Open your Web browser.

Insert "Big Ticket Seller Tried Deal With Scalpers" into the Google window.

Hit return to get results.

Your very first result, under "News results for Big Ticket Seller Tried Deal with Scalpers", with the title "Big Ticket Seller Tried Deal With Scalpers" next to a tiny picture of a newspaper, should work.  Click on this one, right underneath it it will say "Wall Street Journal" in green.

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HOW THIS HAPPENED

I have a subscription to the "Wall Street Journal".  Both print and online.  It’s almost five hundred bucks.  They offer discount subscriptions to students and first time subscribers, but I didn’t want to lie.  But aren’t they asking you to lie?

So, in Safari, I’ve entered my name and registration.  I’ve got full access to wsj.com in that browser. So, I test links in Firefox, where I intentionally haven’t inserted my name and password for the "Journal".

So, I Google the article and see if it’s readable by non-subscribers.
The first time, I made a mistake.  I linked to an old article.  You should read this too!  Because most people did not.  Stated therein is the fact that the acts are guilty of scalping their own tickets.

I was ultimately notified that this was the wrong link.

I was e-mailed a supposedly correct link, tested it, it did not work, it did not show the complete article.  I Googled, got a link that worked, and then copied and pasted this URL in the missive I just sent you.  Little did I know that even though you might be looking at the right page online, you cannot get the complete page by cutting and pasting this URL.

Sound complicated?  IT IS!

MAINSTREAM MEDIA

The average person does not read the "Wall Street Journal".  Certainly not the average concertgoer.  So, what is written there reaches the main offenders, the bigwigs atop the concert companies, yet goes no further.  In other words, if a tree falls in a forest, does it make a sound?

It’s like releasing your music on a copy-protected CD.  You’ll reach your core audience, but word can’t spread, not unless someone literally goes to a fan’s house and listens.  As for radio playing it…  Today’s media is so weak, outlets don’t even re-report what the WSJ says, it’s not SEXY ENOUGH!  Better to write you can’t get Springsteen tickets/Ticketmaster is EVIL!

So the truth can’t come out.

Which way do newspapers want it? Are they about having an impact, or making a difference?  It’s their choice.  Did you read that article about the newspaper that charged a fortune online and then saw its physical numbers go up?  Check it out here: This News Doesn’t Want to Be Free

I think papers are entitled to make money.  But they can’t have it both ways.  They can’t be the omnipresent, omniscient voice of reason, yet make the public unable to view the product.  As for linking to a story…  The newspapers can insure that their articles don’t appear in Google just by adjusting code on their site.  In other words, it’s not Google/the linker’s problem!

God.

And you wonder why this story had no impact…