New York ticket scalpers could face jail time

by Luke Ottenhof

December 1, 2016

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Between 2012 and 2014, three New York ticket resellers managed to procure more than 140,000 tickets.

Most Canadians will remember The Tragically Hip’s summer 2016 tour. Some will remember it for the incredible marathon shows the band staged across the country; some will remember it for screaming themselves hoarse in front of a computer after being informed tickets were sold out, despite the fact that many camped out (virtually) for hours to purchase tickets to what many believed would be the band’s last shows. People lost their shit, and rightly so. LiveNation even admitted that two-thirds of all Hip tickets went to bots and scalpers. The issue dominated news cycles in Canada; in some cities, police cracked down on scalping rings by posing as undercover Hip fans. A St. Catherine’s radio DJ pretended to be interested in one scalper’s expensive offerings to lure him into driving two hours to deliver them, before shutting him down. We don’t mess around with the Hip.

Now, some good news from the US indicates they’re shutting down bot scalpers as well. On Monday, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo signed a bill into law that dubs use of ticket bots a Class A misdemeanour, meaning that scalpers who use bots will face major fines or jail time. The bill will take effect in February 2017.

Governor Cuomo released a statement via the New York State website, and it kind of hilariously reads like anti-something propaganda: “These unscrupulous speculators and their underhanded tactics have manipulated the marketplace, and often leave New Yorkers and visitors alike with little choice but to buy tickets on the secondary market at an exorbitant mark-up.” Unscrupulous speculators and underhanded tactics? Fuck ’em up, fam.

The bill comes alongside a report by the New York attorney general that outlined just how severe the issue was within the state: between 2012 and 2014, three ticket resellers managed to procure more than 140,000 tickets.

So don’t give up on going to shows just yet; maybe just hibernate until February.

[H/T Consequence of Sound]

Tags: Music, News, bots, New York, scalpers, tickets

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