other successful industry takeovers. A vision that envelops every element of the live entertainment experience.

These visionaries would swindle their way into unchecked power, tip-toeing on the tightrope of technicalities while their ticket buyers are trampled to death.

This vision is visible. Their sound is deafening.

The cutthroat schemes of money-minded masterminds exploited this business model, spawning the omnipotent ticketing titan that concertgoers vehemently loathe yet begrudgingly obey.

Someone needs to cut the mic of this insufferable industry plant.

This research unravels the history, business model, scandals, and regulation behind the most hated scam artist in music: Ticketmaster.

It's been a long time coming.

Special thanks to Dean Budnick and Josh Baron for their book, Ticket Masters. My historical analysis of Ticketmaster would be incompetent without their comprehensive research. I highly recommend their journalism.

For Part II of Admit One, click here.