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Madonna Reinvents Herself As a Ticket-Scalping Profiteer


Camacho

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I know the scalper deal is fucked up but I honestly believe Madonna is not all about money, shes a humanitarian and genuinely does have a good heart. I dont think she will do anything for money as people paint her out to be. I doubt she would have got married to Guy Ritchie or dated half the guys she went out with if she was just a money grubbing whore with no morals at all, just $$ signs.

I know most people are going to laugh and disagree with me but thats just my opinion about her.

regardless shes still fucking over the fans but I'm gonna wait till Monday to see what happens with tiks.

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I know the scalper deal is fucked up but I honestly believe Madonna is not all about money, shes a humanitarian and genuinely does have a good heart. I dont think she will do anything for money as people paint her out to be. I doubt she would have got married to Guy Ritchie or dated half the guys she went out with if she was just a money grubbing whore with no morals at all, just $$ signs.

I know most people are going to laugh and disagree with me but thats just my opinion about her.

Well said, glittercandy!

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Guest nothingfails0603

you know, I think there's two sides to this. Yes, she does come off as a greedy bitch who wants to rip off the fans, but at the same time, if someone's going to make a profit off her concert tickets, shouldn't she?

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Guest Topaz Scorpio
you know, I think there's two sides to this. Yes, she does come off as a greedy bitch who wants to rip off the fans, but at the same time, if someone's going to make a profit off her concert tickets, shouldn't she?

The POINT is that scalping tickets is an unfair and (in some places) illegal practice. No one should be making a profit of the concert except for M, Live Nation, and Ticketmaster in the first place. She could just have easily stood up to these sleazebags and forced a requirement of id checks at the venue, meaning that the ticket purchaser had to be one of the people attending the show. I mean Ticketmaster does that when tickets are lost in the mail. Yes, it would mean that everyone would have to go the box office to pick up their tickets, meaning long lines at day of show, but if people are warned in advance they would plan enough time and the fact that it would be a plan to eliminate scalping most people would cheer on.

Eliminating scalpers from the equation would mean that FANS would get better access to the best seats at the PRICE THEY WERE MEANT TO BE SOLD AT. I mean it's the die-hard fans and the scalpers who are the ones clogging up the phone lines and internet trying to get tickets on day one, so if it was just fans clamoring for tickets it's almost a guarantee that all the best seats would be booked up by those fans, meaning that M would have all the people who REALLY SUPPORT HER right in front of her.

But no, instead of trying to stop scalping and make it easier for her fans to get their hands on the best seats, she decides to go the opposite route and gets into bed with these greedy bastards so she can try to make even more money. Because let's remember here. M has already made money on those tickets that the scalpers are selling. She's making the designated money that any ticket has sold for to the general public. Now she just wants to make MORE on top of that.

And if she really wanted to "test the waters" to use the scalpers to see how much money she could really get for certain seats then she could just as easily have gone the auction route like Ticketmaster has been doing for plenty of recent concerts. Certain top seats are set aside and auctioned off, so basically the general public bids on them and THEY DECIDE how much those seats are worth, as opposed to scalpers who immediately mark seats up by 300% and price most fans right out of the market.

The other side of the scalper issue is that when they are unable to sell their tickets many seats wind up going empty. These are seats that COULD HAVE been sold at regular prices and bought by fans who could afford to save up $300-400 for a ticket but not $2000.

I mean it truly boggles the mind that people are defending her on this especially when other bands out there have been trying to fight the scalpers for years and have tried to develop strategies to outmaneuver them and make sure the FANS get the best tickets. I mean why would bands go to all that trouble to keep scalpers out if they didn't think what they were doing was a bad thing for fans and for the industry as a whole?????

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The POINT is that scalping tickets is an unfair and (in some places) illegal practice. No one should be making a profit of the concert except for M, Live Nation, and Ticketmaster in the first place. She could just have easily stood up to these sleazebags and forced a requirement of id checks at the venue, meaning that the ticket purchaser had to be one of the people attending the show. I mean Ticketmaster does that when tickets are lost in the mail. Yes, it would mean that everyone would have to go the box office to pick up their tickets, meaning long lines at day of show, but if people are warned in advance they would plan enough time and the fact that it would be a plan to eliminate scalping most people would cheer on.

Eliminating scalpers from the equation would mean that FANS would get better access to the best seats at the PRICE THEY WERE MEANT TO BE SOLD AT. I mean it's the die-hard fans and the scalpers who are the ones clogging up the phone lines and internet trying to get tickets on day one, so if it was just fans clamoring for tickets it's almost a guarantee that all the best seats would be booked up by those fans, meaning that M would have all the people who REALLY SUPPORT HER right in front of her.

But no, instead of trying to stop scalping and make it easier for her fans to get their hands on the best seats, she decides to go the opposite route and gets into bed with these greedy bastards so she can try to make even more money. Because let's remember here. M has already made money on those tickets that the scalpers are selling. She's making the designated money that any ticket has sold for to the general public. Now she just wants to make MORE on top of that.

And if she really wanted to "test the waters" to use the scalpers to see how much money she could really get for certain seats then she could just as easily have gone the auction route like Ticketmaster has been doing for plenty of recent concerts. Certain top seats are set aside and auctioned off, so basically the general public bids on them and THEY DECIDE how much those seats are worth, as opposed to scalpers who immediately mark seats up by 300% and price most fans right out of the market.

The other side of the scalper issue is that when they are unable to sell their tickets many seats wind up going empty. These are seats that COULD HAVE been sold at regular prices and bought by fans who could afford to save up $300-400 for a ticket but not $2000.

I mean it truly boggles the mind that people are defending her on this especially when other bands out there have been trying to fight the scalpers for years and have tried to develop strategies to outmaneuver them and make sure the FANS get the best tickets. I mean why would bands go to all that trouble to keep scalpers out if they didn't think what they were doing was a bad thing for fans and for the industry as a whole?????

The scalpers will always win. They will just come up with shadier and craftier ways of doing what they do. Another thing, presenting ID's at the show as you suggested sounds great. But what about someone who may have receieved the tickets as a gift from a friend, boyfriend, relative who is far away and cannot attend the show? So you have your legit ticket in hand you just can't present the credit card used to pay for it because it wasn't your card. That person is 3,000 miles away. Then they treat you as if YOU are doing something illegal when you have a perfectly legit ticket in your hand. That would piss me off even more I think.

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I think the whole deal turns out to be publicity desaster because it´s communicated in a wrong way. The reason for this deal should have been adressed much clearer.

And it´s true, the only way to keep the scalpers out is to sell ID tickets. They did it with tickets for the soccer world cup in Germany 2 years ago. And it worked perfectly fine.

BUT is the regular customer actually willing to accept all the unpleasant things that are involved with this method? Longer controls at the entrance or the fact that it´s impossible to sell the ticket once you have received it and you can´t attend the show for whatever reason (which basically means you are losing a lot of money). Not even talking about giving sensitive data away like passport numbers.

And some people in here should really calm down, as if Madonna personally is providing scalpers with tickets. What´s going on here? That´s a little bit MacCarthy-esque for my taste. Guilty by suspicion.

I would like to remind people about the situation with the last 3 tours when "suddenly" additional tickets (and there were a lot of them) were released on the evening of the show, because organizers realized the stage was smaller than originally thought and there were more seats available. Those tickets were sold at the box office at face value and all scalpers were left in the rain because no one without a ticket had to buy those from them. In the end scaplers even had to lower their prices under face value to get rid off them. Do you really believe that organizers realized about the small stage just at the very last minute? If this happened at one venue, okay. But with almost every venue on the schedule? Hardly! This was their way to keep scalpers out. Even pissing them off. Don´t you remember the negative articles how bad tickets were selling, even though all tickets provided by ticketmaster were actually sold out.

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The POINT is that scalping tickets is an unfair and (in some places) illegal practice. No one should be making a profit of the concert except for M, Live Nation, and Ticketmaster in the first place. She could just have easily stood up to these sleazebags and forced a requirement of id checks at the venue, meaning that the ticket purchaser had to be one of the people attending the show. I mean Ticketmaster does that when tickets are lost in the mail. Yes, it would mean that everyone would have to go the box office to pick up their tickets, meaning long lines at day of show, but if people are warned in advance they would plan enough time and the fact that it would be a plan to eliminate scalping most people would cheer on.

Eliminating scalpers from the equation would mean that FANS would get better access to the best seats at the PRICE THEY WERE MEANT TO BE SOLD AT. I mean it's the die-hard fans and the scalpers who are the ones clogging up the phone lines and internet trying to get tickets on day one, so if it was just fans clamoring for tickets it's almost a guarantee that all the best seats would be booked up by those fans, meaning that M would have all the people who REALLY SUPPORT HER right in front of her.

But no, instead of trying to stop scalping and make it easier for her fans to get their hands on the best seats, she decides to go the opposite route and gets into bed with these greedy bastards so she can try to make even more money. Because let's remember here. M has already made money on those tickets that the scalpers are selling. She's making the designated money that any ticket has sold for to the general public. Now she just wants to make MORE on top of that.

And if she really wanted to "test the waters" to use the scalpers to see how much money she could really get for certain seats then she could just as easily have gone the auction route like Ticketmaster has been doing for plenty of recent concerts. Certain top seats are set aside and auctioned off, so basically the general public bids on them and THEY DECIDE how much those seats are worth, as opposed to scalpers who immediately mark seats up by 300% and price most fans right out of the market.

The other side of the scalper issue is that when they are unable to sell their tickets many seats wind up going empty. These are seats that COULD HAVE been sold at regular prices and bought by fans who could afford to save up $300-400 for a ticket but not $2000.

I mean it truly boggles the mind that people are defending her on this especially when other bands out there have been trying to fight the scalpers for years and have tried to develop strategies to outmaneuver them and make sure the FANS get the best tickets. I mean why would bands go to all that trouble to keep scalpers out if they didn't think what they were doing was a bad thing for fans and for the industry as a whole?????

This is exactly how I see this situation. For years I never really gave a shit about Madonna being a megalomaniac because I knew it was her thing and it was part of her mystique and status. But I think this realy pushes it. If she truly wanted to put on a good show for her fans, she would make sure the right people are getting their hands on her tickets. Instead she just takes the easy way out and looks at it from the angle of "well how can I take these guys down in a way that benefits me?" It just sounds like a cunt move to me and I'm not feeling it. Oh well.

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Guest Topaz Scorpio
The scalpers will always win. They will just come up with shadier and craftier ways of doing what they do. Another thing, presenting ID's at the show as you suggested sounds great. But what about someone who may have receieved the tickets as a gift from a friend, boyfriend, relative who is far away and cannot attend the show? So you have your legit ticket in hand you just can't present the credit card used to pay for it because it wasn't your card. That person is 3,000 miles away. Then they treat you as if YOU are doing something illegal when you have a perfectly legit ticket in your hand. That would piss me off even more I think.

Obviously if a policy like this was put into place then there would be notices about it on Ticketmaster's website at the time the tickets were purchased and it just means people planning on buying these tickets as a gift for someone else need to come up with a different strategy. A big change in ticket policy like this would not suddenly be sprung on the public with no notice and with no warnings at time of purchase.

The reason you may not see this happening is because Ticketmaster and or the individual performance venues WANT scalpers to have tickets because they are the ones providing them and getting a likely kick-back as a result.

I am pretty positive M has nothing to do with scalpers getting their hands on tickets and I'm not accusing her of that in any way. My beef with her is that she isn't trying to do anything to stop the scalping and is just going along for the ride and trying to profit from it.

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I'm not surprised by this. Madonna has always been driven by money and she never thinks about the fans...it's all money, money, money. She made a big mistake doing this, but I can't say I'm surprised..she's always been a greedy, selfish woman. She lost her ego my ass LOL.

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I suppose in the back of my mind I've always known she was greedy like this, but never before has it been this frontal, this obvious, this pathetic. I am truly disappointed in her.

I now shudder to think what is in store for us in the LiveNation years.

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M should make her celeb friends pay for tickets. Rosie said on her blog recently she gets her M tix for free.

I remember reading that she makes most of her friends pay, but most performers put their close friends on a guest list to get in or just comped tiks, people who work in music and entertainment get in for free, my friend who worked at mtv, had a whole bunch of free madonna tickets.

If your a close friend of Madonna like Gwenyth or Rosie and she says you have to pay thats a huge insult/

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Obviously if a policy like this was put into place then there would be notices about it on Ticketmaster's website at the time the tickets were purchased and it just means people planning on buying these tickets as a gift for someone else need to come up with a different strategy. A big change in ticket policy like this would not suddenly be sprung on the public with no notice and with no warnings at time of purchase.

The reason you may not see this happening is because Ticketmaster and or the individual performance venues WANT scalpers to have tickets because they are the ones providing them and getting a likely kick-back as a result.

I am pretty positive M has nothing to do with scalpers getting their hands on tickets and I'm not accusing her of that in any way. My beef with her is that she isn't trying to do anything to stop the scalping and is just going along for the ride and trying to profit from it.

:thumbsup:

I hear you. It's just a damn shame we have to deal with any of this anyways. Aside from this new thing, it's always been tough getting good seats through ticketmaster and obviously it's because scalpers are buying the tickets up before the real fans can...what's even worse is now knowing that ticketmaster themselves promotes this. I see where you are coming from too. Scalpers suck! And they should be stopped. But that's kind of like stopping the war on terrorism or stopping file sharing. MAYBE not impossible, but it's going to be one hell of a daunting task. Idealistically it would be great to see Madonna on "our side" but I can't say that I wouldn't do the same thing if I were her. She's probably taking the "why bother" stance on the situation but I certainly hope she's not helping them out in any way. From my understanding, she's just taking advantage of things that are already and have been happening forever now. IF I find out otherwise I may have to "hop the fence" quickly on this issue because that would just be WRONG and she would truly be a GREEDY BITCH!! But I don't think that's the case. She's making the best of a bad situation as far as I can see.

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As a member of ICON,I'm getting my tickets through the pre-sale.I would NEVER pay more than face value for a concert ticket and nobody else should,either.I stay away from scalpers,whether it's on Craigslist,ebay or whatever.The only reason that scalpers are in business is because DUMB people pay them.I refuse to do that.

Get your tickets through normal means,people, and there won't be a problem.

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ticketnews.com

Madonna inks ticket deals with StubHub, viagogo

Mon, May 12th 2008 2:25 pm EST

By Alfred Branch Jr.

In what could be considered a boon for both companies, and further indication of the validity and growing influence of the secondary ticket market, StubHub and viagogo will be the official secondary ticketing companies for Madonna's upcoming Sticky & Sweet world tour.

The tour, which is in support of Madonna's new hit album "Hard Candy," will likely be one of the top concert draws of the year, and in fact the tour is already the 10th most popular overall ticket event, according to TicketNews's exclusive weekly ranking. StubHub is the official "fan-to-fan" ticket exchange, while UK-based viagogo is the official premium seat and secondary ticketer for the British and European markets, except in Germany and Italy. The tour is the first one under the singer's landmark 10-year, $120 million deal with Live Nation.

StubHub spokesperson Sean Pate told TicketNews that the deal is the largest music deal the company has ever done. Madonna and StubHub worked together a few years to promote a charity event, and the company has done that with other artists. Last year, StubHub was sued by Ticketmaster when the Rowdy Frynds tour used StubHub to sell premium tickets, but under the Madonna deal, she is not selling tickets through StubHub, according to Pate. StubHub is a tour sponsor and has received her endorsement.

"We're obviously pretty excited by the arrangement," Pate said. "It's a big stamp of approval from a major artist that will hopefully lead to more partnership with the music industry and less resistance. Madonna has always been a trend-setting artist and business person so it's no surprise that her team would be willing to get this deal done."

The move to StubHub and viagogo would appear to trump Ticketmaster and its new secondary ticket division TicketsNow, which are in a pitched battle with StubHub, viagogo and other secondary ticket brokers for market dominance. Ticketmaster is a primary ticket seller for the tour, and brokers can still resell Madonna tickets through TicketsNow, but the companies are not the ones authorized by the artist for secondary sales.

Eric Baker, founder and CEO of viagogo, told TicketNews that the unprecedented deal marks a triumph for the company. "Madonna and Live Nation are remaking the music scene, and we're thrilled to be working with them." Last year, viagogo and Live Nation signed a deal in the Netherlands for viagogo to be the company's official secondary ticket seller in that country.

"This is the first time a major artist is publicly endorsing a company as a premium and secondary ticket seller for a worldwide tour. And when Madonna is first with something, as she so often has been over the course of her career, she is never the last. This could have big repercussions for the industry," Baker said.

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As a member of ICON,I'm getting my tickets through the pre-sale.I would NEVER pay more than face value for a concert ticket and nobody else should,either.I stay away from scalpers,whether it's on Craigslist,ebay or whatever.The only reason that scalpers are in business is because DUMB people pay them.I refuse to do that.

Get your tickets through normal means,people, and there won't be a problem.

:thumbsup::clap:

Remember as well that if the show is cancelled (beacuse of rain or M is sick and can't do the shows), you wont get your money back paying for a scalped ticket! Dont be DUMB, STUPID or THICK!

Spend that money on a vacation to a place you have never been to, that would be 10X more exciting that giving your money to Greedy M-dolla!

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Madonna,,,,what a REAL class act she's turnung out to be! :thumbsdown:

Yet day after day you come and spend YOUR precious time devoting to HER....the "bad guy"....or girl in this case. If you are over her, then BE OVER HER.

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Guest Damaris

Being 16 and never seeing Madonna live, you people have no idea how hurtfull it is to me. Not to mention that Hard Candy isn't one of my favorite albums. I feel a sudden wave of dissapointment. Some of you will tell me to get over it but when my Idol for the last 4 years is making my parents pay insane ticket prices with their hard earned

cash, I'm sorry but it is very low

No use in spending so much money. I'll buy the cheapest tickets even if that includes sitting all the way in the back.

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Ahhhhhh, these prices are killing me! I just went to purchase two tickets to the MSG show and it was $354. My ass cannot afford that right now and you can only purchase tix by using a citi bank card or using the code from the fan club (which I never got, thx a lot ICON). I'm screwed right now. There will be no point in me going if I'm not gonna get good seats. This whole thing is a nightmare, but i'm determined to go so it looks like i'll eventually end up having to shell out hundreds to see her. Damn, only for Madonna and Janet I swear! If it was anyone else I'd be like f**k them.

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Being 16 and never seeing Madonna live, you people have no idea how hurtfull it is to me. Not to mention that Hard Candy isn't one of my favorite albums. I feel a sudden wave of dissapointment. Some of you will tell me to get over it but when my Idol for the last 4 years is making my parents pay insane ticket prices with their hard earned

cash, I'm sorry but it is very low

No use in spending so much money. I'll buy the cheapest tickets even if that includes sitting all the way in the back.

If you want a Madonna like show you have to pay. You can't expect to pay $50 for floor seats and still see her fly onto the stage inside a million dollar disco ball. Spectacles like hers aren't cheap to put together. I became a diehard fan around 12 years old too. That's when she released EROTICA which was COMPLETELY left field from what she had ever done. I fell in love with Madonna of the Immaculate Collection, fun, breezy, timeless pop songs. Can you imagine the dissapointment when she released an album where her vocals sounded like she was on a drinking/drug binge and couldn't sing right (that's what I thought at the time) and all elements of fun were nearly stripped away? Where was Holiday? Where was Like A Prayer?? I like it now....but I can assure you at 12 yo I didn't quite grasp the whole concept. Then she announced the GS tour...I was so excited, well the bitch only played 5 US cities. NONE of which were close to me. I can assure you Mommy dear wasn't about to let her 13 year old son fly off to NYC to watch Madonna participate in an onstage orgy. She wouldn't tour again for another 8 years....talk about dissapointing, I never thought she would tour again. Then when she did tour the prices were astronomical then too....$250-300 a pop. I thought it was highway robbery, then I saw the show and I understood that to put on a show like that, it ain't cheap.

The moral of the story is with an artist like Madonna who changes CONSTANTLY she is BOUND to do something at some points you aren't going to like. Then, she will do something that will knock your socks off that you will probably think is better than anything she's done before. You either hang on for the ride or spend your time and money on "safer" artists who you know will never dissapoint you!

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Being 16 and never seeing Madonna live, you people have no idea how hurtfull it is to me. Not to mention that Hard Candy isn't one of my favorite albums. I feel a sudden wave of dissapointment. Some of you will tell me to get over it but when my Idol for the last 4 years is making my parents pay insane ticket prices with their hard earned

cash, I'm sorry but it is very low

No use in spending so much money. I'll buy the cheapest tickets even if that includes sitting all the way in the back.

get a job earn some cash, sell stuff on ebay. your making your parents pay not Madonna.

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Being 16 and never seeing Madonna live, you people have no idea how hurtfull it is to me. Not to mention that Hard Candy isn't one of my favorite albums. I feel a sudden wave of dissapointment. Some of you will tell me to get over it but when my Idol for the last 4 years is making my parents pay insane ticket prices with their hard earned

cash, I'm sorry but it is very low

No use in spending so much money. I'll buy the cheapest tickets even if that includes sitting all the way in the back.

Well, in a last case scenario, try ebay. I usually early on buy a good pair of tickets on ticketmaster, then I check ebay for a good deal. Usually I find something good and end up going to several shows :) I went to RIT 3 times and CT twice. What usually happens is that Madonna keeps adding shows till the demand is met. When that happens, the scalper tickers are also no longer in high demand, only the very good ones are in high demand. You can probably find a good deal on decent tickets on ebay a few weeks before the show. You find the best deals the week of the show or the week before the show. Around that time the scalpers are desperate to sell all their tickets and will usually sell them at a loss if necessary.

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Everyone is entitled to look at this situation in their own way, naturally.

Doesn't change the fact that *I* see her as a cold-hearted, money hungry BITCH right now though. :fag:

It's not news to me that Madonna is this way. It seems as though over the last few years it's become more obvious which makes alot of what shes says hypocritical (American Life) giving up the ego material world trying to keep it all under control. Obviously Madonna's obsession with money and power is stronger than ever.

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