I'm a big Springsteen fan and he's touring small venues this year, acoustically. Tickets for most of the first leg went on sale last week and promptly sold out. The problem? The Boss doesn't have an NPGMC, and a ton of tickets ended up with - surprise! - scalpers.

I visit several Springsteen forums, and the boards there are ripe with complaints. Can't say as I blame them. Something's wrong when the best tickets show up on eBay and scalper websites five minutes after they went on sale.

I've been to five Prince shows as an NPGMC member - four Musicology shows and one One Night Alone show. Every time, I got no worse than third row. Yeah, I had to be quick with a mouse when the tickets went onsale, but obviously, I wasn't competing with a multitude of scalpers for the good seats.

And for that, I will be eternally grateful.

Once, during an impromtu autograph signing session, Muhamed Ali was approached by an middle age man. Ali handed the gentleman a signed picture which he kindly refused by saying "i want nothing from you, Champ. You have given us all too much already".