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German Promoters Target Seatwave |
After a legal letter to cease reselling tickets for his Rock am Ring
festival went ignored, promoter Marek Lieberberg is rallying the German
industry to take action against secondary marketplace Seatwave, and
touting in general.
When Lieberberg issued a legal warning last week, the reaction of
Seatwave’s MD Viet Spielberg was to publicly accuse him of employing
“Mafioso”-style methods, and the Marek Lieberberg Konzertagentur (MLK)
chief is now likely to pursue further legal means.
After a legal letter to cease reselling tickets for his Rock am Ring festival went ignored, promoter Marek Lieberberg is rallying the German industry to take action against secondary marketplace Seatwave, and touting in general.
When Lieberberg issued a legal warning last week, the reaction of Seatwave’s MD Viet Spielberg was to publicly accuse him of employing “Mafioso”-style methods, and the Marek Lieberberg Konzertagentur (MLK) chief is now likely to pursue further legal means.
“They will be served an injunction in the course of the next week and they will have to pay a fine for insulting me,” he says. “The next step is going to court, and at the moment we’re discussing this with promoters and others who we want to join in the case.
“It’s going to be an important legal case, and we have to see how European law will review this issue,” he continues. “You have to be very careful not to impact on the rights of the individual which could end up protecting Seatwave, which is the last thing we want to happen.”
In the Netherlands, Mojo Concerts has failed on three occasions to convince the courts to legislate against secondary ticketing, and in the UK, the Concert Promoters Association has also failed to convince the government of its merit. Denmark meanwhile, has been successful.
It is unknown how the German courts would react to such a case, but the terms and conditions on MLK’s tickets expressly forbid their commercial resale.
Whatever the outcome, it looks to become a battle fought in public, and a series of provocative press releases issued by Seatwave has angered the German industry in recent weeks. In the case of a tour by popular act Die Ärzte, Seatwave’s headline read “Die Ärzte Tour Sold Out – Fans finding backdoor into venues,” despite tickets still being available.
Regarding the cancellation of a Tokyo Hotel tour, Seatwave’s press release – with the headline: “Fans peeved about the loss of money” – was actually about additional insurance the company offers to cover the additional ticket prices paid by fans. In response, the band’s agent, Alex Richter at Four Artists agency, issued his own press release warning against resale portals. And the most recent release came from the Wacken Open Air festival team, who issued a similar warning.
“I think in the long run there will be an EU law concerning the resale of tickets,” Lieberberg says. “It’s important to keep people like Seatwave out of our side of the business. They contribute nothing to the music business. They’re just a beneficiary that’s trying to push itself into it, for no reason other than capitalistic purpose.”
In response to the increasingly public furore, Seatwave later retracted the comments of its MD, saying: “The release was not drafted, approved or authorized for distribution by Seatwave...we regret that our passion for our fan-to-fan ticket exchange got ahead of our approval process. We have good relationships with many promoters in Germany, and we value their partnerships.”
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