Association of Independent Festivals Goes After Ticket Re-sellers

In an effort to stem the tide of secondary-market ticket sales through popular websites like eBay and StubHub, the London-based Association of Independent Festivals (AIF) last week released a Fair Ticketing Charter opposing the practice and calling for legislation to curb re-sellers’ activities.

“The whole secondary-ticketing situation does make me really angry,” AIF cofounder Rob da Bank told Complete Music Update  (opens in a new tab). “I just don’t feel many of the people paying vastly inflated prices actually understand the mechanics behind it, and secondly because the people profiting are doing so driven by pure greed.”

There have been many attempts in the United States  (opens in a new tab) and abroad  (opens in a new tab) to pass legislation to curb the growth of the secondary-ticketing market, but none has succeeded. AIF hopes that the amount of support that the charter is attracting will lead to a different result.

“We believe there are strong arguments for legislation to curb the activities of unofficial ticket-sellers,” the charter  (opens in a new tab) states. “Until such legislation is enacted, we believe the entire live entertainment industry should further increase its efforts to protect fans.”

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(photo by marfis75/Flickr)