Ticketmaster may finally get what it deserves

I love it for us.

People collecting tickets

The Justice Department is suing Ticketmaster and Live Nation, the monolithic ticketing company that merged in 2010, over its alleged industry monopoly that allegedly drives prices through the roof and makes it harder for artists, fans, venues and competitors to get their butts into seats.

In a press release about the wide-ranging lawsuit, which was filed in Manhattan and included signatures from 30 state and district attorneys general, the Justice Department said it was seeking to break up the ticketing monolith’s monopoly on the industry.

The giant that is Live Nation-Ticketmaster has been under government antitrust scrutiny from the beginning, given the merger of two of the largest ticketing companies in the US into one.

Apart from the complaint filed by Pearl Jam in 1994 and the StubHub lawsuit in 2015, most of the complaints against the company’s control over ticket sales occurred in the years after the Covid-19 lockdown, with a flurry of lawsuits in 2022 brought by fans Taylor Swift and Taylor Swift. Bruce Springsteen sets the stage for the current era of government skepticism.

After the U.S. Senate took office early last year and held hearings on Ticketmaster, Minnesota earlier this month signed into law a bill that would make the ticket-purchasing process more transparent — and now the Department of Justice appears to be capitalizing on the bill’s success.

High time

The Department of Justice claims in its new lawsuit that the conglomerate “invokes unlawful, anticompetitive conduct to exercise monopoly control over the live events industry in the United States at the expense of fans, artists, smaller promoters and venue operators.”

In its press release, the agency outlined several ways in which Ticketmaster allegedly maintains control over the ticketing industry, including buying out competitors, effectively threatening financial retaliation against other promotional companies, and threatening and retaliating against venues that work with rivals. If this sounds more than a little mafia-y to you, you’re certainly not alone.

AG Garland stated that as a result of these alleged tactics, “fans pay more in fees, artists have fewer opportunities to play shows, smaller promoters are pushed out, and venues have fewer choices in ticket sales.”

In its own statement, Live Nation-Ticketmaster said that claims that it exercises monopoly power over the industry are “absurd” and that there is more competition today than ever before.

“We are yet another victim of the (Biden) administration’s decision to hand over antitrust enforcement to a populist pressure that simply rejects how antitrust law works,” the statement said. “Some people call it ‘anti-monopoly,’ but in reality it’s just anti-business.”

It’s not at all surprising that a merged conglomerate that has just been sued by the federal government would be waving an “anti-business” banner, and this attempt to portray itself as a victim is one of the many reasons why this company’s coming revolution already seems so sweet.

“It’s time to part ways with Live Nation-Ticketmaster,” the attorney general announced, and we couldn’t agree more.

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