For the past 8 years, Congress has had a track record of not doing jack shit, and several times threatening to shut down the government because they’re too lazy to get shit done. Their approval rating is lower than that hemorrhoid you found after binge drinking in Vegas for 72 hours in a row last Summer. But, at long last, they finally did something worthwhile.
The bill was passed in Congress on Tuesday and sent to President Obama to be signed into legislation, and this bill outlaws ‘ticket bots’ which rapidly purchase tickets on online, tickets which are then sold on the secondary market by scalpers at a huge markup.
With this new bill being passed, anyone using bots to purchase tickets online to concerts or sporting events will be in violation of Federal Trade Commission Act due to the “unfair and deceptive practice” of using bots.
This, my bros, is EXCELLENT news. I see a shit ton of concerts every year. The band I see most often is Phish, and tickets to their concerts typically sell out within seconds of going on sale. In my opinion, scalpers deserve to spend the rest of the lives locked up in jail because they’re the scummiest fucking people on the planet. They don’t give a shit about concerts or sporting events, and they’re not selling tickets at market value. They’re just fucking over people by using bots and instantly purchasing up all the tickets available to an event. How bad is it?
Consequence of Sound reports “A report issued by the New York attorney general last January cited over 140,000 tickets to New York shows were scooped up by just three brokers between 2012 and 2014.” That’s just fucking insane.
The Associated Press reports that scalpers using ticket bots are, on average, marking up the face value cost of tickets by 49% on sites like StubHub and TicketsNow:
“Hamilton” producer Jeffrey Seller testified at a Senate hearing in September. He said the bots invade the Ticketmaster system the moment tickets go on sale and electronically purchase almost all the available inventory — one of the reasons tickets to the hit musical about the life of founding father Alexander Hamilton have sold for $1,000 or more.
Kansas Sen. Jerry Moran, the Republican sponsor of the bill, said the legislation will “level the playing field” for people buying tickets.
I’m beyond stoked that this bill was passed by Congress, but if I’m being honest with you bros I won’t be truly happy with it until some of these fucking assholes are prosecuted and there’s a precedent set for their scumbaggery.
(h/t ConsequenceOfSound)