I don't think they are hated by the artists. I think they provide the artists a very useful and desirable service. Which is to extract every possible penny from

I don't think they are hated by the artists. I think they provide the artists a very useful and desirable service. Which is to extract every possible penny from fans while also taking the negative PR hit on behalf of the artist. The artist can throw their hands up as if there really is nothing they can do and blame it on Ticketmaster. Yet they are getting a healthy cut of all those fees and above retail ticket prices. Either through up front exclusivity agreements or through other hidden means. Ticketmaster then tries to offload some of the blame to unknown "scalpers" but I think it's very likely that most of the scalpers are either Ticketmaster itself or entities contracted with them. it's the only logical explanation since if they really wanted to solve the scalping problem, it would be the easiest thing in the world to solve. just make the tickets non-transferable.