LOS ANGELES (Hollywod Reporter) - America Online is plunging deeper into the growing online business of reselling tickets to rock concerts, sporting events and other live shows.

The Time Warner unit is set to announce Tuesday that it has lined up TicketsNow.com as the second partner in the ticketing endeavor, having previously struck a deal with StubHub.com.

While AOL has been selling secondary live-event tickets for several months, it had been doing so without a dedicated Web home until Tuesday's official unveiling of http://www.AOLTicketMarketplace.com. The service also is available at AOL CityGuide and for subscribers at the appropriate AOL keyword.

In gathering competing ticketers StubHub and TicketsNow under one virtual roof, AOL is following a strategy it laid out more than five years ago with its primary ticketing business, when it partnered with Ticketmaster, Tickets.com, Telecharge.com, Showtickets.com and Cygnus.

TicketsNow purchases tickets on the open market and resells them for a profit. StubHub, whose investors include Hall of Fame quarterback Steve Young and Hollywood executives Frank Biondi and Michael Fuchs, among others, has a different business model. It allows users to sell or buy tickets in a model similar to eBay.

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Concert Tickets, Sports Tickets, Broadway Tickets, Family Show Tickets

posted by ADMIN @ Tuesday, August 23, 2005