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Yes, Live Nation and Ticketmaster literally serve as "the bad guy" in the transaction. The truth is, due to market realities, ticket prices (MSRP, not reseller

Yes, Live Nation and Ticketmaster literally serve as "the bad guy" in the transaction. The truth is, due to market realities, ticket prices (MSRP, not reseller prices) need to be high so that everybody gets their cut. All those fees people lose their minds about? Those more or less pay out the promoters, because the artists are too chickenshit to roll the full costs into their bare ticket prices, and unrealistic ticket prices signal to fans that the artist "really has their best interests in mind". But it's all smoke and mirrors lol, if promoters don't get paid, no shows happen; if no shows happen, venues don't get paid. If there are no promoters or venues, shows are dead and artists don't get paid. Considering all of that, everybody in the chain prefers and benefits from sold-out shows for myriad reasons, and all live performance is theatre at its core anyways, so IMO what's a little extra theatre on top to make sure the shows go on in this year of our Lord 2026, where very little is cheap and affordable?

CPLX 5mo ago
This is not a reasonable take on what's actually happening. It's never been a reasonable take, but posting this today after Live Nation has literally just been found liable by a jury shows deep confusion. The ticket prices are not high because of market realities. They're high because of illegal monopoly behavior that inflates costs and then steals the money and gives it to Michael Rapino and his friends. The behavior of Live Nation has been shown to be much closer to organized crime than what most people think of as standard business practice. There's extensive on-the-record testimony and an official federal court verdict backing up my side of this argument.
- reactordev 5mo ago
  1000% this.
- lotsofpulp 5mo ago
  Livenation’s profit margins are not very impressive for a business that supposedly has pricing power. https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/LYV/live-nation-entertainment/profit-margins https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/LYV/live-nation-en... Are you suggesting Livenation’s leaders (Rapino, etc) are stealing from the other shareholders? Looks like Liberty Live Group owns 30% of Livenation? And Rapino owns less than 2%, per Yahoo Finance. https://www.libertyliveholdings.com/about https://www.libertyliveholdings.com/about Page 31 of Livenation’s 2025 10-K shows $25B revenue, $19B direct operating expenses, and $4B selling, general, and admin expenses. I wonder how much of the expenses is not going to performers and the expenses of operating venues. https://investors.livenationentertainment.com/sec-filings/annual-reports/content/0001335258-26-000009/0001335258-26-000009.pdf https://investors.livenationentertainment.com/sec-filings/an...
  - sdellis 5mo ago
    I don't think anyone is suggesting that Rapino is stealing from shareholders. We don't know how that money is spent or disbursed. What is clear from the case and settlement is that they were illegally maintaining a monopoly in the live entertainment industry that had stifled innovation and competition, and resulted in higher ticket prices for music fans.
    - lotsofpulp 5mo ago
      The claim was that Livenation (or a few insiders) is benefiting from the higher prices. But the financials (low profit margins) don’t show that (absent fraud). In which case, the benefit of the higher prices would be going to (some) performers. Which supports the claim that Livenation is useful as a punching bag for the most popular performers.
      - reactordev 5mo ago
        Watch this: https://youtu.be/u--se25_px8 https://youtu.be/u--se25_px8 Even Coachella, which was supposed to be an F-U to high ticket prices and Record Label red tape, is now $5,000/ticket.
      - CPLX 5mo ago
        There's the occasional top performer that's in on it for sure. But yes, the few insiders are benefiting from higher prices. I know these people personally. I'm telling you that it's true. I can think of one example where all the insiders created a startup in the ticketing space that had no reason to exist, really, and nothing worth buying solely so that they could acquire it and all the insiders could profit off of it. Lo and behold, COVID came along and made it so their plan made even less sense, and they just ran with it anyways. Money went straight from the stock market into their pockets. There's a million examples, but again, a lot of the stuff is on the record. I'm sure Rapino is giving money to shareholders for the most part (being one is a pretty relevant part of that for him obviously) but he's doing it via illegal actions. He has made himself a billionaire in the process. You can hedge however you want on that, but it's horrible and bad and your posts sound like they're defending it or acting like it's natural or normal in some way. It's not mitigated by the fact that someone like Ari Emanuel or a few guys in Nashville had their hand in the cookie jar too. Victims are millions of normal Americans, like me and you, and basically every working musician, except for a few special people at the top.
- kevinsync 5mo ago
  Re: LN, I agree 100% with the evidence presented in, and outcome of, that trial; Live Nation absolutely deserves the verdict they received and it's amazing it took this long to get it. I just don't fully buy the idea that they (and they alone) are the reasons that tickets are priced the way that they are. I guess I'm in the Lefsetz School of Thought [0][1] about it all (and I know, he's a polarizing personality, so I get it when people think he's full of shit), but I also think that two things can be right at the same time (Rapino and gang are criminals, ticket prices cost a lot because that's what they cost) Maybe I'm wrong! I don't have much skin in this game man, I just personally find that his takes mirror what I see happening in real life to friends and colleagues who are artists, promoters and venue operators. [0] https://lefsetz.com/wordpress/2026/04/20/capping-resale/ https://lefsetz.com/wordpress/2026/04/20/capping-resale/ [1] https://lefsetz.com/wordpress/2026/04/15/live-nation-loses/ https://lefsetz.com/wordpress/2026/04/15/live-nation-loses/

CPLX 5mo ago

This is not a reasonable take on what's actually happening. It's never been a reasonable take, but posting this today after Live Nation has literally just been found liable by a jury shows deep confusion. The ticket prices are not high because of market realities. They're high because of illegal monopoly behavior that inflates costs and then steals the money and gives it to Michael Rapino and his friends. The behavior of Live Nation has been shown to be much closer to organized crime than what most people think of as standard business practice. There's extensive on-the-record testimony and an official federal court verdict backing up my side of this argument.

reactordev 5mo ago
1000% this.
lotsofpulp 5mo ago
Livenation’s profit margins are not very impressive for a business that supposedly has pricing power. https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/LYV/live-nation-entertainment/profit-margins https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/LYV/live-nation-en... Are you suggesting Livenation’s leaders (Rapino, etc) are stealing from the other shareholders? Looks like Liberty Live Group owns 30% of Livenation? And Rapino owns less than 2%, per Yahoo Finance. https://www.libertyliveholdings.com/about https://www.libertyliveholdings.com/about Page 31 of Livenation’s 2025 10-K shows $25B revenue, $19B direct operating expenses, and $4B selling, general, and admin expenses. I wonder how much of the expenses is not going to performers and the expenses of operating venues. https://investors.livenationentertainment.com/sec-filings/annual-reports/content/0001335258-26-000009/0001335258-26-000009.pdf https://investors.livenationentertainment.com/sec-filings/an...
- sdellis 5mo ago
  I don't think anyone is suggesting that Rapino is stealing from shareholders. We don't know how that money is spent or disbursed. What is clear from the case and settlement is that they were illegally maintaining a monopoly in the live entertainment industry that had stifled innovation and competition, and resulted in higher ticket prices for music fans.
  - lotsofpulp 5mo ago
    The claim was that Livenation (or a few insiders) is benefiting from the higher prices. But the financials (low profit margins) don’t show that (absent fraud). In which case, the benefit of the higher prices would be going to (some) performers. Which supports the claim that Livenation is useful as a punching bag for the most popular performers.
    - reactordev 5mo ago
      Watch this: https://youtu.be/u--se25_px8 https://youtu.be/u--se25_px8 Even Coachella, which was supposed to be an F-U to high ticket prices and Record Label red tape, is now $5,000/ticket.
    - CPLX 5mo ago
      There's the occasional top performer that's in on it for sure. But yes, the few insiders are benefiting from higher prices. I know these people personally. I'm telling you that it's true. I can think of one example where all the insiders created a startup in the ticketing space that had no reason to exist, really, and nothing worth buying solely so that they could acquire it and all the insiders could profit off of it. Lo and behold, COVID came along and made it so their plan made even less sense, and they just ran with it anyways. Money went straight from the stock market into their pockets. There's a million examples, but again, a lot of the stuff is on the record. I'm sure Rapino is giving money to shareholders for the most part (being one is a pretty relevant part of that for him obviously) but he's doing it via illegal actions. He has made himself a billionaire in the process. You can hedge however you want on that, but it's horrible and bad and your posts sound like they're defending it or acting like it's natural or normal in some way. It's not mitigated by the fact that someone like Ari Emanuel or a few guys in Nashville had their hand in the cookie jar too. Victims are millions of normal Americans, like me and you, and basically every working musician, except for a few special people at the top.
kevinsync 5mo ago
Re: LN, I agree 100% with the evidence presented in, and outcome of, that trial; Live Nation absolutely deserves the verdict they received and it's amazing it took this long to get it. I just don't fully buy the idea that they (and they alone) are the reasons that tickets are priced the way that they are. I guess I'm in the Lefsetz School of Thought [0][1] about it all (and I know, he's a polarizing personality, so I get it when people think he's full of shit), but I also think that two things can be right at the same time (Rapino and gang are criminals, ticket prices cost a lot because that's what they cost) Maybe I'm wrong! I don't have much skin in this game man, I just personally find that his takes mirror what I see happening in real life to friends and colleagues who are artists, promoters and venue operators. [0] https://lefsetz.com/wordpress/2026/04/20/capping-resale/ https://lefsetz.com/wordpress/2026/04/20/capping-resale/ [1] https://lefsetz.com/wordpress/2026/04/15/live-nation-loses/ https://lefsetz.com/wordpress/2026/04/15/live-nation-loses/