FEAT held its annual general meeting in Barcelona on Thursday 19th October.
Discussions about lobbying priorities for the coming year focused on the role of online search advertising in supporting predatory ticket resale. It’s estimated that Google is responsible for driving two thirds of traffic to Viagogo.
The EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA) brought in tough new measures from August requiring large search engines to clamp down on illegal product listings. These include working with risk-affected parties to carry out assessments of ‘systemic risks’ relating to illegal content.
FEAT members agreed that by failing to properly consider the continued prevalence of illegal ticket resale advertising, large search engines may already be in breach of their new responsibilities.
FEAT is also looking to adjust ticket T&Cs to enable event organisers to de-list resale ticket listings more aggressively via the Digital Services Act’s notice and action mechanisms once the regulation comes into force more widely in the New Year.
The AGM also saw FEAT plan the next phase of its consumer awareness campaign Make Tickets Fair!. Working with live event professionals, this will feed messaging into official announcements from artists, festivals and venues to help fans buy tickets safely.
FEAT welcomed new member Kiki Ressler, Managing Director of KKT, a significant booking and touring company in Germany, representing 64 artists including Die Toten Hosen and Die Ärzte.
FEAT founding director and founder & CEO of Doctor Music Neo Sala, who hosted this year’s AGM, said: “With new Europe-wide regulations coming into effect for predatory resale platforms in the New Year, we united at a critical moment. During the meeting we agreed exciting plans to use the DSA to get illegal ticket resale listings taken down, as well as ramp up the “Make Tickets Fair!” campaign to help educate music fans on safe ticketing.”