Congress passes BOTS Act to ban ticket-buying software

[Hammettf2b]

Love this!!!

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/12/congress-passes-bots-act-to-ban-ticket-buying-software/

Click to read more...

 

[JDinkalage Morgoone]

Thank god.

 

[kook10]

Hammett - you getting tix to Metallica at the Fonda next week? Go on sale in 4 mins...

D'oh...damn bots must have got them all

 

[FLYLine27*]

Why did it take so long?

 

[aleshemsky83]

I have heard (and I only heard this in passing so apologies if I get the terminology wrong) ticket buying "bots" are just ticketmaster or stubhub having under the table arrangements with concert/show/game runners, where they either do not want the negative publicity of having overpriced tickets, or they want to underpay the artist on the face value of the tickets.

I'm sure theres a lot of holes in this conspiracy but it just caught my interest.

 

[John Price]

Good to hear those bots were snatching up tickets and reselling them at insane prices. That's why Adele is like 1000 dollars.

 

[Osprey]

I have heard (and I only heard this in passing so apologies if I get the terminology wrong) ticket buying "bots" are just ticketmaster or stubhub having under the table arrangements with concert/show/game runners, where they either do not want the negative publicity of having overpriced tickets, or they want to underpay the artist on the face value of the tickets.

I'm sure theres a lot of holes in this conspiracy but it just caught my interest.

Apparently, Ticketmaster has been one of the biggest fighters against these bots, so it seems less likely that they're actually behind and profiting from them.

Ticketmaster and its parent company, Live Nation Entertainment, have stepped up efforts to combat bots, in part to improve the ticket-buying experience for concertgoers, but also to burnish the company’s reputation with consumers. The result has been a game of cat and mouse between the company and the bots.

“As with hackers, you can solve it today, and they’re rewriting code tomorrow,” said Michael Rapino, Live Nation’s chief executive. “Thus the arms race.”

In late 2011, Ticketmaster hired John Carnahan, an expert on machine learning who fought online advertising frauds at Yahoo, to lead its anti-bot effort.

...

Last month, Ticketmaster sued 21 people in federal court, accusing them of fraud, copyright infringement and other offenses in using bots to search for millions of tickets over the last two years.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/27/b...-off-tickets-frustrate-concert-promoters.html

 

[Hammettf2b]

Hammett - you getting tix to Metallica at the Fonda next week? Go on sale in 4 mins...

D'oh...damn bots must have got them all

I would but its on a Thursday. F that noise. I'll see em when they come back for the tour even though the Fonda would be a really good place to see them

 

[Led Zappa]

Apparently, Ticketmaster has been one of the biggest fighters against these bots, so it seems less likely that they're actually behind and profiting from them.



http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/27/b...-off-tickets-frustrate-concert-promoters.html

I'm convinced, because if Ticketmaster didn't want this bill passed then it wouldn't have passed.

 

[theotis77]

I really wish Ticketmaster would just collapse and die. They're a cancer on entertainment and sports industries.

 

[Lost Horizons]

I have heard (and I only heard this in passing so apologies if I get the terminology wrong) ticket buying "bots" are just ticketmaster or stubhub having under the table arrangements with concert/show/game runners, where they either do not want the negative publicity of having overpriced tickets, or they want to underpay the artist on the face value of the tickets.

I'm sure theres a lot of holes in this conspiracy but it just caught my interest.

Players unions have asked that the resale market be looked into with regards to their cba's. The revenue the unions get is based on the face value of the tickets sold. So if a ticket get sold at $100 they get a cut of that but if that same ticket bought for $100 is resold sold for $125 they don't get a cut of that extra $25. There has been talk that teams with their own reselling sites and partnerships have be siphoning tickets off selling them at a higher price and making more money off tickets and cutting the unions out of that extra revenue. It's amazing that seconds after tickets go on sale that resale sites aligned with teams already have the best seats listed for more then face value for sale. Coincidence? I think not.