John,
If you were one of the 14 million people who tried to buy Taylor Swift tickets last week — facing crashed servers, hours on a virtual line without updates, presale codes that failed to work, surprise ticket sale reschedulings and cancellations, and massive fees for those lucky enough to snag a ticket — you already know what this is about.
This is about yet another mega-corporation abusing its power to squeeze every last cent out of its users, sometimes under false pretenses.
This is about a monopoly illegally bullying and buying up its competitors to create a landscape where customers have to use their service, no matter how incompetent or unethical.
This is about the enabling of price gougers that make it impossible for anyone but the richest of the rich to experience community-building events like live music, sports, theatre, dance, and the fine arts.
This is about Ticketmaster.
For way too long, federal regulators and the Department of Justice have allowed companies like Ticketmaster, the tech monopoly that controls 70% of the primary ticketing for live events like concerts and sports events, to operate virtually unchecked — and it’s regular people and fans who have faced the consequences.
We’re demanding that the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission move to break up tech monopolies like Ticketmaster, so that you and your loved ones can attend live events at a fair cost. Click here to use our easy tool to send the DOJ and the FTC a letter to demand they break up Ticketmaster.
Break up Ticketmaster
The Department of Justice allowed Ticketmaster and Live Nation to merge in 2010 under the condition that the new company would refrain from threatening and bullying independent venues choosing to use another service.
That did not happen.
In addition to their illegal anti-competitive practices, Ticketmaster has found new ways to flout the law for its own corporate gain.
They’ve hacked into the computer systems of their competitors to steal information and gain an advantage — and then promoted the perpetrators. They’ve secretly withheld tickets from real fans, instead passing them along to resale sites that have charged thousands of dollars for tickets, knowing that they will be the ones profiting from the increased fees.
Whether you’ve used Ticketmaster or not, it’s impossible to avoid the consequences of tech monopolies in your life. From Facebook reshaping our political system by prioritizing far-right conspiracies theories and hate, to Amazon destroying countless small business across the country, to the pernicious and ubiquitous collection and sale of our personal data, these companies have proven that they’ll choose making a quick buck over their customers’ wellbeing every single time. When we break these companies up, we give consumers a choice. And when we create real competition, we can win better, more ethical service for everyone.
It's time to take a stand. Use our tool to send a letter to the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission telling them that they have both the responsibility and the authority to break up tech monopolies like Ticketmaster.
Break up Ticketmaster
In solidarity,
Working Families Party
