@K Leonard

I understand your point, but your example is a bit off.
Is it worth it for me to fly to South Africa to buy a diamond for $100 rather than pay someone here in the USA $3000 for it?
the problem is the "overhead" expense, which would cost about $3000 in flight costs, not including transportation on arrival and having to know where to look to get these diamonds, with no guarantee that I'm getting a real one. Add to that the time I have to take off to get there and it's worth paying the extra "fee".

When it comes to tickets, two things:

(1) going to a ticket booth will not usually give you any monetary discount, even though you think it would
(2) going there doesn't guarantee that you get a ticket

Is it worth going out of your way for the same chance of getting a ticket at the same price?
Unfortunately, this is why ticketmaster has gotcha, through their strong-arm tactics against the entertainment industry.