(Opening music plays, followed by the sound of a sarcastic British accent)
Jimmy Carr (style): “Well, well, well, what do we have here? It seems some people are willing to pay an absolute fortune to watch Taylor Swift’s arse all night. I mean, who wouldn’t want to spend thousands of dollars to look at the back of a stage, right? It’s not like you can just, I don’t know, listen to her album or something. No, no, no. You need to be in the stadium, surrounded by screaming fans, with a massive screen blocking your view of the stage. It’s like the ultimate immersive experience… of not seeing the show.”
Rowan Atkinson (style): “Ah, the absurdity of it all. I mean, really, 31,000 percent markup on tickets with no view of the stage? It’s like selling tickets to a restaurant where you can’t see the food, but you can smell the kitchen. ‘Oh, yes, I’ll have the steak, please. No, no, I don’t need to see it, just give me the aroma.’ Ridiculous!”
Ricky Gervais (style): “You know, I was talking to a friend the other day, and he said, ‘I’m going to see Taylor Swift in Vancouver.’ I said, ‘Oh, great, where are you sitting?’ He said, ‘Behind the stage.’ I said, ‘What, you mean you’re paying to watch the roadies?’ He said, ‘No, I’m paying to be in the same room as Taylor Swift.’ I said, ‘But you won’t be able to see her.’ He said, ‘That’s okay, I’ll just watch it on my phone.’ I said, ‘You’re paying thousands of dollars to watch a video on your phone? You might as well stay home and watch it on YouTube.'”
Lee Evans (style): “I mean, what’s the logic behind this? ‘I want to see Taylor Swift, but I don’t want to see the stage.’ It’s like buying a car without wheels. ‘I just want to sit in it and listen to the engine.’ Or buying a holiday to a beautiful beach, but only if you can stay in the hotel room with the curtains closed. ‘I just want to hear the sound of the waves, but I don’t want to see the sea.'”
(Sarcastic tone) “But hey, who are we to judge? If people want to spend their hard-earned cash on tickets with no view of the stage, that’s their prerogative. I mean, it’s not like they’re buying a timeshare or something. Oh wait, it’s exactly like that.”
(Deadpan) “And the best part is, StubHub is allowing people to relist their tickets if their plans change. So, if you buy a ticket for $5,200 and then realize you’d rather stay home and watch Netflix, you can just sell it to someone else for an even higher price. It’s like a never-ending cycle of stupidity.”
(Concluding in a cheeky tone) “Well, there you have it, folks. The art of buying tickets to a concert where you can’t see the stage. It’s a bold move, but hey, if it’s what the people want, who are we to argue? Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to buy some tickets to a Justin Bieber concert… with a great view of the parking lot.”
Here is the rewritten article:
Is a glimpse of Taylor Swift’s stage setup worth a small fortune? Apparently, to some die-hard fans, it is.
On November 25, a new batch of tickets for Swift’s Eras Tour shows in Vancouver, scheduled for December 6, 7, and 8, was released on Ticketmaster. These tickets, however, came with a major caveat: they offered restricted or no view of the stage, earning them the moniker “listening” tickets. Their original price tag? A relatively modest $17, plus additional fees.
However, it didn’t take long for resellers to swoop in and buy up the tickets. Within hours, they had already popped up on resale sites like StubHub, sporting price tags that were significantly – we’re talking thousands of dollars – higher than their original prices. The markup on the most expensive tickets, which boast zero view of the stage, is a whopping 31,000 percent.
It’s possible that fans with no view of the stage might be able to livestream the show on their phones, thanks to BC Place’s 5G network upgrade. This could render the whole “no view” thing a little more palatable. On the other hand, for those who want to experience the full visual spectacle of a Taylor Swift concert, be prepared to shell out significantly more: the highest-priced tickets on StubHub, which offer an unobstructed view of the stage, are currently going for a staggering $24,144 each.
V.I.A. has reached out to StubHub for more information on the resale of these tickets and will update this story when new information becomes available.
