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Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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From The New York Times, I'm Rachel Abrams, and this is The Daily. For years, music fans have said they felt ripped off by Ticketmaster and its parent company, Live Nation. And last week, a jury ruled that they were right and that the company is, in fact, a monopoly.
And so today, music reporter Ben Cesario breaks down the dramatic trial that unfolded, what it may mean for concertgoers, and why the federal government's handling of the case is now under scrutiny. It's Thursday, April 23rd. Ben, welcome back to The Daily.
Thank you.
You were in the courtroom for, I think, six weeks following the trial of probably one of the most reviled companies in this country, which is Live Nation. The case, of course, ended last week with a jury's verdict. So just to start us off, how big of a deal is this?
It's a huge deal in the music industry. Live Nation and Ticketmaster were found to be a monopoly in a resounding verdict. And Live Nation is a colossus in music. They're a giant company. They put on tens of thousands of concerts all over the world every year. They sell something like 600 million tickets every year on Ticketmaster. Wow. They own hundreds of venues.
They have deals with dozens of artists for their tours. If you saw Beyonce, Coldplay, The Weeknd, Kendrick Lamar, Metallica, those are Live Nation tours. If you saw a tour by an artist working with Live Nation, you may have seen it in a Live Nation venue. You may have bought the ticket from Ticketmaster. While you were at the venue, You bought a hot dog and beer.
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Chapter 2: What led to the jury ruling Ticketmaster as a monopoly?
And the case that the government was making was that because of its scale, because Live Nation is so big – and that it's this many-tentacled beast. It controls the music industry. It's a monopoly in concert promotion. It's a monopoly in ticketing. It's stymied competition. It's driven up ticket prices for everybody. And that was the case that the government made and brought to trial.
So the trial opens, and one of the big claims that the government is making is that Live Nation threatens venues to use Ticketmaster.
And the way they do this is through part of their monopoly, that they have one side of their business that's selling tickets and one side of their business that's putting on concerts, and that they go to venues and say, you better use Ticketmaster or else you're not going to get our concerts. And if a venue loses access to those concerts, it would be devastating for them economically, right?
So right off the bat, they make that argument, and there's this really striking testimony about the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. The very first witness in the case is the former head of the Barclays Center. And in 2021— The Barclays Center had been open for almost 10 years and had been a Ticketmaster client. Then they decide they want to switch to a different ticketing company called SeatGeek.
The jury hears a recording of a phone call where the head of the Barclays Center is on the phone with the CEO of Live Nation, Michael Rapinoe, one of the most powerful people in music. And Barclays tells him, We're not using Ticketmaster anymore. We're going with this other company. And Rapinoe's reaction is angry. He's dropping profanities. He's very upset. You hear the anger in his voice.
Because he's feeling what? What is his interpretation of what they're saying to him?
Well, he doesn't want to lose the account. It's a prominent venue, right? And they work hard to keep their ticketing deals. So he's very upset that they're losing Barclays. And he says to him, it's going to be a tough time to deliver tickets or concerts.
And the head of the Barclays Center testifies that he took that as a threat, saying that if you don't renew your Ticketmaster deal, you're not going to get our concerts. And he actually follows up and says, after that point, we tracked what we were getting and we lost Live Nation concerts. And one of the ones that stood out to him was Billie Eilish.
And what happened with Billie Eilish specifically? Yeah.
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Chapter 3: How significant is the verdict for the music industry?
And he said, we asked Live Nation why didn't she come back to our venue? And the answer was, it was the artist's decision to go to the other place.
Mm-hmm. But he didn't believe that.
Well, he testified that they reached out to Billie Eilish's manager who told them, no, it was Live Nation's decision to do this.
It sounds like the Barclays CEO heard this and he connected it to that phone call he had had with Rapinoe that he had interpreted as a threat earlier.
And that this was making good on that threat, that it was retaliation. And that was one of the big arguments that the government was making, that this company does make threats and they even follow through with them and retaliate if they don't get what they want. And that is classic anti-competitive behavior.
Right, because they have the size to make these threats make good on them. Were there other threats that stood out to you from the trial?
Well, there was one that I wrote about in a separate story about Irvine, California. Irvine had a really popular amphitheater that closed, and the city wanted to build a new one. And so they got into business with Live Nation, and they were working out a deal, and the city said...
We want to have what's called an open venue, which means any company who wants to put on a show, call us, make a deal, you can put on your show. Live Nation was very upset about that because they wanted to control the bookings. And the person who testified was not some experienced music industry person.
This was a city official who said they told us that if you don't do it our way, we're going to send concerts around you. This venue will fail.
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Chapter 4: What were the main arguments presented during the trial?
They said that they were going to loosen up the rules that they had about ticketing to allow other ticketers to work in some of their venues, and also that they would make it easier for artists who were not working with them to put on shows in their venues. And there was also a pool of money of about $280 million that they were going to offer to any of the states that signed on.
Now, this is a company that has revenues of about $25 billion. So $280 million, I think that caught people's eye right off the bat as, gee, that seems like a fairly low amount of money, especially when the government at that point in the case was kind of holding a lot of leverage.
For Live Nation, it potentially meant the end of the case, that they were able to avoid getting broken up and that the trial might now be over. But that is not what ended up happening.
We'll be right back.
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Okay, so Ben, how did this trial go from looking like Live Nation had largely escaped unscathed to them losing so completely by being declared this monopoly?
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Chapter 5: How did Taylor Swift's situation influence public perception?
And they answered yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, every question that was presented to them. They answered yes. So there's absolutely no wiggle room or inconsistency in it. The jury was completely persuaded by the government's case, and it was a real victory for the states that continued this.
OK, so that's the verdict. Live Nation, Ticketmaster, they're found pretty convincingly, it sounds like, to be a monopoly, which, as you said at the beginning of the conversation, that's a very big deal. But I think the question for everybody listening, Ben, is how does the verdict affect the concert going public?
Like, what can we tell people about how their concert or ticket experience might change going forward?
Well, first of all, this case is not over. There's going to be a whole separate trial that will happen probably in a few months where the judge will determine what are called the remedies for this. That's how is Live Nation going to be punished. Breaking up the company still is on the table. That is one option available to the judge. There will also be monetary damages that will go to the states.
That will be a heavily contested thing between the government and Live Nation. There may be appeals and so forth. So we know there's going to be some kind of ramifications for Live Nation. I think for average music fans, the big question of what this case, what this case has all been about is, will this lower ticket prices? Will this lower fees? Will this help me when it comes to my wallet?
I think we really don't know that yet. For the biggest shows, for those Beyonce concerts, for Bruce Springsteen, for the Kendrick Lamar tour, that's where it really gets into that supply and demand dynamics. And it really is about those artists charging what they think they're worth and what fans are willing to pay for it. And what we've seen is that fans will go through anything to
to see their favorite artists. If that fan was willing to pay $1,000 for that Beyonce ticket yesterday, they might still pay that same $1,000. The question is, who gets it? Does Live Nation get it, or does somebody else have the opportunity to get that now?
But for the last 16 years, we've been sort of living in the Live Nation regime where they set the rules and they have all the power and prices have gone up, fees have gone up. Buying a ticket has come with a lot of hassle that really bothers music fans. I think now there is a chance for that to change.
that if there's more competition in this business, if Live Nation isn't the only power in town and somebody else really can compete against them, there is the possibility that that could change.
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