Ticketmaster and Live Nation hoping to merge

[liverpoolken]

Not good news for concert goers I fear.
This from today's financial pages.....


Concert ticket prices have doubled in the last decade, and consumers can expect no relief now that Live Nation and Ticketmaster, the two most powerful entities in the concert business, confirmed Tuesday their intentions to merge.

It’s easy to see why Live Nation Inc. and Ticketmaster Entertainment Inc. want to blend their operations into a new entity called Live Nation Entertainment. They are competitors who would create a company with roughly $6 billion in annual revenue that would operate the majority of major concert venues in America, sell the tickets to events at those venues, and manage many of the artists who play there. Their union would instantly create a full-service music company that would reduce the economic clout of other concert promoters, ticket sellers and even record companies.

Far more difficult to fathom is how this partnership would in any way benefit consumers, and how it could pass muster in a federal antitrust proceeding.

News of the merger has already set off alarm bells in some prominent corners. Connecticut Atty. Gen. Richard Blumenthal and U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell, N.J., are among officials calling for investigations and hearings into the merger. Last week, Pascrell denounced Ticketmaster for funneling fans seeking to buy Bruce Springsteen concert tickets to Ticketsnow.com, a company owned by Ticketmaster that sells concert tickets significantly above face value. Springsteen himself called the Ticketmaster redirection of his tickets “a pure conflict of interest.”

In an open letter to his fans, Springsteen went further: “The one thing that would make the current ticket situation even worse for the fan ... would be Ticketmaster and Live Nation coming up with a single system, thereby returning us to a near monopoly situation in music ticketing.”

In addition to creating its own ticketing company, Livenation.com, Live Nation has completed deals with major artists such as Jay-Z, Madonna and Shakira to represent them in a variety of multimedia platforms and share in revenue streams from merchandise to recorded music.

Ticketmaster has been expanding its business as well, recently partnering with Irving Azoff’s Front Line management company and a stable of talent ( Christina Aguilera, Eagles, Guns N’ Roses) that would play many of the same arenas booked by Live Nation. In merging, Live Nation-Ticketmaster would hold a significant position in every aspect of the music business.

The merger brings together the two companies most responsible for the rise of concert ticket prices in the last decade. Ticket prices for the top 100 tours in 2008 averaged $67, more than double the 1998 average - far outstripping the overall rate of inflation. Industry insiders predict that prices will continue to increase, with a greater premium put on the best seats.

Now that Ticketmaster has a stake in the secondary ticket business, where tickets are resold at market value, it can create a more fluid price structure for concerts. In effect, each seat could be offered for bidding, putting an end to the era of fixed-price tickets, especially for high-demand acts.

Such a system could mean consumers will no longer have to scramble to sign on and gain access to overloaded Web sites for high-demand shows. And it could mean that long-reviled service fees would no longer exist, or be folded into the price of a ticket.

But those positive results may not compensate for the higher ticket prices brought on by an auction-based ticketing system. In that world, the concertgoers with the most cash would prevail every time. That’s not always the case in the current system, which in theory gives all consumers equal access to all tickets for a fixed price.

[lizzytysh]

This will be the nail in the coffin of concertgoers going to concerts. If a worldwide boycott on ticket sales could be arranged, however. How can anyone expect a conglomerate, of which Ticketmaster's a part, to do right, when they're already so severely gouging people on the semi-open market .


~ Lizzy

[ladydi]

OMG...Lizzy and Ken agree on something

[John Etherington]

The anti-Christ is clearly alive and well!

[osmachar]

I thought there were some sort of 'anti cartel' laws against the over-dominance of one company ....

So I guess this will mean that we're only ever going to get tickets in the last row for £200 a pop...

[Womanfromaroom]

Ladydi,
grab a chair and steady yourself: I agree with Ken on this one, too!

[jillian0108]

The Obama Justice Department is investigating whether this buyout constitutes a monopoly. Senator Shumer(Ny) and rep Pascell from NJ are opposing the merger.

It's a good thing we have a new administration because it is unlikely the previous one would oppose it under the antitrust laws.

We can only hope that the Justice Department will see the merger as illegal and unfair.
JIll

[Dem]

Ticket prices for the top 100 tours in 2008 averaged $67, more than double the 1998 average -

How much of the averaged $67 goes to the artist?


Dem

[guy1]

The Obama Justice Department is investigating whether this buyout constitutes a monopoly. Senator Shumer(Ny) and rep Pascell from NJ are opposing the merger.

It's a good thing we have a new administration because it is unlikely the previous one would oppose it under the antitrust laws.

We can only hope that the Justice Department will see the merger as illegal and unfair.
JIll

it would have been the same with the old administration... the ones suing would have been the competitors of the companies anyway, and they would win... this is a very problematic merger with many questions.

[dalsh327]

What I don't get is when a band is sponsored by a company, the ticket prices should be lower.

The service charge per ticket is ridiculously high, it seems to go up every time. When you see a 10 dollar service charge on a 10 dollar ticket, it's ridiculous.

I don't get why Live Nation wants to go back to working with Ticketmaster, except the economy is affecting the entertainment industry. They need to stay apart. We've already seen what happens when one ticket company monopolizes, and it just drives ticket prices through the roof.

I can justify Leonard Cohen charging over $100 for playing smaller venues because you have to factor the band in to this (they don't come cheap), but when people are asking that much in an arena setting, which is more about hot dogs and t-shirts than about sound quality, it rankles me. Cohen playing festivals is purely money motivated, I know bands that love festival gigs because it's a huge payday for doing little work, but it's also getting exposure to a lot of people in one shot.

Why Bocelli plays arenas, or Pavarotti was playing stadiums was ridiculous. I think Streisand was the most expensive arena act to date.