AllThingsD » Irving Azoff

Live Nation Chairman Azoff Resigns

Ethan Smith and John Jannarone — Mon, 31 Dec 2012 21:44:38 +0000

Irving Azoff, the executive chairman of Live Nation Entertainment Inc., has left the concert promotion giant’s board and resigned as an executive, the company said Monday.

The 65-year-old music industry veteran is taking with him some of his talent-management business, through which he handles the affairs of the Eagles, Christina Aguilera and other acts, according to people familiar with the matter.

Mr. Azoff’s employment contract hadn’t been due to expire until mid-2014. Chief Executive Michael Rapino’s contract, also due to expire in 2014, was recently renewed for a new five-year term, Live Nation said last week, without mentioning Mr. Azoff.

Read the rest of this post on the original site »

Live Nation Entertainment's Irving Azoff Tweets Up a Storm

Ethan Smith — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 12:00:36 +0000

Now we know why executives have handlers.

Irving Azoff, Live Nation Entertainment’s colorful executive chairman, has long been known in the music industry for his short fuse. Now thanks to Twitter, anyone who feels like it can get a taste of Azoff’s legendary temper.

In less than 24 hours, during which he’s posted just eight tweets (and changed his profile picture twice), @irvingazoff has already gotten involved in a series of surreal microblog brawls: with celebrity blogger Perez Hilton, Billboard business columnist Glenn Peoples (”u r a jerk,” Azoff tweeted) and rival concert promoter Randy Phillips, whom Azoff implied was a habitual liar.

Azoff apparently signed up for a Twitter account earlier this summer, but until Tuesday night, he had barely used it. Then, out of the blue, he let loose a tweet that set the music world—industry and fans alike—ablaze: “so if you want ticket prices to go down stop stealing music.”

Read the rest of this post on the original site

Ticketmaster-Live Nation Merger Gets Conditional Thumbs Up From DOJ (Plus D7 Video With TKTM CEO Azoff)

Kara Swisher — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 00:46:31 +0000

While many thought it would not sail through regulatory scrutiny easily, and it has taken a year, the merger of two entertainment industry giants–Ticketmaster and Live Nation–can go forward as long as a certain set of conditions is met, the Department of Justice said.

And while DOJ’s antitrust head, Christine Varney, told reporters today that she warned the two companies that the federal government was prepared to litigate if necessary, it–well–did not.

“We concluded the transaction as originally proposed was anti-competitive,” said Varney, a statement that was pretty much negated by her decision not to block the merger, given that the conditions she set were not a stretch for the parties to meet.

Still, Varney noted: “The proposed settlement allows for strong competitors to Ticketmaster, allowing concert venues to have more and better choices for their ticketing needs, and provides for anti-retaliation provisions, which will keep the merged company in check.”

We shall see about that–many are expecting even higher ticket prices and “fees.”

The companies also reached an agreement with 17 State Attorneys General as part of the U.S. consent decree, as well as with the Canadian Commissioner of Competition.

Not surprisingly, shares of both West Hollywood-based Ticketmaster (TKTM) and Live Nation (LYV) of Beverly Hills, Calif., were up about 15 percent today, even though the deal still has to undergo public comment and be approved by a judge.

But after today, Ticketmaster investors will get Live Nation stock, valued at $15.49, and with its ticker retired, Ticketmaster shares will no longer trade.

Now the combined company will be able to do everything from selling tickets to booking artists to selling their T-shirts and more.

And all Live Nation and Ticketmaster have to do to operate like this is sell off a college sports ticketing unit to Comcast (CMCSA) and license ticketing software to Live Nation’s nearest competitor, the Anschutz Entertainment Group.

Also, for a decade, the merged company cannot play dirty, blackballing those who decide they don’t want to use its services.

With 75 big venues across the U.S. under the purview of Live Nation, that’s a lot of places the world’s largest concert promoter could apply pressure.

And because Ticketmaster is the dominant player in ticketing for sports and entertainment events, as well as the manager of a spate of major acts that play at those Live Nation venues, it’s clear you have a very powerful entity.

It will all be led, in part, by Ticketmaster CEO Irving Azoff, who can be seen below in an interview with BoomTown at the seventh D: All Things Digital conference last May.

One of the most influential behind-the-scenes movers and shakers in the music industry for a long time now, Azoff talked about with me about the merger and digital forces buffeting the entertainment business.

Azoff will be the executive chairman of the merged company, which will be called Live Nation Entertainment, as well as CEO of Front Line artist management. Longtime Hollywood and Internet mogul Barry Diller is set to be chairman, and Michael Rapino will be CEO and president.

Here’s the video of the D7 interview, including the very funny intro that music legend Joe Walsh of the Eagles did for Azoff (and below it, a video of a terrific version of “Life’s Been Good,” sung by Walsh, which it certainly is today for Ticketmaster-Live Nation):

[ See post to watch video ]

And here’s the press release from Live Nation and Ticketmaster:

LOS ANGELES and WEST HOLLYWOOD, Calif., Jan 25, 2010–Live Nation, Inc. and Ticketmaster Entertainment, Inc. today announced that they have reached agreements with the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and with the Canadian Commissioner of Competition, clearing the way for the merger of the companies. Upon closing, the company will be renamed Live Nation Entertainment, Inc. to reflect the combination of Live Nation’s concert promotions expertise with Ticketmaster’s world-class ticketing solutions and artist relationships.

Under the terms of the proposed final judgment filed today in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, the companies have agreed to divest Ticketmaster’s self-ticketing subsidiary, Paciolan, to Comcast-Spectacor and to license the Ticketmaster Host technology to Anschutz Entertainment Group, Inc., as well as to other terms that protect competitive conditions in ticketing and promotions. Seventeen State Attorneys General also participated in the matter and have joined in the U.S. consent decree. The parties’ consent agreement with the Canadian Commissioner of Competition is on substantially equivalent terms.

As previously announced, in connection with the merger, each issued and outstanding share of Ticketmaster common stock will be cancelled and converted into the right to receive a number of shares of Live Nation common stock such that Ticketmaster stockholders will receive approximately 50.01% of the voting power of the combined company. Subject to final confirmation, the companies expect each share of Ticketmaster common stock to be cancelled and converted into the right to receive 1.474 shares of Live Nation common stock in connection with the merger and for Live Nation to issue approximately 84,613,661 shares of Live Nation common stock to Ticketmaster stockholders in the aggregate.

The combined company will be led by Michael Rapino as CEO and President of Live Nation Entertainment and Irving Azoff as Executive Chairman of Live Nation Entertainment and CEO of Front Line. Barry Diller will serve as Chairman of the Board of Live Nation Entertainment. The Board will consist of 14 directors, seven from each company.

Ticketmaster CEO Irving Azoff: The Full D7 Session

Beth Callaghan — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 15:42:46 +0000

Today, the full sessions of the seventh D: All Things Digital conference get rocking–literally–by posting Kara’s onstage interview with music powerhouse and Ticketmaster (TKTM) CEO Irving Azoff.

Here’s the video of the D7 interview (including the very funny intro that music legend Joe Walsh did for Azoff) :

[ See post to watch video ]

Ticketmaster CEO Irving Azoff: The Full D7 Session

Kara Swisher — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 15:23:29 +0000

Today, the full sessions of the seventh D: All Things Digital conference get rocking–literally–by posting my onstage interview with music powerhouse and Ticketmaster (TKTM) CEO Irving Azoff.

One of the most important behind-the-scenes movers and shakers in the industry, Azoff is now running the world’s biggest entertainment ticketing company while still heading one of the largest music management companies. He is also personal manager for the Eagles and many others.

He and I talked about all this and more, focusing on the digital forces buffeting the music business.

Here’s the video of the D7 interview (including the very funny intro that music legend Joe Walsh did for Azoff) :

[ See post to watch video ]

D7: The Conference in Quotes

John Paczkowski — Fri, 29 May 2009 07:00:45 +0000

Like last year’s D6 conference, this year’s D7 has had its share of memorable lines. A selection of some of the better ones below:

“He drew arrows everywhere. It looked like a Dilbert cartoon.”

– Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz on the org chart that company co-founder Jerry Yang drew for her while wooing her for the CEO job

“Unless you are selling porn, and weird porn, it’s not worth going the subscription route.”

– Arianna Huffington, Editor-in-Chief of the Huffington Post

“There’s always going to be someone trying to rush the fat kid to the head of the buffet.”

– Mark Cuban on a potential bandwidth crisis

“We should have named it ‘BOOM!’”

– Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer suggests an alternative Steve Jobs-esque name for Bing

“The Pre eats iPhones for breakfast.”

– Roger McNamee jokes about the Pre’s prowess

“People in the music industry, we’ve had a horrible record of shooting ourselves in the head.”

– Ticketmaster Entertainment CEO Irving Azoff states the obvious

“I’ve always said that if we described Twitter in three sentences, the first two would be about not putting too much fidelity on it, and the last sentence would be ‘we don’t know.’”

– Twitter co-founder Biz Stone

“You can’t take nine women and make a baby in the month; there is a process.”

– Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz

“Down 15 percent is the new flat. I mean, isn’t it? C’mon.”

– Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz on the econalypse

“It is a product that has changed the face of wireless communications.”

– AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson makes obeisance to the Apple iPhone

“Would I like to see the [Palm] Pre on our network some day? Of course I would.”

– AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson

“Do you want me to say something naughty now?”

– Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz to Kara Swisher

“Are you leading up to ‘I’m too old and too stupid to know what the Internet is?’ Cause by the way, Walt is 61 and I’m only 60. So… f— you.”

– Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz brings down the house with the f-bomb

“They’d have to have big boatloads of money.”

– Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz names Yahoo’s selling price to Microsoft

“I don’t see the benefits of a tablet over a notebook.”

– RIM CEO Mike Lazaridis

“That was pretty cool.”

– Walt Mossberg reviews the unreleased Nokia N97 from the D7 stage

“The people who fired you [from AOL] were later fired, so that must feel great.”

– Kara Swisher to Jon Miller, chief digital officer of News Corp.

“I’m sorry we’re starting late. Carol Bartz just trashed my hotel room.”

– Kara Swisher

“I wouldn’t have bought it.”

– Mark Cuban on YouTube

“‘First come the innovators, then come the imitators, then come the idiots.’ That’s where we are on the Internet.”

– Mark Cuban quotes Warren Buffet

“We just want everyone to get along.”

– Twitter co-founder Evan Williams on claims that the company will someday kill Google

“When someone in the government wants you, it’s not a good place to be. You don’t want to be someone’s skin on the wall.”

– Mark Cuban on his legal problems

“So what have you been up to besides dancing and fighting the government?”

– Kara Swisher to Mark Cuban

“We need companies to say, ‘this matters.’”

– Activist Eve Ensler calls for rape-free cell phones

“We like to call them minicomputers.”

– Nokia CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo renames the smartphone

“The discussion we need to have is about saving journalism, not saving newspapers.”

– Arianna Huffington, Editor-in-Chief of the Huffington Post

“You are so lucky I wasn’t born in this country!”

– Arianna Huffington, on running for president

“We’d like to be the most-watched TV network. We don’t have to be.”

– NBC Universal CEO Jeff Zucker on ratings

“If you were a business picking a space in which to compete, you wouldn’t pick one with Microsoft, Apple and Google.”

– Mozilla chairman Mitchell Baker

“Steve,

Forget it

Won’t help

Ha

Carol”

– Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz‘s note to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer

“It’s aimed at women.”

– Roger McNamee on the Palm Pre’s mirror

“I worked with Steve for many years and learned a tremendous amount from him, the value of user experience and design–taste. I also learned the idea of great marketing.”

– Apple alum and Pre-designer Jon Rubinstein on Steve Jobs

“Most people think of the browser as a pane of glass, they don’t realize that it really effects the way they see the Web.”

– Mozilla CEO John Lilly

“Encarta is an encyclopedia…that is not getting much ongoing investment.”

– Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer on the now-defunct Encarta

“It’s not hard, I’ve been watching ‘Green Acres’ for years.”

– Kara Swisher on her imitation of Arianna Huffington’s accent

“You’re now where Google’s “don’t-be-evil” bulldozer is heading.”

– Walt Mossberg to Mozilla execs John Lilly and Mitchell Baker

“I like Chrome.”

– Mozilla CEO John Lilly reviews Google’s new browser

D7 Video: Ticketmaster Entertainment CEO Irving Azoff

Beth Callaghan — Wed, 27 May 2009 17:01:25 +0000

Irving Azoff hopes to pull off the deal of a lifetime by merging Ticketmaster Entertainment (TKTM) and Live Nation (LYV)–in effect, covering both ends of the live music spectrum. In order to do so, he has to convince Washington D.C and face a range of skeptics that includes Bruce Springsteen. He takes the stage with Kara Swisher to talk about the company and the future of the music business.

[ See post to watch video ]

Ticketmaster CEO Irving Azoff: How to Make Money While Music Becomes "Demonetized"

Peter Kafka — Wed, 27 May 2009 16:31:16 +0000

As a longtime music executive and talent manager, Irving Azoff has had to find a way to work with everyone from inebriated rock stars to David Geffen. But he’s never had to placate Washington, D.C., before. But that’s what Azoff needs to do in order to pull off the deal of a lifetime: A merger between his Ticketmaster (TKTM) Entertainment, which dominates the ticketing business, and Live Nation, (LYV), which dominates the live concert business.

When Azoff isn’t busy trying to convince people that the merger doesn’t violate antitrust regulations, or running his ticketing company, he manages the careers of everyone from the Eagles to Christina Aguilera. Note the one thing in the music business he doesn’t spend time on: selling recorded music.

Session Highlights

[ See post to watch video ]

Live Blog

Introduction: Legendary Eagles survivor Joe Walsh, looking very much worse for wear, shows up via video to talk about his longtime manager. “Irving is the only manager that I ever knew that said to David Geffen ‘pffft,’ and he’s still here.” Also: “He’s a friend of mine….All the guys in the Eagles love him. He has a beautiful house that we bought him.”
Irving notes that Joe is now sober.
Irving rattles off his management empire: 16 management companies, handling everyone from Miley Cyrus to Willie Nelson. Country, classic rock “where the tour money is.”
Kara: Where’s the music business going? Irving: Obviously, with the “demonetization of recorded music,” everyone got into a woe-is-me attitude, but I’m enthusiastic. “Narrowcasting” of the industry has created new stars, and live business is good.

Irving: Music labels have always been slow to react to technology, and a lot of people in this room profited from that. Basically the record industry sat around and tried to protect an old model.
Kara: Could the business have reacted differently? Irving: Yeah, suing your customer is a bad idea.
Kara: Will there be record companies in the future? Irving: Yes. They have 100 years of content. They’ll be more like publishing companies, where they are a repository of rights.
Kara: How do you feel the technology business has treated the music business? [Apologies for gap, technical issues]. Eagles have generated about $400,000 in Apple (AAPL) iTunes royalties. Which is about what they get for a couple live shows.
Irving: Overall, the state of music industry is promising. Was fallow for a bit, but there’s a whole new generation of singers, songwriters, performers. “You never know where it comes from.” In terms of the business, there will be more companies than the four big labels that dominate today. “It will be a great time for entrepreneurs….It’s not over, but it’s warping into 2.0, 3.0.”
Kara: What does a music executive have to do to survive? Irving: You have to take chances. They can’t complain about the iTunes deal. They have to embrace new technology, and I think they are, and it’s easier to get deals done now.
Kara: What about these little digital companies like Playlist and iLike, which Ticketmaster owns a piece of? They can survive, and they’re excellent marketing opportunities. But they’ll have to find other ways of making money. Can they? “I don’t know.” Advertising? “I don’t know.”

Onto the merger. Irving lays out the case. Everything revolves around live music, and they’re the biggest player in live music. It’s really the promotion piece, and the marketing piece, added to Ticketmaster. Without that, Ticketmaster wouldn’t survive. “Any of you guys can write a program that does what Ticketmaster does….I’ve been there a couple of months and I have gripes myself.”
People’s gripe with Ticketmaster isn’t with what we do, it’s demand issues: People want tickets to attend sold-out shows, so we have unhappy customers. Plus we’ve been the “collection agency” for a whole bunch of fees. “But the decision is ultimately made by the act.”
What about criticism to the merger from the likes of Bruce Springsteen? “Everything we do revolves around what’s good for the artist and what’s good for the fan. That’s our new model.”
Not really an answer, Kara points out. Irving: “I would say that Bruce is uninformed about the potential of what this could be.” [Maybe someone could tell Jon Landau.] For instance, we could be bundling new songs along with tickets. “The business traditionally resists change,” so complaints about the merger are nothing news. And there’s plenty of competition: Phil Anschutz competes with us and he’s worth more than the combined market cap of both of these companies. Warner Music Group’s (WMG) Edgar Bronfman Jr. says he’s in the ticketing business, etc.
Discussion of TicketsNow, a StubHub-like “secondary market”/scalping business owned by Ticketmaster. Irving has said that in the past that he wouldn’t have bought it. Would he sell it now? Maybe.
What are the prospects for the merger? “Very optimistic” that it will get done between now and end of the year.
Back to griping about prices and availability: “People in the music industry, we’ve had a horrible record of shooting ourselves in the head.” We haven’t done enough dynamic pricing for tickets, and we should, and that will help make people happy. But these issues are fundamentally the artists’ responsibility. They decide what tickets we sell, and at what price.

Where is the music business going, overall? Who’s your favorite? “It’s like asking what’s your favorite kid.” Internet makes things very exciting, distribution is opening up. What about the industry suing customers? I think that’s a “very small issue.” We do need to protect intellectual property, and the people who make it.
Q&A: Esther Dyson wants to know what Ticketmaster/Live Nation will do with all the data they collect about customers, etc. “Any artist that calls up and says I’d like the email list of the people who came to my show, we’ll make that available.” But with regard to pricing, etc., artists and their management are not being sophisticated about how they use data. And we have to keep the press from chastising artists that use dynamic pricing.”
Q: Not clear what the question is. But seems to be about using an auction model from the get-go. “Auctions are falling into real disfavor at the moment….We’re finding that people don’t want to spend the time to participate in them.” They just want to know that this VIP package costs this much.
Q: What do you think about subscription services? “I’ve always thought subscription was an incredible model.” But tricky to pull off with labels, publishers, unions, mobile guys all trying to figure out how to split the money.
Q: Do you have specific advice for classical music artists? The great thing about the Internet is that you no longer have to be popular with everybody to have a career. Classical should flourish in this era. Build a base, get in front of people, have people like you live. “That’s been true in 1966, and that will be true as long as there is music.”
Do your artists like Twitter? Some do. “Very useful” but other artists “refuse to get a mobile phone.”

A note about our coverage: This liveblog is not an official transcript of the conversation that occurred onstage. Rather, it is a compilation of quotes, paraphrased statements and ad-lib observations written and posted to the Web as quickly as we were able. It was not intended as a transcript and should not be interpreted as one.

Joe Walsh Introduces Irving Azoff At D7

Adam Tow — Wed, 27 May 2009 16:30:59 +0000

Former Eagles band member, Joe Walsh, introduces Ticketmaster Entertainment CEO Irving Azoff to the stage at the D7 Conference.

[ See post to watch video ]

Welcome to Lucky D7: Still Gambling on the Digital Future

Kara Swisher — Mon, 04 May 2009 07:26:10 +0000

Incredibly, this is the seventh year of the D: All Things Digital conference.

We feel very lucky to get here, especially in the midst of what our own site’s Digital Daily scribe, John Paczkowski, has so perfectly dubbed the “econalypse.”

Ironically, Walt Mossberg and I planned to launch the very first conference in the middle of the last major downturn for tech, in 2001. But, in the carnage of the Web 1.0 meltdown, we actually held off for two years, with our first D gathering taking place in 2003.

It’s been a real winning streak since then for D, due in large part to our great speakers–such as Microsoft (MSFT) icon Bill Gates and Apple (AAPL) legend Steve Jobs.

Both have been onstage many times over the years, including a historic interview the pair of tech titans did together in 2007 at D5.

Other amazing speakers have included: Howard Stringer of Sony (SNE), Barry Diller of InterActiveCorp (IACI), legendary director George Lucas, Time Warner (TWX) CEO Jeff Bewkes, Jeff Bezos of Amazon (AMZN), former eBay (EBAY) CEO Meg Whitman, News Corp. (NWS) head Rupert Murdoch, Microsoft head Steve Ballmer, Walt Disney (DIS) honcho Bob Iger, Bobby Kotick of Activision Blizzard (ATVI), CBS (CBS) CEO Les Moonves, Democratic and Republican pols like former Vice President Al Gore and Sen. John McCain, all the leadership of Google (GOOG) and many, many more.

We have had a lot of great moments onstage with all these tech and media players over the years, to be sure, with interviews ranging from the funny to the sublime to the truly disastrous.

But, like the digital industry and the innovation our conference focuses on, we also like to lean forward to try to figure out what the Next Big Thing is around the corner, whether it comes from Silicon Valley or not.

That’s why we’re kicking off our conference on May 26 with two of the founders of Twitter–Biz Stone and Evan Williams–who are riding high on tech’s latest hot thing, which might turn out to be either a rocket ship or a shooting star.

They’ll be followed up over the next two days by a plethora of interesting players, from the leaders of several major mobile companies to content execs hit hard by fast-moving digital forces to a new Internet leader like Yahoo (YHOO) CEO Carol Bartz, who is trying to turn around one of the Web’s great icons from its more recent lackluster path.

And, as we always do, we will be featuring a spate of demos too, trying to see if we can unearth that next next thing.

In the past, the D stage has seen the debut of start-up products like Sling Media’s Slingbox, Aliph’s Jawbone and Pure Digital’s Flip, all of which have gone onto glory. And also some, like Palm’s Foleo, which did not.

While not everyone can attend D, our crack staff is committed to bringing all the action from this year’s conference to readers of the All Things Digital site via up-to-the-minute blogs, photos, videos, tweets, digs and more. We’ll also, as soon as we can, post the videos of each of the onstage sessions, in their entirety.

Until it all kicks off, here is the list of speakers, below, in alphabetical order, who will be appearing at 2009′s D7 conference:

Irving Azoff | CEO of Ticketmaster Entertainment (TKTM)

Mitchell Baker | Chairman of Mozilla

Steve Ballmer | CEO of Microsoft

Carol Bartz | CEO of Yahoo

Mark Cuban | Chairman of HDNet and Owner of the Dallas Mavericks, Landmark Theaters and Magnolia Pictures

Eve Ensler | Playwright and Founder of V-Day

Arianna Huffington | Editor-in-Chief of the Huffington Post

Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo | CEO of Nokia (NOK)

Mike Lazaridis | Co-CEO of Research In Motion (RIMM)

John Lilly | CEO of Mozilla

John Malone | Chairman of Liberty Media Corporation (LCAPA)

Roger McNamee | Partner, Elevation Partners

Jon Miller | Chief Digital Officer of News Corp.

Jon Rubinstein | Executive Chairman, Palm (PALM)

Randall Stephenson | CEO of AT&T (T)

Biz Stone | Co-founder of Twitter

Owen Van Natta | CEO of MySpace

Katharine Weymouth | Publisher of the Washington Post (WPO)

Evan Williams | Co-founder and CEO of Twitter

Jeff Zucker | CEO of NBC Universal (GE)

Welcome to Lucky D7: Still Gambling on the Digital Future

Kara Swisher — Mon, 04 May 2009 07:15:55 +0000

Incredibly, this is the seventh year of the D: All Things Digital conference.

We feel very lucky to get here, especially in the midst of what our own site’s Digital Daily scribe, John Paczkowski, has so perfectly dubbed the “econalypse.”

It’s been a real winning streak since then for D, due in large part to our great speakers–such as Microsoft (MSFT) icon Bill Gates and Apple (AAPL) legend Steve Jobs.

Both have been onstage many times over the years, including a historic interview the pair of tech titans did together in 2007 at D5.

We have had a lot of great moments onstage with all these tech and media players over the years, to be sure, with interviews ranging from the funny to the sublime to the truly disastrous.

And, as we always do, we will be featuring a spate of demos too, trying to see if we can unearth that next next thing.

Until it all kicks off, here is the list of speakers, below, in alphabetical order, who will be appearing at 2009′s D7 conference:

Irving Azoff | CEO of Ticketmaster Entertainment (TKTM)

Mitchell Baker | Chairman of Mozilla

Steve Ballmer | CEO of Microsoft

Carol Bartz | CEO of Yahoo

Mark Cuban | Chairman of HDNet and Owner of the Dallas Mavericks, Landmark Theaters and Magnolia Pictures

Eve Ensler | Playwright and Founder of V-Day

Arianna Huffington | Editor-in-Chief of the Huffington Post

Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo | CEO of Nokia (NOK)

Mike Lazaridis | Co-CEO of Research In Motion (RIMM)

John Lilly | CEO of Mozilla

John Malone | Chairman of Liberty Media Corporation (LCAPA)

Roger McNamee | Partner, Elevation Partners

Jon Miller | Chief Digital Officer of News Corp.

Jon Rubinstein | Executive Chairman, Palm (PALM)

Randall Stephenson | CEO of AT&T (T)

Biz Stone | Co-founder of Twitter

Owen Van Natta | CEO of MySpace

Katharine Weymouth | Publisher of the Washington Post (WPO)

Evan Williams | Co-founder and CEO of Twitter

Jeff Zucker | CEO of NBC Universal (GE)

Ticketmaster Makes Up With Bruce Springsteen–And His Fans

Peter Kafka — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 19:49:33 +0000

Remember the great Ticketmaster/Bruce Springsteen controversy of 2009? The one where fans of the Boss said they got screwed by the ticketing company everyone loves to hate? The one that prompted Springsteen himself to complain about Ticketmaster and its proposed acquisition of concert giant Live Nation (LYV)?

Well, that’s all resolved now. In a convoluted way. But it’s resolved. Via New Jersey’s Star-Ledger:

Ticket giant Ticketmaster has reached a national settlement with the New Jersey Attorney General in which it agrees to stop linking customers to TicketsNow, a subsidiary agency that sells tickets at scalper’s prices.

Attorney General Anne Milgram said Ticketmaster has agreed to run a lottery that will make 2,000 tickets available at face value to customers who complained about the way Ticketmaster handled the Feb. 2 sale of tickets to Bruce Springsteen’s shows May 21 and 23 at the Izod Center at the Meadlowlands….

Fans–more than 1,000–who don’t win a pair of tickets in the lottery will be given $100 gift certificates, Milgram said, and the ability to purchase tickets for an upcoming Springsteen concert in New Jersey.”

Ticketmaster (TKTM) will also pay a $350,000 fine, and has agreed to stop using Google (GOOG) keywords to direct Ticketmaster searchers to TicketsNow.

Given that Ticketmaster and Live Nation are trying to pull off a politically tricky deal, this seems like a great settlement for Barry Diller, Irving Azoff and company–no use going before the Department of Justice while you’ve got state investigations into your ticketing practices.

And what does Springsteen himself think about the deal? There’s no comment from him or his management team on his site. But tellingly, his previous comments about the Ticketmaster/Live Nation deal–the ones where he described the proposed merger as a “near monopoly” and asked his fans to complain to their representatives about it–have vanished from his site.

I’ve spent way too much time trying to wrap this one up with a Springsteen lyric pun. Too hard! So here’s your YouTube, instead. Apologies for the subpar video/audio: Sony Music Entertainment, Springsteen’s label, won’t allow me to embed the higher-quality versions.

Barry Diller: Trust Me–You're Going to Love the Ticketmaster/Live Nation Deal

Peter Kafka — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 19:03:23 +0000

This will be a fun one to handicap. One side: Struggling Ticketmaster, which holds a near-monopoly on concert ticket sales, and struggling Live Nation, the biggest concert promoter in the world. On the other side: Just about everyone who’s ever bought a concert ticket and grumbled about the experience later.

Ticketmaster (TKTM) and Live Nation (LYV) formally rolled out their merger agreement today, which calls for Live Nation to buy out Ticketmaster shareholders for $575 million in stock. But the financials here are less important than the public relations: To get this deal done, the two companies are going to have to convince regulators that they come in peace and mean no harm–no matter how loudly their constituents disagree.

So far, we’ve only heard the carping about the deal, but it’s been loud, and prominent: Bruce Springsteen has weighed in. So has the New York Times. And now Congress is getting warmed up, too.

Today, argues Ticketmaster chairman Barry Diller, the companies get to start making their case, which they couldn’t do until the deal was formally announced. Now “we are going to really explain and explain and explain and make all of this clear to all our constituencies.”

Diller gave a preview of his talking points during this morning’s conference call:

Argument 1: Don’t blame us for high ticket prices–blame Madonna, or U2, or Phish.

“Ticketmaster does not set prices,” Diller said. “Live Nation does not set ticket prices. Artists set ticket prices.”

That’s true. And then Ticketmaster and Live Nation add supplementary charges, which can jack up the price by 30 percent or more. That’s standard operating procedure for all sorts of transactions–check the invoice for your last plane ticket or give your hotel bill a once-over–but it doesn’t seem to inspire the same rage as it does in concert ticket buyers.

The other problem with this argument: Live Nation is run by Irving Azoff, who is one of the sharpest dealmakers in the music business and who also runs one of the biggest management companies in the business. And since managers are now the most powerful players in the business, they’ve got a great deal to say about how their clients price concert tickets. See the problem here?

Argument 2: Don’t blame us if you can’t get tickets for that Hannah Montana show your kids are demanding. But if you do want a ticket for a sold-out show, we can help you–at a price.

This is what Bruce Springsteen was complaining about. In addition to its core business, Ticketmaster also runs “TicketsNow,” a “secondary marketplace” for tickets. The other word for that is scalping, which is now a legal and booming business on the Web.

But when a concert ticket company also sells “aftermarket” tickets, it makes people feel queasy in a way that they don’t about eBay’s (EBAY) Stubhub, which only does resale.

That feeling is exacerbated when people suspect that Ticketmaster is directing buyers away from its regular tickets and toward its marked-up TicketsNow inventory, which is what happened to Springsteen ticket buyers this month.

Diller says the Springsteen incident was a “technological glitch.” Which may well be true. But you’re going to hear about that one a lot in the coming months.

Argument 3: Whaddaya gonna do? We sell tickets. People are never going to send us thank you cards.

Diller: “This is such a sexy issue. Ticketmaster is never perceived to be on the side of the angels.”

Remember when Pearl Jam testified against Ticketmaster in Congress in the ’90s, convinced the Department of Justice to investigate the company and led a boycott against any venue that did business with them? Those were the days.

Except that Pearl Jam ended up playing small venues, the DOJ (that’s the Clinton-era DOJ, mind you) gave Ticketmaster a pass, and by the end of the decade Eddie Vedder and crew were working with Ticketmaster again.

So maybe this one goes through, too. I’ve heard from plenty of folks who hate the proposed merger (“These two companies SHOULD NEVER be allowed to merge and reproduce,” a former Live Nation employee tells me via email), but I’d love to hear someone who knows both the music business and antitrust law make a cogent defense: You can reach me directly at peter@allthingsd.com and I’ll give you an open forum.

Until then, here’s the slideshow Live Nation is using to explain the deal:

live nation dek – Get more Business Documents

[Eddie Vedder image credit: sick of goodbyes]

The Boss Says No: Bruce Springsteen Already Campaigning Against Ticketmaster-Live Nation Deal

Peter Kafka — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 20:56:44 +0000

Struggling Ticketmaster, which holds a near-monopoly on concert ticket sales, wants to merge with struggling Live Nation (LYV), which is the biggest concert promoter in the world. Will antitrust regulators let this one fly?

We’ll find out once the reported deal becomes official, which could happen as early as Friday. In the meantime, you can consider the varied opinions of antitrust attorneys and experts quoted in The Wall Street Journal and the New York Times.

Or you can just ask the Boss, who gives the deal an unqualified thumbs down.

The story: Bruce Springsteen happens to be embarking on yet another megatour (perhaps you caught him on TV the other day). Said tour, which is using Ticketmaster (TKTM) to sell tickets (again, like just about everyone else in the concert business) has already run into a snafu involving TicketsNow, the “secondary marketplace” (i.e., legal aftermarket/scalping) company Ticketmaster bought last year.

If you want the details, you can consult Springsteen’s Web site, where the musician and manager Jon Landau have posted a long apology. Or you can cut to the chase:

The one thing that would make the current ticket situation even worse for the fan than it is now would be Ticketmaster and Live Nation coming up with a single system, thereby returning us to a near monopoly situation in music ticketing. Several newspapers are reporting on this story right now. If you, like us, oppose that idea, you should make it known to your representatives.

The abuse of our fans and our trust by Ticketmaster has made us as furious as it has made many of you. We will continue to do our utmost now and in the future to make sure that these practices are permanently curtailed on our tours.”

And that’s the thing: There are plenty of companies Americans enjoy disliking, but most of them have some kind of lobby and political clout to help shrug off that animus. But just about anyone who’s bought a concert ticket has at some point cursed Ticketmaster for some kind of perceived slight or insult. And unlike banks, oil, health care or any of our favorite bugaboos, it’s hard to argue that ticket brokers perform some crucial function in our economy, so we have to put up with it.

Ticketmaster CEO Irving Azoff is one shrewd dude. But he’s going to have to be awfully persuasive to find people in Washington willing to back this one when it gets to Washington.