Notice how socialists never talk about seizing the wealth of George Soros or any of the other multi-billionaires who bankroll their operations. They would be praising Elon to the sky, and vigorously protecting his wealth, if he were politically on their side.
Reminder that the Biden admin set up a hotline for migrant children to report issues with sponsors.
65k calls went UNANSWERED
Only ONE person was assigned to answer calls
450k kids were placed with unvetted sponsors. Some were r*ped over 600 times.
DHS rescued 146k kids so far.
Nobody has gone to prison for this yet.
As if we needed any more evidence…
This poor Spurs fan, man. You can see the look on his face when he turns around after someone tries to rip the jersey off - He’s incredibly nervous. And the person trying to light his hair on fire?! I’ve seen it all. Knicks fans are garbage 🗑️
Inflation would have taken a $35 concert ticket to about $50 today. The jump to $350 came from a change in how the music business makes its money.
Fifteen years ago, the concert was an ad. Artists made their money selling albums, and the tour was there to sell more CDs. Then streaming showed up and wrecked that. Spotify pays about $0.003 to $0.005 per play, so an artist with 10 million plays in a year makes around $30,000. Money from recorded music fell so far it hit bottom in 2014 at $13.1 billion, down from $22 billion in the CD days. The album stopped paying the bills.
So the tour became the paycheck instead of the ad. For many working musicians it now brings in up to 80% of their income. Even Taylor Swift, the biggest streaming artist alive, made 91% of her 2018 money on tour and under 6% from streaming. When the live show is the only thing left to sell, it gets priced that way.
Then there is who controls the tickets. Live Nation and Ticketmaster merged in 2010 and never let go. Ticketmaster now handles about 80% of tickets when they first go on sale at major venues, and Live Nation owns or runs close to 78% of the big outdoor amphitheaters. In April 2026, a jury in New York found the company ran an illegal monopoly that overcharged fans. Live Nation made a record $23 billion in 2024.
Fees pile on top. A 2018 government report found fees add about 27% to a ticket's price, and a look at 40 recent concerts put it closer to 28%. That turns two $100 tickets into a $256 bill. To be fair, the venue keeps most of that fee, not Ticketmaster, whose own share is only a few percent.
The biggest jump came from something newer. After the pandemic, promoters saw that fans would pay almost anything, so they turned on dynamic pricing, the same way airline seats cost more as a flight fills up. Bruce Springsteen's $400 seats shot up to $4,000 and $5,000 the moment they went on sale. Live Nation's own finance chief said it plainly: stadium tickets are now priced to scare off scalpers. That means setting the official price at whatever a scalper would charge, so the extra money goes to the artist and Ticketmaster instead of a reseller.
The $35 ticket made sense when a concert sold a $15 album. The $350 ticket makes sense when the concert is the product, the streaming money barely counts, and one company controls almost the whole path to the stage.
I come back to this speech every once in a while:
“in the 1,526 singles matches I played in my career, I won almost 80% of those matches
… what percentage of points do you think I won in those matches?
only 54%.”
There really aren’t any rules. You just go to court. If it fails, go to court again until a judge says you’re all set.
Want a 7th year?
Sure
Broke rules?
Ahhhh, it’s fine.
There AREN’T any rules.
@bretthave@t0rktanks Do not mess with the perfect round bowl. But from a fans perspective it actually sucks to watch a game because you’re packed in like sardines. Just my .02
@t0rktanks As a 52yo lifelong UM fan you’re both correct and incorrect. It is just “really big.”
BUT…the very unique feature that is hard to fathom is from the outside it’s only 2-3 stories tall. Once you walk inside you realize it’s built in the ground. Field level is where it’s mammoth.