LONDON (CelebrityAccess MediaWire) — The outcry of fans irate over Harvey Goldsmith's efforts to deter ticket scalpers from making a buck off of Led Zep's reunion has become a cacophony. The controversy arose when Goldsmith introduced a lottery to determine who had a chance to get a passcode to use to purchase tickets, reasoning that it would level the playing field. Perhaps inevitably, some of the lottery winners seeing the chance for green, sold their ticket passcodes, leading Harvey to state that he intends to cancel any ticket of any concert-goer who's name doesn't match the passcode.
"Now for the small minority, if you think that you can beat the system by buying from eBay or any other website you are wrong, you will NOT be allowed in to the concert and your application for tickets will be cancelled within the next 14 days." Harvey wrote on his blog.
The decision outlined in this post has garnered more than 1,200 responses, most of which are irate fans who shelled out money for an eBay ticket or even used the credit card of a friend or family-member to purchase tickets. Fans have been quick to point out that this approach doesn't hurt the scalpers, who make money either way, rather the fans who, after shelling out major gelt for a code, are left with naught but a scrap of worthless paper and unfulfilled dreams of what might have been.
Although some angry Zep fans are even talking about class action suits, it remains to be seen if there is sufficient legal ground to support a lawsuit. Lawsuit or not, it remains unlikely that this furor will subside before the concert if Goldsmith continues in his present course.
"Bonham, Grant and Ertegun will be turning in their graves. Harvey, you've cocked it ROYAL." wrote one fan "All this has cast a shadow over the whole thing. We should be talking about the gig, like a brotherhood of fans. But no, Harvey's personal war against the touts has tainted the whole event." – CelebrityAccess Staff Writers
