{"id":6601,"date":"2026-03-13T12:42:29","date_gmt":"2026-03-13T12:42:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nicheblog.top\/worldpostone\/2026\/03\/13\/live-nation-employees-caught-mocking-customers-in-leaked-comments\/"},"modified":"2026-03-13T12:42:29","modified_gmt":"2026-03-13T12:42:29","slug":"live-nation-employees-caught-mocking-customers-in-leaked-comments","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nicheblog.top\/worldpostone\/2026\/03\/13\/live-nation-employees-caught-mocking-customers-in-leaked-comments\/","title":{"rendered":"Live Nation Employees Caught Mocking Customers In Leaked Comments"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/loudwire.com\/tags\/live-nation\/\" target=\"_blank\">Live Nation<\/a> employees described ticket buyers as &#8220;so stupid&#8221; and joked about &#8220;robbing them blind&#8221; in private messages from the company&#8217;s internal Slack account.<\/p>\n<p>The exchanges were collected as part of a 2024 antitrust lawsuit filed by the U.S. Department of Justice against Live Nation and Ticketmaster, which was <a href=\"https:\/\/loudwire.com\/live-nation-antitrust-settlement\/\" target=\"_blank\">tentatively settled<\/a> earlier this week. Live Nation would be ordered to open ticketing deals to other vendors and to pay up to $280 million in damages.<\/p>\n<p>The federal government had been joined by attorneys general from 39 states and the District of Columbia who said Live Nation and Ticketmaster had <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/livenation-antitrust-justice-department-0a6ef66f497e5f626096de753bfff8ce\" target=\"_blank\">maintained an illegal stranglehold<\/a> on the live entertainment industry, leading to higher prices for consumers amid fewer alternative options.<\/p>\n<h3>What Did the Live Nation Employees Say About Ticket Buyers?<\/h3>\n<p>The two Live Nation employees were Florida regional ticketing director Ben Baker and Virginia regional ticketing director Jeff Weinhold, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/12\/arts\/music\/live-nation-ticketmaster-trial-fees-slacks.html\" target=\"_blank\"><em>The New York Times<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;These people are so stupid. I almost feel bad taking advantage of them,&#8221; Baker reportedly wrote after customers paid $199 for &#8220;VIP Club Admission&#8221; at a <a href=\"https:\/\/loudwire.com\/tags\/kid-rock\/\" target=\"_blank\">Kid Rock<\/a> concert in 2022. The <em>Times<\/em> said Weinhold responded: &#8220;I have VIP parking up to $250 lol.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><b>READ MORE:\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/loudwire.com\/artists-combat-scummy-ticket-practices\/\" target=\"_blank\">10 Artists Who Tried Their best to Combat Scummy Ticket Practices<\/a><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Because this was a private Slack message,&#8221; Live Nation said in a news release, &#8220;leadership learned of this when the public did and will be looking into the matter promptly.&#8221; They argued that the comments should be excluded from evidence at trial, describing this as an &#8220;irrelevant&#8221; private exchange that did not reflect company policy.<\/p>\n<p>Lawyers from the U.S. Justice Department countered that the messages instead &#8220;provide a candid, contemporaneous look into how they view the prices that Live Nation charges fans for ancillary services at their respective venues.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Also in 2022, Baker appeared to openly mock ticket buyers who added a &#8220;premier parking&#8221; option that netted an unnamed venue some $666,000 in 2021. &#8220;Robbing them blind baby,&#8221; he wrote, according to the report. &#8220;That&#8217;s how we do.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Below, see a bunch of musicians who have tried their best to combat scummy concert ticket practices through the years.<\/p>\n<div class=\"photogallery-wrapper blog-photogallery \">\n<h2 class=\"photogallery-title\">Artists Who Tried Their Best to Combat Scummy Concert Ticket Practices<\/h2>\n<p class=\"photogallery-credit\">Gallery Credit: Jacklyn Krol<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><script src=\"https:\/\/loudwire.com\/rest\/carbon\/api\/scripts.js?mver=168&#038;gver=9&#038;bid=366&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Fbtloader.com%2Ftag%3Fo%3D5642230212591616%26upapi%3Dtrue&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Fcdn.p-n.io%2Fpushly-sdk.min.js%3Fdomain_key%3DRRv3qtOHmtGBG8AXI2xRyXQoxt5kKsM0YQjZ&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Ftownsquare.media%2Fpublic%2Fresources%2Fjs%2Fpubcid.min.js&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Fplatform.twitter.com%2Fwidgets.js&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Fapis.google.com%2Fjs%2Fplatform.js&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Fconnect.facebook.net%2Fen_US%2Fsdk.js&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Fassets.pinterest.com%2Fjs%2Fpinit.js\" type=\"text\/javascript\" async defer data-osano=\"ESSENTIAL\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/loudwire.com\/live-nation-employees-mock-ticket-buyers-stupid\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Live Nation employees described ticket buyers as &#8220;so stupid&#8221; and joked about &#8220;robbing them blind&#8221; in private messages from the company&#8217;s internal Slack account. The exchanges were collected as part of a 2024 antitrust lawsuit filed by the U.S. Department of Justice against Live Nation and Ticketmaster, which was tentatively settled earlier this week. Live [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6602,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6601","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-rock"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nicheblog.top\/worldpostone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6601","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nicheblog.top\/worldpostone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nicheblog.top\/worldpostone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nicheblog.top\/worldpostone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nicheblog.top\/worldpostone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6601"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nicheblog.top\/worldpostone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6601\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nicheblog.top\/worldpostone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nicheblog.top\/worldpostone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nicheblog.top\/worldpostone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nicheblog.top\/worldpostone\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}