Problem with scalpers is they reduce the supply of the tickets endemically, thus driving the market price up. If the scalpers aren't involved at all, the market price is lower than the scalped price.
So what? They're not adding any value in the equation, they're just parasitically extracting wealth from all other entities. What's the point of that from a social perspective?
Indeed. And what is the incentive for an artist to allow his/her fans to have their wealth extracted by a third party? None. It only makes the fans less able to buy things from the artist in the future.
Louis C.K. is cultivating/nurturing his fans like a gardener cultivates/nurtures a plant. That clearly includes not letting insects eat the leaves off of a plant one intends to get an ongoing crop from.
I still don't see how that is an incentive to allow a third party to extract anything from the transaction. He could run an auction for tickets himself to satisfy that desire (if he had it).
You're not going to be able to sell this on HN. The HFT apologists will come invade this thread and go on for paragraphs on end about how market makers provide a valuable service that would otherwise not be provided.
Without scalpers (HFT) apparently absolutely no commerce in the relevant market would ever occur.
