Chinese Music Fans Prepare To Get Even More Repressed Than Usual
Hey, there Chinese citizens! Do you enjoy jacked-up surcharges, non-existent customer service, and impossible-to-topple monopolies? Yeah? Well, then, today’s your lucky day:
Ticketmaster, the world’s largest ticket supplier, has won the exclusive contract to supply tickets for the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics and plans to use the event as a springboard to enter the Chinese market…
Event marketing is in its infancy in China, where less than 5% of the population have credit cards. As such, most ticket sellers tend to be regional or city-based, employing low-cost courier services which use a cash-on-delivery model and charge fees of about up to 15%.
Of course, any music act that wants to perform in the country will have to pass the Culture Ministry’s “nasty lyrics” test, which prevented Jay-Z from playing a show in Shanghai earlier this month. But rest assured that Ticketmaster honcho Barry Diller will work hard to smooth over any international difficulties, as he’s clearly made it his mission to screw over concertgoers worldwide. And, frankly, after listening to some of China’s top pop acts–many of which sound like a bullfrog getting a hot-stone massage–we have to ask: Haven’t these people suffered enough?
