In the short term, there are a fixed number of hard drives (and beach balls, and microwave ovens, ...). Why don't we have to worry about hard drive scalpers artificially constraining the supply?
It would be determined mostly by price, and this would just be another version of the supply/demand curve. If he sells the tickets at $20 each, then 100k will want to see his show. At $50 each, 10k people, and so on.
There is a much smaller quantity of seats that need to be acquired to scalp the market and push out competition. The spread is much higher if you know there is a relatively high demand that cannot be justifiably spent elsewhere.
Shows are much more constrained. It's the very specific "skilled labor" involved (only one person can produce a show in only one city, maybe two a night). Imagine if you needed a hard drive factory in each city and only one factory could run at a time.
I can't buy a show for Denver. I might not even be able to buy a show for Friday nights. That severely limits the pool of "supply" I can buy from. Louis might be in my city once a year for a few days if I'm lucky.
How often would CK have to perform to make scalping essentially a non-issue?
More than once a year I would guess. But once a month? Every week?
What factors determine this?