[ghaff]

In general, I guess I'm confused why someone wanting a ticket to an event wouldn't at least check to see whether it was available and for how much on the venue/organization's own site. It would certainly be the first place I'd look for tickets.

Sure, if there's nothing available or available seats aren't great, I might suck it up and go to a ticket broker if I really wanted to see something. But my assumption going in would be that I should expect to pay a big premium.

Maybe there are people out there who aren't price sensitive and default to making ticket purchases through StubHub or whatever, but I have trouble believing it's the norm.

I'd just add that although I don't really think dynamic pricing is a good idea here, presumably the San Francisco Opera, like many such organizations, does price discriminate is various ways: VIP seating, student tickets, more expensive weekend tickets, etc.