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On the Beat: David Menconi on music

News & Observer music critic David Menconi's random (and we do mean random) musings about all things related to music and culture of the "popular" variety.

Scalped by parasites

Submitted by dmenconi on 07/10/2011 - 06:40
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In the old days, ticket-scalping was a pretty unsophisticated business. Scalpers would get people to stand in line, buy what tickets they could, jack the price and try to sell them. But online ticket-selling has introduced ever-more-complex ways to gouge people, some of them quite sneaky. The latest wrinkle is the "sham site," websites that look like they're connected to a venue -- but they're not, and you can wind up paying big bucks for lousy seats if you're not careful. For more, see the story in Sunday's paper.

ADDENDUM (7/14/11): Followup editorial.

SECOND ADDENDUM (9/10/11): More on brokers.

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Having to deal with

Mon, 07/11/2011 - 12:48 — TonyPlutonium

Having to deal with Ticketmaster is scalping enough, thanks.

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About the blogger

David Menconi has been the News & Observer's music critic since 1991. Before that, he spent five years at the Daily Camera in Boulder, Colo. He has a masters in journalism from the University of Texas and a B.A. in English from Southwestern University. You can find more of his writing here.

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