Facebook Offering Tickets in Pact With Ticketmaster, Four Others

NEW YORK - Five major ticket sellers, including Ticketmaster and StubHub, launched an online store on Facebook Wednesday night to offer tickets via the social network, the Los Angeles Times reported. ScoreBig, Eventbrite and TicketFly are the other partners hoping to tap into Facebook's 800 million users to boost their sales.

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Facebook last fall unveiled first moves to position itself as an entertainment hub that allows its users to share and discover music, videos and concerts, among other things.

Ticketmaster's Facebook application uses a person's list of favorite bands and genres of music as well as location to suggest upcoming concerts near-by that could interest the person.

"We can use that data to make targeted recommendations about what people want to go see," Kip Levin, Ticketmaster's executive vp of e-commerce, told the Times. He and other industry executives estimate that about half of concert tickets go unsold because fans weren't aware that a musician or band was in town.

Email: Georg.Szalai@thr.com

Twitter: @georgszalai