Aventus Blockchain-Based Ticketing System Aims To Wipe Out Ticket Touts (theguardian.com)

umafuckit writes: The Guardian reports on Aventus, an open-source protocol designed to eliminate fraud and touting for large events. The Aventus Protocol "would allow event organizers to give each ticket a unique identity that is tied to its owner. Since each ticket is a linked list of records, where each new one contains an encrypted version of the previous one, they cannot be faked. The software also allows event promoters to keep an easy record of who owns the ticket, which means they can control the prices. The protocol was launched at Imperial College London last week and will be trialed at this year's world cup, where it will handle 10,000 ticket sales.

Comments

Traditional database

[enriquevagu]

Isn't it possible to implement this using a traditional, centralized database, instead of a blockchain?

Re:Traditional database

[Anonymous Coward]

No. In 2018 definitely not. If it ain't got many AIs and is not very blockchain, nobody will use it nor will mention it in the news.

P.S. It makes sense to use digital signatures with public key cryptography to allow offline verification without lookups into the centralized DB, but there is absolutely no point in chaining the tickets together, nor using any distributed voting mechanisms.

Re:Useful for software bug report tickets, too?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Thing which already exists, except implemented using blockchain instead" is only a good idea if you're a contractor looking to generate billable hours out of buzzwords.

Re:For those of us who are Yanks

[Zocalo]

Based on TFS I'm guessing they'll be recording the name of the purchaser of the ticket(s) in the blockchain and somehow using this to try and prevent resale or transfer of the tickets by comparing that info with an ID at the venue. I'm assuming they've got a system that allows for tickets bought for a group, as a gift, for use as a prize, or any other legitimate scenarios where the specific individual(s) attending the event might not be known at time of purchase and/or the actual purchaser might not be present, but that's not strictly necessary if they are prepared to accept the lost sales that might result if they don't.

Of course, they could do all that with just a regular database that links a unique ticket serial number to the ticket's purchaser or intended user at the original sale with no block chain required, but that wouldn't have quite the same effect at generating hype and (more importantly) investment money, would it?

Better Ways to Eliminate Scalping

[crow]

The way I would eliminate scalping is to schedule a decreasing ticket price. Buy on the first day, and the prices are $1000. They drop $100 for each of the next four days. Then they drop $50 for the next 5 days. Then they drop more slowly as the event gets closer.

Or something like that.

The point is that if you buy them up early to scalp them, you'll have trouble making a profit. If the fans really want to pay $500 for front-row tickets, the artists (or their promoters) get the money, not the scalpers.