Ticketmaster Beats Injunction Request

Songkick, an online ticket-selling company, filed suit against TM last year claiming the ticketing giant was unfairly defining which fan clubs would be able to access the standard 8-10 percent of tickets traditionally held and sold through presales.

TM claimed that it was within its rights to define which fan clubs were legitimate and which were simply seeking to gain access to discounted tickets for resale. The plaintiff claimed in March that TM began demanding artists using Songkick pay TM’s standard ticketing fees, citing examples with Alabama Shakes and “Weird Al” Yankovic shows.

Songkick asked the court to prevent TM from charging the fees but the court ruled that in winning the contract the Live Nation division was within its rights to decide whether to allocate tickets to fan clubs for presales.

Zeeshan Zaidi, Ticketmaster senior VP and GM of artist services, said Songkick “is a serial violator of Ticketmaster’s fan club policy” and “largely got away with trafficking in ticketing rights that belong to Ticketmaster” because it “exploited the fact that it is difficult and costly for Ticketmaster to monitor the fan club policy,” according to court documents.

Another issue Songkick raised with the Live Nation/Ticketmaster merger was also dismissed, but the company said it will continue following through on the conspiracy and unfair competition elements of its current suit.