Following the recent spat of early Warped Tour announcements, it appears some bands have been attempting to take advantage of the large amount of publicity and possibilities for corporate sponsorship surrounding the tour. Warped Tour founder, Kevin Lyman explained the situation thusly:

Basically we've become aware of several bands that have not been booked on the 2006 Warped Tour who are soliciting sponsorship money from companies by claiming that they're playing on next year's tour. We're already aware of a couple of bands that have been telling companies they're playing Warped, and we're finding out about more every day. And when we do, those bands are banned from not just next year's tour, but all future editions of Warped. We don't tolerate fraud.

In terms of the effect on your average Warped-goer, Lyman had this to say:

Everybody knows that Warped has cheap tickets, and that's because we rely on corporate sponsors. And when bands try to rip those sponsors off, it not only confuses the marketplace, but it can only make the price of tickets go up…

He went on to say that this possibly hurts not only the fans, but also their fellow musicians in confirmed bands and the relationship between the tour and the sponsors that keep the ticket prices low.

No names of offending groups were specifically mentioned.