TICKETMASTER APOLOGIZES

Irving Azoff, legendary record label dude and artist manager turned Ticketmaster CEO wrote an open letter to Bruce Springsteen, his management and his fans over the recent fracas over Bruce tickets. It's posted at Bruce's website, Backstreets, and a few other places. He said, among other things, that they would no longer provide links to Ticketsnow (Ticketmaster's scalping site) without the consent of the artist and the venue, if offering to refund fans the difference between the price of tickets they purchased at Ticketsnow and the face value (but asked not to abuse it - it is only if they inadvertently bought the tickets not realizing it was from a scalper.  As if anyone will feel guilty about ripping off Ticketmaster!).  And they say that scalpers don't get preferential treatment.  Hard to believe when they were reselling tickets 15 minutes after they went on sale, for up to $1000. It's a mess, but it's cool to see an industry giant grovel.