Why has nobody dethroned Ticketmaster? Because you and I were never its customers (news.ycombinator.com)
The thread's unifying insight: Ticketmaster's real customers are venues, promoters and artists. The fees let artists keep a 'fair' face price while TM absorbs the hatred and funnels the money back.
An ex-competitor laid out the moat: a chicken-and-egg content problem, and incumbents who'll sign big venues at a loss just to deny you the catalog.
Pearl Jam tried to route around it in 1994 and got turned away by contract-locked venues.
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