pure bullshit, i'm sure ticket prices is going to go up.

Subject: pure bullshit, i'm sure ticket prices is going to go up.

Ticketmaster and Live Nation Win Approval To Merge
By BEN SISARIO

After months of scrutiny, the Justice Department announced on Monday that it had approved a merger of Ticketmaster Entertainment and Live Nation, creating a giant new company that could reshape almost every aspect of the live entertainment business.

The new company, to be called Live Nation Entertainment, would dominate touring, management and ticketing.

In a deal widely seen as the Obama administration’s first major antitrust ruling, the two companies will be allowed to merge, with certain concessions. Ticketmaster must sell one of its ticketing divisions, Paciolan, to Comcast-Spectacor, and must also license its ticketing software to a competing concert promoter, AEG. In addition, the combined company will be subject to anticompetitive provisions for 10 years.

“After a rigorous investigation we concluded that the transaction as originally proposed was anticompetitive,” Christine Varney, the assistant attorney general in charge of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division, said during a news conference. “But required divestitures and behavioral prohibitions alleviate our concerns.”

Live Nation and Ticketmaster released statements in support of the decision, and said they would proceed with the merger, which must still be approved by United States District Court in Washington.

In 2008 Ticketmaster sold about 141 million tickets worth $8.9 billion, and Live Nation is by far the world’s largest concert promoter, producing some 22,000 events. In addition, both companies have significant assets: Ticketmaster owns a controlling interest in Front Line Management, which manages more than 200 major touring artists, including the Eagles, Neil Diamond, Van Halen and Miley Cyrus, and Live Nation owns or operates about 120 theaters around the world.

Ticketmaster and Live Nation have argued that their combined company would reduce inefficiencies in the marketing and presentation of live events, which would help to revive the music industry and benefit consumers.

“The music business is in far worse shape that most people realize,” Irving Azoff, Ticketmaster’s chief executive, said last year in a hearing called by the antitrust subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary Committee. “We cannot keep doing things that no longer work. This merger will allow the live music industry to avoid repeating the mistakes of the record business.”

Ms. Varney said the Justice Department’s decision would preserve competition. “We expect that we will see prices coming down,” she said.

But the merger, which was proposed last February, has drawn wide complaints from consumer groups, lawmakers and competitors.

Representative Bill Pascrell Jr., Democrat of New Jersey, who has been a vocal opponent of the deal, said in a statement released on Monday afternoon that he was disappointed with the ruling.

“The American people need to be told how DOJ decided that this deal, even with the concessions made, passes muster with our nation’s antitrust laws,” he said in the statement. “Moving forward, as these two companies with a history of anti-consumer behavior are poised to join together into an entertainment behemoth, I will be keeping a close eye on how the Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission enforce any conditions they impose on this new entity to ensure consumers are protected.”

http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/01/25/ticketmaster-and-live-nation-get-approval-to-merge/?hp