How Can Technology Improve the Current Issues with Concert Ticketing?

Concert ticketing has taken the spotlight many times over the last few years, and rarely by way of glowing commendations of how ticket operators have run an event. The secondary market, ticket bots, scalpers, and now even the ticket providers themselves have become major issues that inhibit fans from seeing their favourite performers live. So, can technology help to improve these issues, or are they here to stay?

The Tech Problem Causing Issues for Fans

In the UK, the biggest story on concert ticketing that had everyone sit up and finally take notice was the dynamic pricing or surge pricing that caused outrage when the Oasis reunion tour went on sale. The long-awaited stream of events for the much-loved Mancunian double act was met with ire when Ticketmaster varied the prices of tickets, automatically letting prices grow and grow from their starting rates because more people were interested.

While it’s certainly not anything new – just ask US concert-goers and sports fans – it was high profile enough to alert UK and EU authorities. The technology that allows the ticketing company to slide the prices with demand seems very anti-consumer in the eyes of many, which is why the UK government launched an investigation into the method. The WWE, which came to Belfast in March, has also recently adopted this dynamic pricing model.

Is there a tech solution to this tech-driven problem? Well, the real question is if the event organisers want a solution. It’s compared to how hotels and airlines change prices dynamically to sell rooms and tickets with demand, with bumps in price for high-interest slots mitigating ticket drops when trying to fill up in low seasons. For major concerts, though, the programming should have tighter ranges as the act won’t deal with such ebbs and flows.

Tackling Bots and Fair Queuing

Because of how lucrative the second-hand ticketing market can be in certain countries, ticketing bots have become very real business opportunities. Someone can set up multiple bots using VPNs to cover their IP addresses and make them appear unique, have them queue, and then snap up as many tickets as possible essentially automatically. They play by the first-in, first-out queuing standard, but solely with the intent to sell for profit.

The first in, first out process isn’t suited to the online landscape as buying tickets online doesn’t require the same sacrifice as, say, queuing at a physical store for a new release. Plus, bots can get a place. Some ticket operators enforce strict anti-VPN measures against known providers, but it’s rarely enough. It also doesn’t factor in the issues with the queuing system. A better way could be to have a signup phase followed by stages of authentication and then random invite windows.

Those interested can input lots of data points (age, address, reason for applying, etc.) for an AI program to analyse for authenticity, and then, invite phases to those authenticated can be randomised. It’s what we see all of the time in the jackpot slots in the UK, to give a tech-driven example. Thousands of players will spin the slots for the multi-million prizes each day, but the ultimate drop is always wholly randomised. Everyone knows this going in, giving everyone parity on every spin of a WowPot!, Jackpot King, or Mega Moolah game.

Capping Second-Hand Ticket Prices

Another area of concern for fans is the second-hand market. Tickets are a limited resource, so when they’re all sold, they become more valuable to those who still want to go. The issue is that scalpers and owners of ticket bots can jack up the prices as much as they want. With Ticketmaster going with digital tickets and hosting its own resale section, it then gets to take a fee from the resale, encouraging them to not cap the price hikes.

Now, some countries do have laws that stop this practice, such as in Germany, where resale prices can’t be above 25 per cent. In the Republic of Ireland and Italy, there’s an outright ban on resale price hikes. Tech that could help with this is the blockchain. By using NFTs, not only can fake tickets be eliminated, but the network can ensure that tickets stay within set price parameters and, if there is a bump, the artist can even be sent sale royalties.

Since going digital, concert ticketing only seems to have become less consumer-friendly, but with some combinations of law and tech, the situation can be improved to create a fair ticketing space.