Since my happy hour plans fell apart for an impromptu-pre-U2-concert hangout, I googled for information on any official U2 parties happening around the Target Center. That’s when I saw this link for ticketsnow.com that was selling tickets to u2 for their Minneapolis Vertigo show. Thing is… they weren’t the face value of the ticket… one of the tickets was going for around $570 for section 112 row S in the lower level.

I took screenshots to capture the prices and quantities available (as this page’ll expire after today): page start, continued, end

How can you charge $570 for a concert ticket when the original face value was no more than around $150 to begin with??? You do that on the street and that’s called ticket scalping. And that is suddenly legal on the internet? That’s just not right.

I counted 126 tickets that they were selling for these rediculous prices—that’s 126 people that might have been able to see the show at the NORMAL PRICE if these bastards didn’t swipe all these tickets and decide, “yah, we’re going to sell them for four to five times their value.” And it’s not just in Minneapolis. There was one city where a U2 ticket with a “VIP Pre-Party” was going for nearly $1,000. That is just not right.

I think I’m going to write the Attorney General’s office on this one for starters. It’s not a matter of “if we can’t do it on the street, why can they do it on the internet”, but moreso a matter of principle… if a PERSON is limited to X amount of tickets, the same should go for a company. It’s companies like TicketsNow and other online ticket scalpers that make it all the more difficult for the average joe/jane to get decent tickets at a decent price.

September 23, 2005, 12:25 pm

Filed under: Awareness

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