Ah, ticket scalpers, the bane of my existence. Bastards have stolen hundreds from me over the years, usually under anonymous identities on ebay. One thing that would really grind my gears was attempting to haggle down a fellow student during the post-dark ages so that a visiting friend could tag along inside the gates.
Most of my fellow students were rather shameless about it, honestly. I got out right before things turned crazy. Following the Orange Bowl, season tickets sold out in 13 days. The next year? 59 minutes. Things will likely be just as bad, or worse, going forward...but this brings me to the point.
Who is benefiting from ticket scalping? Not the fans, that's for sure. Not the schools, they don't get a cut. Not even the government...I've never been charged 6% sales tax by some shady character standing in front of McLanahans.
Que angry soccer moms. Legislators in New York are doing what they do best, writing up legislation that probably won't get passed:
Leroy Comrie, the chairman of the Consumer Affairs Committee, will introduce the legislation, officially called the Ticket Resale Consumer Fairness Bill, on Wednesday. The bill mandates that any New York City entertainment venues which receive public funding (which is true for essentially any large venue) must reserve at least 40 percent of tickets for individual customers, publicly announce the number of tickets for sale to individual consumers, and limit individuals buyers to four tickets per day per through any sales medium.
Why all the fuss?
Once upon a time, hardcore fans would camp out to buy tickets. But with the advent of online selling, ticket resale agencies or ticket brokers now swoop in and purchase bulk tickets to theatrical, musical, sporting or athletic events by using advanced computer software. Many times, within minutes, they turn around and sell the tickets for multiple times face value online, at sites such as at StubHub....Ticketmaster estimates that on some days, 80 percent of all ticket requests that arrive at its Web site are generated by the automated software bots.
Interesting, so what triggered all the legal action? Well, scalpers starting breaking rule number one: Don't piss off the parents of spoiled rich white girls. Hannah Montana, some type of fake singer, has been touring the country and parents have been shelling out thousands of dollars a ticket so their young ones can see her live.
So bringing this a little closer to home, no one needs to worry, PSU is on it!
Unfortunately, there is no way to control students reselling their tickets, said Greg Myford, associate athletic director of marketing and communications...."We're looking at how we can police [scalping] and, more importantly, act on it," he said.
Right, actually doing something, thanks for laying it out for us Greg.
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