Phish Fan Uses Twitter to Get Band’s Attention on Scalpers

With Phish having sold-out all four nights of their upcoming Madison Square Garden New Year’s Eve run, plenty of ticketless fans were shut out. In the wake of the sellouts, unsurprisingly, auctions for tickets started popping up on eBay. Phish fan Dave Ginsberg (@youenjoyme) started taking note of the Phish Tickets by Mail auctions and sent tweets to @Phish alerting the band of the mail order tickets being scalped.

[blackbirdpie url=”http://twitter.com/#!/youenjoyme/status/131725086892900352″]
[blackbirdpie url=”http://twitter.com/#!/youenjoyme/status/132993025059192832″]

[blackbirdpie url=”http://twitter.com/#!/youenjoyme/status/133743049451896832″]
[blackbirdpie url=”http://twitter.com/#!/youenjoyme/status/134129847067885568″]

The persistence may have paid off. While Ginsberg’s requests for having the offending tickets transferred to him may or may not be fulfilled, he certainly got Phish’s attention.

[blackbirdpie url=”http://twitter.com/#!/phish/status/134122727001960448″]

With a promise to investigate the auctions and a request for further notification of similar attempts at scalping PTBM listings the band gave a glimmer of hope to their ticketless fans not wanting to pay extra hundreds of dollars for tickets.

Ginsberg remains vigilant, responding to the band’s request with another tweet calling out a would-be scalper.

[blackbirdpie url=”http://twitter.com/#!/youenjoyme/status/134314039714123776″]

Meanwhile, another fan found a different way to have fun with scalpers:

[via YEMblog]

If you come across a listing of a scalper trying to sell Phish Tickets By Mail tickets, send a link to [email protected]. This all comes down to one thing – fuck scalpers (#fscalpers).

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32 Responses

  1. HAHA Phish fans are some of the biggest idiots in the US
    PHISH works directly with scalpers for PROFIT, you DUMB FUCKS!

  2. Thank you HT for putting this up. These are the stories that need to be made public to put pressure on Phish to take a more active roll in cracking down on scalping.

  3. I feel that if Phish really wanted to do something about scalpers/prevent them from having control— they would. Its obviously not too high on their agenda- although that can for sure change- as this article demonstrates.

    But- if the band fails to take serious action- besides just recalling a few tix requests- sometimes you gotta just deal with the market as is. I mean it sucks- but nothing is going to prevent me from getting into the garden on each of those 4 nights

  4. Everytime the boys release new tour dates, with certain “high interest” stops the story is always the same … more people want tickets than have them, and scaplers are some how able to swoop in and buys tickets before most fans are capable of doing so. This is now simply a fact of life. For ANY high interest sold out show at MSG (Jay-Z, Prince, U2, Taylor Swift, Roger Waters … neeed I go on?) there will ALWAYS be scapers. Fact of life. I hate to say it, but to all those bitching, i only have one thing to say… get used to it. There’s nothing that the band can do – in fact I would say this has nothing to do with Phish… it’s simply market dynamics. Does it suck to have to pay $$$ for tickets, yeah of course. Anyway … i guess all i’m saying is quit moaning. The above videos and twitters are pretty freaking awesome though! 🙂

  5. awesome! If we don;t stand up and call attention to this shit, then we just have to roll over and accept it. That’s lame. FUCK SCALPERS – they are leeches.
    If you have all that money for tickets – spend that extra money in the “lot” – support your scene this way. (~);}

  6. Happycat, I wish there was lot scene at MSG…It’s not Summer tour it’s NYC in December and way too cold to vend grilled cheese and heady necklaces.

    Most of the true scalpers get their ticketmaster tix or through the promoters. My understanding is they use a BOT of some kind to attack the servers and get them access. which is why you could get the 28th or 29th up to a 1/2 hour AFTER the initial sale was on.

    I reported everyone I found with PTBM last night on eBay to the email address. With the mobile app you can just “share” the listing with [email protected]. I did that about 20 times last night.

    This still doesn’t stop the ticket “brokers” from taking advantage of a market. We want the tickets, they have them…supply and demand. As a “community” we could wait it out, or if you’re flying from the West Coast, you want to make sure your tix are secure before boarding a plane. I’m willing to fly to see Phish and unfortunately if I’m forced to paying over face, I’ll have to. But I’m holding out as long as possible…

  7. we were in NYC standing outside (in the blizzard) Disc-o-rama 2 Saturdays ago, 4th in line for tickets, and we could not even get tickets for the 30th/31st.

    It didnt help that the shop only allowed one person in the shop at a time and wouldnt allow the next person to walk the 2 floor maze to the ticket counter until the prior person was finished.

    f*ck the scalpers. StubHub is listing NYE floor tix for $8K. wtf.

  8. The only solutions to date have been paperless tickets (used by Miley Cyrus on her last tour) and/or will call pickup only. The will call pickup doesn’t work for venues the size that Phish plays, generally more for clubs and small theatres. Trying to have 20,000 people pick up tickets at will call on day of show just doesn’t work.

    As for paperless, there’s almost as much headache, given people trying to swipe credit cards they bought the tickets with on the night of show. Have seen these headaches first hand how many times CC’s don’t swipe. Not to mention having the original purchaser actually go to the show. Would probably work better with Phish than with moms buying Miley Cyrus tickets, although then i think of the typical delays in getting into Phish shows even with hard tickets (pat downs, etc).

    There’s really just too many hands in the ticket pot to expect that we won’t ever see any tickets in scalpers hands whether paperless or not. Think about how many people work at MSG, ticketmaster, the promoter, the band’s organization. To expect that nobody within these organizations won’t take tickets and sell to a broker or put on stubhub is unrealistic.

    I’m of the opinion that a ticket is a commodity and given state laws, anyone is allowed to sell their ticket for whatever a market bears as long as it’s not illegal. Sure it might suck for fans without tickets, but Phish fans are much better than most bands’fans (Pearl Jam is another good example) where fans just don’t ever sell their tickets and actually use them.

  9. Sounds like a bunch of people are being babies. Dave Ginsberg get a life. I mean your narcing on all these people because you didn’t score tickets. Shit happens.

  10. Phish has always priced their tickets extremely affordably. Every ticket, from the front row to the roof is the same price. Phish is a MAJOR live act. The demand for tickets, especially great seats, HEAVILY outweighs the asking price. UNFORTUNATELY, since the band does not and will not price their tickets to market demand, the HEAVY DEMAND will be reflected somewhere. The band is being PRESSURED TO SELL OUT and start pricing their tickets to meet demand. If the band priced every floor seat for $150, you will see LESS floor seats available on the secondary market because the price already reflects demand.

  11. For those that are “missing the boat”
    A) I have tickets to all 4 shows
    B) I understand supply/demand
    C) My fight has been against PTBM being sold, that is a big no no in the community.

    to the 99%, thanks for the support

  12. Scalping is entirely fucked up, no doubt. Ticket brokers fuck the die-hard fans year in and year out. This DOES NOT excuse the actions of this snitch, however. He is just trying to score tickets for himself by ratting other people out. I’d say that’s at least as egregious as the people making money off of scalping. First off, if people never PAID outrageous amounts for tickets, they could never get away with CHARGING that much. Its a free market, plain and simple. Secondly, if phish really wanted to curtail it, they could take measures to ensure that brokers and middlemen were locked out. I hate scampers as much as the next person, but every year I manage to get into MSG without paying exorbitant amounts. It’s a nuisance, but people snitching on others for their own selfish gain is inexcusable and a far more threatening element to our community and to society at large.

  13. It’s actually simple. Have two lines to get into the venue. One for people to use CC swipe or some other lower tech method to verify that they purchased the ticket legally, the other for people who have gone through a verification process tied to a webcam that links the tickets to faces using facial recognition software.

    Airport security has a two-tiered system for frequent flyers and people who pay a bit extra. The Dead used to make you go through hell to mail order tix through GDTS, so there’s precedent. People can go through a few minutes of confirmatory work up front, then breeze into the show. People who can’t (or people with scalped tickets) get delayed a bit or denied entry. Ba da bing, ba da boom, house lights go down.

  14. So it is not up to Phish to deal with scalpers although nice to see they are willing to help-bottom line is that in no way is there a question of whether or not phish will sell out and releasing the tix this early GUARANTEES the scalpers and brokers will receive top dollar—-It is a simple solution but nonetheless the tix are always released with ample time for scalpers and brokers to stay in the game-Releasing tix early is a way to judge the turnout and plan for changes as necessary-PHISH is not in the realm of wondering if it will sell out so someone is well aware of the game and ok with it.

  15. The airport security measures pricetag is just a bit extreme for concert attendance but yes the solutions are there and simple but as I said-SOMEONE in the mix is not looking for change.

  16. I bought some ptbm from a guy on eBay and he had his tickets taken from him. He wasn’t a scalper though. He happened to win 4 tickets to one night and wanted to sell 2 tickets to buy 2 others to another night. I bought 2 tickets from him for $115 each. I don’t think that is an extreme amount of mark up considering they were 300 level tickets.

    I thought buying from this guy seemed a little more moral than straight up brokering.

    I wish if they were going to do it they would do it for ALL tickets brokered and scalped by ALL entities. It seems very harsh that they did it in this case while brokers with tickets in hand that know how to play the game make sick amounts of money at the expense of real fans.

    Stub Hub’s motto is absolutely ridiculous.

    I wouldn’t mind paying so much for tickets either, if I knew the band got the money.

    I remember a time at MSG one night long ago where a “listman” screwed the scalpers and saved us lucky people who had made his list. I miss those days of being able to really earn your tickets…..

  17. Phish has always priced their tickets extremely affordably. Every ticket, from the front row to the roof is the same price. Phish is a MAJOR live act. The demand for tickets, especially great seats, HEAVILY outweighs the asking price. UNFORTUNATELY, since the band does not and will not price their tickets to market demand, the HEAVY DEMAND will be reflected somewhere. The band is being PRESSURED TO SELL OUT and start pricing their tickets to meet demand. If the band priced every floor seat for $150, you will see LESS floor seats available on the secondary market because the price already reflects demand.

  18. the only true way to beat the scalpers is to simply not buy those tix until right before the show. its risky but the prices will fall if the scalpers think they have an abundance. also the scalpers will always have the tix they want. between the venues and the ticket providers there are deals in place to guve them the tickets they want. this will create an atrificial demand because the show will be sold out with most the tickets not being sold to individuals. the same level of demand would simply not be there if a greater & of people had the tickets they wanted. i have personally superceded this by sneaking in with the help of workers, force of numbers, and using past stubs to get through checkpoints to make it easier to make the dash.
    most of all simply dont pay outrageous prices or they would never ask you to. if nothing will stop you from getting into the show, then you truly do not need to anyway. i never missed a show ive shown up to…..and only showed up with tix to less than half

  19. scalpers suck, it can be an easy temptation to just turn to ebay or craigs list when a show is sold out. However if you do this once, you make it possible for someone to go ahead and order tickets to scalp on the next tour. I would love go see the boys in Nyc but I cannot let myself by a single ticket from a non fan. The only way we cn defeat this scalpers is to stand up in unity and DO NOT BUY TICKETS FROM EBAY OR CRAIGSLIST. TRADE Grilled Cheese for tickets. TRADE for your heady crystals and your weird incense. AND FOR THE LOVE OF GOD if you have an extra ticket give somebody a miracle !!

  20. Better yet, go to cashortrade.org. This site is dedicated to only face value, sales or trades. I have traded extra’s for a show and it worked out great.

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