QuiGon

Remember that discussion we had a few months ago about scalping tickets...? I made the point that opening things up, legalizing scalping, and having more scalpers around ultimately benefits consumers. For those of you foolish enough to doubt me, here is an exerpt from an article supporting my point.

The National Association of Ticket Brokers says there are about 600 brokers nationwide; those in the industry say their online presence has increased competition and pricing transparency. They say -- believe it or not -- tickets used to be marked up even more. "It used to be, buy a ticket, triple your profit," Vaccaro said. "Now it's buy a ticket and you're lucky if you get 20 percent."

http://www.boston.com/news/local/con...online/?page=1

PatsFaninAZ

The national association of ticket brokers thinks scalping is a good thing? Shocking.

I just took a casual look over on ebay. Upper level superbowl tickets are going for $2800 to $3200 for $450 tickets. Lower level and club seats are going for $3500 to $10,000 or more for $500 to $700 tickets.

Twenty percent markup my as*.

Fixit

None of that negates the fact that the ticket broker business itself is horse****.

pats1

You use an article from a ticket scalping agency to support your point that ticket scalping should be legal.

Brilliant work, QuiGon.

Are you on that company's payroll?

QuiGon

No, I used an article in the Boston Globe's website that discusses the industry and uses a quote from a ticket scalper as part of the article.

Well, it may not have been "brilliant" but it was clearly too much for your not-so-keen intellect.

All you guys are free to disagree with my beliefs, and I look forward to reading your supporting evidence printed from major metropolitan publication. Please be sure to include the necessary links and/or references.

QuiGon

Translation: "I'm too poor to afford tickets at the open market value so I will just whine and complain about the industry itself."

Here's a question which absolutely no one seems able to answer: Why is it perfectly OK for me to wait in line at Best Buy for 72 to buy a PS3 for $600 then sell it on eBay the next day for $2,000, but the same thing is unacceptable for tickets to sporting events...?

pats1

All the same. When will an internet pirate argue that what he is doing is illegal?

Anyone with half a brain can realize using such an obviously biased statement to back up an argument is foolish.

It's like someone trying to make a case that the Holocaust was made-up by using the Iranian president's statements that it was.

Great. The Globe can print whatever they want. It doesn't one bit change the fact that it about as biased a view on the problem as you can get.

pats1

Is reselling PS3's illegal?

Fixit

Okay, first off, no. My wife and I aren't exactly on food stamps, jackass. The fact that it's illegal for an individual to scalp tickets, but it's okay for a company to buy up all the tickets and triple the face value is what I find ridiculous.

Secondly, I find the game system gouging to be a joke, too. Then again, the people who will pay $2,000 for a PS3 or $1,000 for a Wii when all they have to do is wait a month or two to pay retail are tards, so they deserve it.

Thirdly, your handle on a Pats board is "QuiGon" and your avatar is Liam Neeson holding a lightsaber, so you're not in a great position to insult anyone. I really hope you're not over the age of fifteen.

PatsFaninAZ

It's not that different from the perspective of the consumer, although from the perspective of the artists or a team, there's the problem that with scalping you're free riding on their intellectual property. The PS3 circumstance is very rare, though, in the consumer products industry, since most producers of durable goods will always eventually make an unlimited supply to meet demand and so there is no secondary market except for a very brief period of time. And even then, most of the people who buy PS3s are buying them not for the secondardy market, wheras a large percentage of those who purchase Red Sox tickets are doing so with no intention of attending the game.

But the main difference is that ticket scalping is frequently not the result of someone willing to stand in line for 72 hours. The prevalence of scalping has led to outright graft or coordinated efforts by people who have no interest in attending the events not merely to take advantage of the secondary market, but to CREATE the secondary market by systematically and artifically deflating supply while at the same time enhancing their own supply.

If all scalping were, from an economic perspective, truly merely the addition of sweat labor by the scalper onto the price of a ticket (like your PS3 example), it would not be problematic (or not that problematic). The way the system currently works, however, it's patently anticompetitive. No serious economist or market-watcher would ever suggest otherwise. Certainly, the author of this Boston Globe article is not saying otherwise. In fact, he or she is not saying much at all, other than collecting quotes to write a lame superbowl story.