“Live music will not be affected by the internet.” That line was trotted out regularly by the naive and the mentally lazy, but the arrival of online ticket exchanges demonstrates the simplicity of such thinking. For some gigs, it is estimated that between a fifth and a quarter of all tickets are changing hands over the net, with none of the cash generated going back to the artists.

Some, such as the promoter Harvey Goldsmith, want to ban touting. He wants a simple system of ticket exchange, where the only price paid is the face value. But the demand for some events will be such that banning the resale of tickets is simply unrealistic. Should England rugby fans have been criminalised just because their team unexpectedly reached the World Cup final and they wanted to go?

Meanwhile, artists, managers and owners complain that they are losing money on a trade that they have generated. The ticket exchanges say that a ticket is an item of property and that the owner should be free to sell it on if they wish. The debate is marred because self-interest on both sides is all too obvious.

What matters is what happens to the consumer. The worry is that if trends continue, then concert-going will not be the same again. Events will sell out more quickly - if not immediately – ticket prices will be pushed up and consumers will be at greater risk of online fraud, where tickets supposedly on offer turn out to be fakes.

It is hard to regulate concert pricing, and when well-meaning bands, such as the Arctic Monkeys, try to keep ticket prices down, that creates an opportunity for touts. However, promoters could introduce better security. It might not be cost-effective to have a Led Zeppelin-style system for every event – where those going in had to bring proof of identity – but at events where there is a risk of tickets being cornered, online and telephone purchases could be prevented.

Standards elsewhere are too low. EBay makes no effort to police ticket sales, unlike other exchanges, such as Viagogo. That needs to be made clearer to the public. Yet even Viagogo falls short by not making it clear to buyers who is selling the tickets. At least then it would be obvious if somebody was trying to corner the market for an event. The resale of tickets is not a problem. A price squeeze is.

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