Being reminded by a friend that Tom Waits tickets go on-sale this Friday, I quickly looked for the ticketing method for the show thinking that it may not be Ticketmaster (as Tom is a bit unconventional), but indeed it was.  The other interesting thing was that there are no tickets available for his shows this tour.  Ever.  Welcome to paperless tickets.

If you visit the Ticketmaster section for the tour,  you’ll notice a sort of ticketing-for-dummies explanation of how this works.  Online and phone orders, credit-card only.  Does anyone still buy tickets by phone?  Anyone miss queuing up at a random grocery store which happens to have a Ticketmaster outlet? I personally will never forget waiting for tickets to go on-sale for an industrial music show, at a Macys with a bunch of fans who probably have never been in a Macys before that.

In an effort to thwart scalping (although you could argue that any Ticketmaster-sold ticket is pre-scalped given the over-the-top surcharges), admission to the venue is only granted via ID and credit-card and only one guest is allowed with you.  Tickets are non-transferable.  Given that Tom does not have the cheapest tickets (see memory here) , it would be a shame if your boss made you work late, your child was violently ill or you became grounded and could not pass on $100+ tickets to a friend.

But tying a ticket to the person who ordered them still seems like the best way to prevent black market sales.  But it’s a bit like DRM for music… you are penalizing the person who pays legally with some handcuffed rules.