Author | Ding Qianwen Edit | Fan Zhihui
The cancellation of Mayday fan group tickets kicked off the first shot of this year's "ticket defense war".
On May 10, Mayday 2023 "I Want to See You" concert Shenzhen was officially announced, and three pre-sales will be opened on the 13th. For Mayday fans "Five Fans", it can be described as a small flame of hope after experiencing "crossing the calamity".
Just the day before, Mayday had two themes ("I Want to See You" and "Noah's Ark 10th Anniversary Evolution Remastered Limited Edition") and six concerts in the Bird's Nest, which were simultaneously sold on platforms such as Barley, Fun Island, and Maoyan. According to the data, these six concerts sold more than 180,000 tickets on the Damai platform alone. According to this calculation, it is conservatively expected that the cumulative total mobilization number will exceed 300,000, and Mayday may also set a record for the highest number of Chinese singers in a single station with their Beijing performance.
At present, the number of people who mark "want to see" on the Damai platform is still rising, and a large number of fans are still racking their brains to find various methods, unwilling to accept the reality that "the bird's nest is so big that it can't accommodate me", but it has also fallen into an increasingly chaotic ticket collection storm.
For no other reason, since May 6, fans have actually fought a "ticket defense war" with scalpers and ticketing platforms, "Mayday ticket grabbing", "Mayday group tickets", "Mayday arbitrary door" and other related terms once appeared at the forefront of Weibo's hot search, and the topic of "five fans resisting scalpers" has exploded the public opinion field.
And this fierce fan vs. scalper incident has also pulled the current situation of "pouring oil" in the ticket market into the public's field of vision again.
Declare war on scalpers
The reason why scalpers have become the key targets of this year's "five fans" is that the fan group tickets for the Mayday concert in Beijing were forced to cancel.
Fan group tickets are also a common ticket purchase practice to ensure that some tickets actually flow into the hands of fan groups. Under the organization of fan stations such as Mayday Bar, Mayday Any Gate, and Innocence MAYDAY, these fan representatives will dock with the organizers responsible for Mayday's concerts to reserve quota tickets. As a guarantee for fans to purchase tickets, fan group tickets also need to pass the answer screening mechanism before they can be purchased.
According to the group purchase pilot information released by "Mayday Any Door" on May 5, the fan group ticket only provides fans with tickets other than 1655 yuan tickets and packages, and there are restrictions on the number of tickets purchased by a single person according to different prices, such as 355 yuan per person is limited to two tickets per game, and 555 yuan is four tickets; At the same time, based on the group purchase link, the platform is a micro-store, and fans will also pay a 6% handling fee for purchasing the original price tickets, and all tickets are also prohibited from being transferred at a high price.
Even with such caution, this group ticket is still greatly affected by the "gray industry", and the reality of suspected agency auctions, scalpers cutting off a large number of orders, and merging tickets still gives many fans a blow.
On May 6, less than half an hour after the start of sales, "Mayday Any Door" screened out a large number of abnormal orders, and more than 200 orders were created in 0 seconds; At the same time, on platforms such as Xiaohongshu, Xianyu, and WeChat Moments, many scalpers have said that "there are tickets to be issued" and sold them in the form of high-priced ticket speculation. This is the strange phenomenon that fans can't grab tickets, and a large number of fans have also revealed, angrily asking the organizer Hua Le Extraordinary and the official ticketing platform Damai for an official explanation.
However, in the afternoon, fans not only did not wait for a reasonable explanation, but were also told by major fan stations that the group ticket event was canceled due to "force majeure" factors, and fans who grabbed tickets would also be refunded all money. According to the Qianjiang Evening News, the "force majeure" in the cancellation announcement was due to anonymous reports of "illegal fundraising" received for the group ticket activity.
This reason may indeed exist, after all, the "virtual order early receipt" option in all group ticket processes means that the fan ticket purchase money will be credited to the fan station account in advance, and only with the original funds can the ticket be traded with the organizer, and then enter the express delivery link.
And May Tianbar insiders also said that at present, all fan sites are still speeding up the refund matter, "As mentioned in the announcement, the group purchase amount is huge, involving relevant transfer policy restrictions or causing risk control." "At present, the refund is also going on a daily basis, and a large number of fans have said that they have received the refund," "(We) credibility cannot be destroyed, fans are fans, not scalpers. ”
Affected by this, before the official ticket opening day on May 9, Mayday fans also spontaneously organized and launched a boycott of scalpers who "would rather stand at the gate of the bird's nest than let scalpers earn", and major social platforms and second-hand trading platforms were also laid by fans to refuse to buy scalpers tickets, and called on consumers not to rush to collect tickets, "stay up until the scalper's mentality collapses, and wait for the return of the original price tickets". The fans' confidence is also based on the successful experience of forcing scalpers back for many years to try to win again.
It can be said that in order to maintain the basic rights and interests of consumers and the normal operation of the performance ticket market, fans have made great efforts to do so.
But in the face of Mayday fans who smashed scalpers, they were regarded as useless struggles by a large number of scalpers, "Honestly grab tickets, can't grab scalpers to buy it, it's so complicated, let's get rid of it." A scalper said in the circle of friends.
Inexhaustible scalper
The fearlessness of scalpers is largely due to the loopholes in the ticketing system of the current performance market.
Generally speaking, the main sales channels of concert tickets are nothing more than multi-platform purchase and scalper ticket distribution, so the platform side often chooses to release tickets in batches in different time periods to ensure that the ticket volume can flow into the consumer market normally. Most of the ticket purchases implement the real-name system and have a transferable button for consumers to resell, but this also invisibly increases the convenience of scalpers.
Therefore, some performances will also implement a mandatory real-name system, which means that tickets have additional conditions that cannot be refunded, exchanged, or even transferred, which is also a measure to restrict the purchase of scalpers.
For example, Mayday's concert tickets show a mandatory real-name system before the sale, which means that there are no paper tickets and can only swipe their ID cards to enter, but according to fans, "the day before is still mandatory and cannot be transferred, and the rule a few hours before the sale is changed to stop transferring 48 hours before the performance." Previously, the Strawberry Music Festival and the Taihuwan Music Festival have also done so.
However, the mandatory real-name system for ticket purchase does not mean that the real-name system will be mandatory for admission. Scalpers "Mango" gave an example, "Even if it is a mandatory real-name system, it is basically not embarrassing, most of the ticket inspectors are also volunteers, as long as the ticket is true, the electronic information is correct, and the gender difference can sometimes pass the check," which has also become a loophole for scalpers to be flexible and free, that is, a large number of borrowed identity information for binding, and then provide electronic ID cards to ticket buyers for identification, even if the ID card is different in identifying faces, artificial channels can also be passed loosely.
She also pointed out, "Although the mandatory real-name system seems to cut off the possibility of scalpers purchasing goods, it is actually to prevent consumers from backtracking after tickets are sold, resulting in organizers and platforms having to recycle 'empty checks'." ”
To put it bluntly, the concert box office is closely related to the revenue risk borne by the organizer, and as a part of the performance outsourcer, when the organizer bids for the concert project, it is equivalent to confirming the artist's performance fee and paying a deposit. It can be said that when winning the bid, the box office situation of a concert is tied to the organizer, and the profit risk of the box office of the performance has long been transferred to the organizer.
In order to maximize profits, scalpers also go from mere middlemen who earn private interests, and act as the "guaranteed leverage" of the organizer. By selling to scalpers at a high price and then scalping tickets to a higher price, to share the risk for them, it has often become an unconventional default means for the organizer and even the platform to ensure self-profit maximization.
Although the original price group tickets that cooperate with fans ensure the successful sale of quantitative tickets, for the head artists who do not lack market appeal, the fan group tickets have become a "burden" for the organizer. On Xiaohongshu, some netizens said that the cancellation of Mayday fan group tickets is "the organizer's self-directed and self-acting", with the aim of "making greater profits through scalpers raising prices after canceling group tickets".
What's more, today's scalpers are no longer independent individuals, and most of their registered and formalized companies and studios package this gray industrial chain of ticket circulation from legal channels, which gives birth to the so-called "internal ticket channel".
The price rise and fall law of scalper ticket speculation is basically the closer to the performance date, the lower the price, and the hottest performances are usually higher for flipping. For example, Mayday's re-enactment of the limited performance of Noah's Ark's Bird's Nest concert ten years ago is the number of times the scalper has been heavily attacked, with an average price increase of about 500 yuan for a 355 yuan grandstand ticket, and an in-court ticket soaring to 20,000 yuan a piece.
Some scalpers advised fans in the circle of friends, "Why don't you recommend everyone to buy in a group, because the organizer earns too little for the group purchase at the original price, and they can only earn a lot of money by selling high-priced invitations."
And this may be the possibility of hindering the original price group tickets, after all, the cake still has to be divided, and in the end, fans who guard the rules and ensure fair ticket purchase have become a thorn in the side.
On the other hand, even if there is no cooperation channel, scalpers can open plug-ins, use server attack interfaces to swipe tickets, use technology to hoard tickets, and get the largest share of tickets possible. In this regard, the ticketing platform Fun Island publicly stated that it would open a "bullfighting plan" to protect fans' rights and interests in purchasing tickets, which is also the first third-party platform to clearly indicate its boycott of scalpers' participation in this turmoil.
It is worth noting that the rise of fan scalpers has also exacerbated the phenomenon of scalpers "blowing and giving birth to the spring breeze" to a certain extent. Counting up, fan scalpers are also the subordinates of the old scalpers in the ticket market, and they are also a new batch of scalper reserves, and even more familiar with fan psychology and fan economy than ordinary scalpers.
During the period when Mayday fans boycotted scalper tickets, many fan scalpers sold tickets at non-original prices on the grounds of "trying hands" and "accidentally grabbing more", and some ticket issuing "fans" did not clearly mark the price, but let the ticket collector make its own price.
A fan posted on social platforms that he had originally offered a package of 2,000 yuan to reach a ticket collection transaction with the seller, but because others offered 2,200 yuan, he was temporarily run. However, such practices have also inspired many ordinary fans, and there are endless cases of issuing tickets in exchange for "benefits" such as interview opportunities, internal quotas, and journal publications.
"Mayday fans have had success in bringing down scalpers," Mango, an old scalper, confessed to Music. As early as 2017, even if scalpers were sold at low prices outside the venue, fans ignored them, "and finally ended with the organizer counting vacant seats to resell a round of tickets on the spot, which was actually quite effective, and scalpers really failed to speculate tickets." ”
epilogue
In the end, boycotts are boycotts, but scalpers still have demand in the performance market.
Even if Mayday fans shout with such fanfare that "the rules are clear, don't be in a hurry to collect tickets", there are still some fans who are willing to increase the price of 100 yuan to 1,000 yuan to buy the scalper through train. According to a fan scalper Xiaofan revealed to Music Herald, the first and last concerts of Mayday's Noah's Ark Bird's Nest concert are currently hot, "Some ticket prices have been increased to about 5 times, whether it is fans or good roads, in fact, they have a certain income level, and they also think that it is troublesome to grab tickets, and they will feel that it is more convenient to find scalpers to collect tickets." ”
Like before, the concerts of top echelon artists such as Xue Zhiqian, Jay Chou, and Zhang Jie also had chaotic scenes of scalpers turning clouds and rain, fans paying high prices, and not bargaining to collect tickets.
So, in the face of scalpers disrupting the ticket market, is there really no breakthrough?
In fact, as early as February and April, in the Mayday concert Taiwan and Hong Kong performances, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan fans opened a "regular-price ticket trading plan" transfer section on the social platform Discord, fans who want to collect tickets must answer Mayday-related content, and then the system draws lots to release the original price tickets, and requires buyers and sellers to follow the principle of original price transfer, and send them by the responsible moderator, otherwise users will be reported and permanently blocked. The unanimous boycott of fans also forced scalpers to flow tickets back to the organizers, and Cityline, a ticketing platform, was once again sold in batches many times, ensuring the fans' rights and interests in purchasing tickets. Similarly, Wu Qingfeng fans have also boycotted scalpers, forcing the tickets in the scalper book to flow back to Barley.
If the organizer and platform cannot compare their hearts and minds from the perspective of consumers, it will eventually lose their credibility and reputation.
After the Mayday fan boycott of scalpers, according to fans, as the organizer, "Huale Extraordinary" has also been interviewed by the Beijing Dongcheng District Cultural and Tourism Bureau on May 10, confirming that each concert is approved to sell 41,000 tickets, the barley platform occupies about 30,000 tickets, and the fun island is circulating and selling about 9,000 tickets, and requires the organizer to pay attention to scalpers at a premium and assume the responsibility of hosting.
This also means that in order to completely eradicate scalpers and return the performance market and ticket market to the normal operation of regularization and chain, upstream and downstream coordination is always required, after all, even mandatory punishment measures still have loopholes to exploit. As mentioned above, the mandatory real-name system of ticket purchase can not completely restrict scalpers, how to achieve clarity and transparency in all aspects of ticket purchase, ticket verification, admission and so on, and clarify the whereabouts of each ticket, is the pain point of combating scalpers.
As Mayday called for in 2019, "don't panic, don't let scalpers take advantage", the performance market and ticket market that are back on track need the joint efforts of the whole industry.
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