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Ticketmaster Providing Bots to Brokers to Power Own Resale System
IndustryLegalTop Story
June 20, 2018
TicketNews
While Ticketmaster time and again blames the resale industry and “bots” for rapid sellouts for high profile events, the Live Nation (NASDAQ: LYV) subsidiary is in the business of providing automated programs to professional resellers using its system that allow them to immediately post tickets they purchase from the company for resale, TicketNews has learned.
A source in attendance at a meeting last fall between members of New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s staff and representatives of all sides of the ticketing industry as well as staffers in the Attorney General’s office said that a Ticketmaster executive admitted as much at the meeting.
“Frankly, a lot of us were shocked that they’d be so forthcoming about something like that,” our source, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the off-record nature of the meetings, told us. “Especially with how hard [Ticketmaster, venues, and promotional interests] have been pushing the narrative that “Bots” are the real problem.”
The use of automated programs commonly referred to as “Bots” was the subject of a strong push by former New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman – who resigned following allegations of sexual impropriety earlier this year – following an investigation into the ticketing world by his office. A law outlawing their use in the purchase of tickets was passed in the Empire State in the summer of 2016.
“For too long, unscrupulous ticket brokers have used illegal bots to scoop up tickets to popular events, denying ordinary fans the chance to buy them at a reasonable price,” reads a statement issued by Schneiderman’s office following the passage of that law.
But this new information shows that the use of bots is tacitly legal in New York, so long as they are operational in the favor of Ticketmaster and Live Nation, which reportedly sent lobbyist Giorgio DeRosa – father of top Cuomo aide Melissa DeRosa – to the meetings that kicked off the process of writing changes to the ticket resale laws in New York that are expected to be voted on this week.
Representatives of Schneiderman’s office were in attendance at the meeting in question, but have issued no statement or condemnation of the company’s practice of using automated programs to aid ticket brokers looking to immediately turn purchases from the primary system into resale tickets at whatever markup they deem the market to be likely to bear.
The only challenges to the use of automated software “bots” out of the office of the New York Attorney General – now headed by Barbara D. Underwood following Schneiderman’s sudden resignation in May – have come against brokers it claimed were circumventing ticketing system limits to purchase tickets to upcoming events. Two such cases resulted in settlements announced in 2017. Ticketmaster also has a lawsuit in progress against a Floriday-based ticket broker it claims breached its systems using bot programs.
Questions to the Attorney General’s office regarding the legality of the automated bot programs Ticketmaster has employed in its own resale operation have gone unanswered as of Wednesday afternoon.
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Ticketmaster Providing Bots to Brokers to Power Own Resale System