Comment by tyre
6 days ago
People would revolt if there were auctions, because it would make it impossible for many people to attend live events. Right now there is the hope that you can, even if that’s most not true.
For example, I did the Amex presale for US Open tickets. There were 22k people in front of me for regular day passes during the earliest rounds. So we end up with an auction-ish situation anyway, via the resale market, but can blame scalpers.
The thin illusion keeps it palatable enough, if only barely. Ticketmaster is wants to extract the most profit. Being hated is fine. Being regulated because you’re _too_ hated is not.
For some artists in Japan we do lotteries. There's an application period and then the opportunity to purchase is doled out randomly among the applicants. You can often apply for multiple tickets together if you're a group, but ID is checked at the venue for the purchaser so you have to arrive together, making resale more awkward. Usually there are multiple rounds to sell the tickets when nobody paid - some times an early round for fanclub members.