Rhian Jones

The fight against the secondary ticketing market – where online scalpers buy large amounts of gig tickets to sell on for a marked-up price – has been relentless over the past few years. Artists, managers and promoters have waged public campaigns against the business that’s worth an estimated $8 billion a year worldwide.All that cash doesn’t make its way back into the music industry, for the most part, and customers are losing out too as it renders the ticket buying process on the primary market arduous for in-demand shows. Touts use computer programmes, so-called “bots”, to snap up tonnes of tickets as soon as sale opens, leaving fans refreshing the page continuously in the hope of eventually reaching the front of the queue.If the show sells out before they’ve made it, their only option is to pay the sometimes extortionate prices that touts ask for tickets on the secondary market via sites like Viagogo, StubHub and Seatwave/Get Me In, which are sometimes fraudulent. High prices and a frustrating buying experience angers the consumer, and starts to damage the relationship that keeps the music industry buoyant: the one between the artist and their fan.

Music streaming is arguably the hottest topic in the music industry. Eight years ago Spotify was founded, and many other players have since entered the market: Deezer, WiMP and most recently Beats to name a few. And while streaming platforms are made in heaven for the consumer, some artists and labels have struggled to accept it as the future of music listening habits. Thom Yorke famously called it “the last desperate fart of a dying corpse” late last year and much ado has been made about ‘unfair’ royalty payments.