First off, this is essentially a direct clone of Fansnap.com's UI; I'd be surprised if SeatGeek didn't get heat over it. And since Fansnap has taken something like 10 times the funding Seatgeak has, it's not a move I would have personally made. But it sure is ballsy!
Secondly, I created interactive seating maps for TicketStumbler in one day using image maps and JS instead of any fancy (read: quality) canvas/SVG stuff. Turns out that was good enough to get StubHub to ban us from their API without so much as a notice. The ticketing affiliate industry is as shady and predatory as they come; if your product is similar to or better than a "partner" site's, don't think blackmail is beyond them or even outside the norm. All of which is to say, in this industry it pays to spend as little time as possible on features that you may be forced to disable or dumb down. Today, TS' maps are either disabled entirely or reduced in utility, literally to avoid being as good as StubHub's.
Although, with StubHub quickly making themselves irrelevant in the affiliate space by reducing commissions to near-zero, maybe it won't be such a huge deal this time around. Their affiliate manager would contact us the same day we released something StubHub didn't like; no other site has been quite that bad.
All that being said, I really hope Seatgeek does well. It would be amazing to have one honest, successful startup in this space that isn't run by a suit factory.