Variable Priced Concert Tickets

The thing that everyone hates about concert ticketing these days is the ever elevating prices that gouge music fans everywhere. On the other hand, if these fans are still willing to pay the price, it's hard to complain about the hole in their wallets.

One proposal to stabilize prices a bit is to create a demand-based, variable priced ticketing market similar to airline pricing systems.

On premium shows, the cheap seats (similar to the coach seats on a plane) get more expensive, and the best house seats (equivalent to business and first class) go to the highest bidders. The prices also increase ahead of the start time as supplies shrink. As you get closer to departure, the price is going to be a lot higher than if you bought a ticket a couple of weeks ago.

While I doubt this scheme will ever be adopted, something has to be done about the current pricing policies. We've all been burned too many times.

Of course, Ticketmaster could probably eliminate the secondary market entirely by taking hint from No Doubt, Trent Reznor and Bruce Springsteen. No Doubt wrestled control of roughly 10 percent of tickets on its current North American tour and implemented its own sales terms. Reznor and Springsteen's plan includes direct sales to their Tour Club members, and prints buyer names directly on the tickets to prevent subsequent resale.

Ticket prices are just like Wall Street in that greed abounds. Ticketmaster, the promoters, agents and now even the act are all responsible for wanting more and more. Just like Wall Street, they're going to find that there's a limit to greed before it backfires on you.