There’s no question Taylor Swift is one of the biggest pop stars on the planet. Since her debut album in 2006, Swift has sold over 200 million records, making her one of the best-selling music artists of all time. Her latest album, Midnights, made history by being the biggest album debut since Adele’s 25 and occupying the entire top ten spots on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. Swift has always been at the front of history-making moments but no Swiftie could have predicted how the “All Too Well” singer would change the world next.
When Swift announced “The Eras Tour,” we knew it was sure to be an event — but no one was prepared for the ticket presale to break Ticketmaster. Ticketmaster’s had its share of problems over the years; the company has been accused of holding a monopoly over the ticket-selling business, enabling them to price-gouge and charge exorbitantly in “additional fees” without being transparent about the added price.
In late October of last year, President Joe Biden announced a plan to go after Ticketmaster for its hidden fees and what the president called a “monopoly” on event tickets but did not disclose a timeline for cracking down on the ticket-selling company’s practices. Many concertgoers have been burned by Ticketmaster and were hopeful the industry giant would be taken down at last but not many would have thought Swift’s “The Eras Tour” would be the reason the company might finally see some consequences.
In what might seem like a strange turn of events, Swift plays a pivotal role in the Supreme Court’s attempt to dismantle Ticketmaster; but for those not caught up on the saga, the whole ordeal is just confusing. Fortunately, we’re here to help with a comprehensive timeline of the whole thing to better understand how a Taylor Swift tour might lead to Ticketmaster’s demise.
The Taylor Swift-Ticketmaster connection
The Ticketmaster debacle first began when Swift announced she would be going on tour following the release of her album Midnights. On Nov. 1, the singer went on Good Morning America to announce “The Eras Tour,” a tour celebrating the many stages of her career. At first, she dropped a touring schedule listing 27 shows but on Nov. 4, she added more shows due to demand. As we detailed at the beginning of this article, Swift is one of the biggest pop stars on the planet, and adding a paltry eight more shows was never going to be enough to satisfy the massive demand her tour generates and Swifties were pleasantly surprised on Nov. 11 when the “Blank Space” singer announced 17 more tour dates.
In order to buy tickets for the tour, fans had to sign up for Verified Fan Presale, ostensibly to avoid scalpers and bots from snatching the majority of the tickets, through Ticketmaster. Fans who registered successfully would be contacted on Nov. 14 via an email informing them they would either have access to the presale or be placed on a waiting list. For those who actually gained access, the presale would take place at 10 am local time of the venue the following day.
The day of reckoning
The long-awaited day arrived on Nov. 15 — the day of “The Eras Tour” presale. Those who were notified had access to the presale and entered the website right as the clock struck 10 but were greeted with error messages as the Ticketmaster site repeatedly crashed, overwhelmed by the number of would-be ticket buyers. If a fan actually made it to the queue, they would find themselves stuck in place behind thousands of others waiting for the increasingly unlikely chance to buy a ticket.
Politicians, like House Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, seized the moment to state their (overwhelmingly negative) opinions of Ticketmaster as fans shared their frustrations on social media. Ticketmaster quickly responded to the backlash, saying they were unprepared for the “historically unprecedented demand.” The company moved some West Coast times to later in the day and completely rescheduled the Capital One presale, which was supposed to take place later the same day.
On Nov. 17, Ticketmaster disappointed millions by canceling the general ticket sale, planned for Nov. 18. The company once again cited “extraordinarily high demands” as the reason for canceling as well as not having enough tickets to meet said demand. To add insult to injury, tickets were being resold for upwards of $40,000 on third-party platforms and fans urged Swift to sue Ticketmaster over the incident.
Taylor Swift decides to “Speak Now”
On Nov. 18, the day the now-canceled general sale was originally planned, Swift posted a statement on her Instagram story, airing her own frustrations with Ticketmaster, saying she and her team had checked in with the company multiple times to ensure they were prepared to meet the unprecedented demand for tickets. Ever appreciative, she finishes her statement by thanking the fans for “wanting to be there. You have no idea how much that means.”
“It goes without saying that I’m extremely protective of my fans. We’ve been doing this for decades together and over the years, I’ve brought so many elements of my career in house. I’ve done this SPECIFICALLY to improve the quality of my fans’ experience by doing it myself with my team who care as much about my fans as I do. It’s really difficult for me to trust an outside entity with these relationships and loyalties, and excruciating for me to just watch mistakes happen with no recourse.”
Ticketmaster posted their own lengthy statement shortly after, first apologizing to both Swift and her fans before explaining what happened. The company explained the reasoning behind the Verified Fan Presale, saying it’s designed to prevent bots from buying up tickets in lieu of real people; however, they acknowledged the “unprecedented” (there’s that word again) amount of fans entering the presale, combined with a staggering number of bot attacks, was too much for their servers to handle. They finished the statement by listing some records the presale broke as well as pledging to do better in the future.
The same day, the Dept. of Justice reportedly began investigating Ticketmaster.
The plot “swiftens”…
On Nov. 22, U.S. Senators Amy Klobuchar and Mike Lee announced they would hold a bipartisan senate hearing “on the lack of competition in the ticketing industry.” At the time, the two did not specify the exact date of the future hearing.
Things were quiet for a time — Swift did inform the public of a desire to switch places with Guillermo del Toro, ahead of plans to direct a feature film — but Swifties can never stay silent for long. According to Deadline, several dedicated fans moved forward with a lawsuit against Ticketmaster, asking for a $2,500 fine for every violation of California’s Cartwright Act and Unfair Competition Law. In the lawsuit, the fans accused the ticket company of intentionally allowing unverified scalpers and bots to access the Verified Fan presale, as well as encouraging scalpers in order to profit from additional fees. The suit also alleges Ticketmaster deceived fans by giving more presale access codes than there were tickets, knowing all the while they would never be able to satisfy fan demand.
On Dec. 12, Ticketmaster began contacting fans who participated in the presale without successfully buying tickets. Per Buzzfeed News, several Swifties received emails telling them they would get another chance to purchase tickets in light of their past ordeal. In a blog post, Ticketmaster further clarified the selected fans would get the chance to submit a request for up to two tickets, subject to availability, by Dec. 23. A nice gesture for sure, but how would Ticketmaster fair during the upcoming Senate trial?
This is why we can’t have nice things
Almost two months after the initial announcement, the antitrust senate council held the Ticketmaster hearing on Jan. 24 of this year. Immediately, the senators revealed themselves as the Swifties they have been all this time, dropping Swift song references whenever the opportunity presented itself. In her opening statement, Sen. Klobuchar began by saying competition was key to a “strong capitalist system… Something that unfortunately for this country — as an ode to Taylor Swift, I will say — we know all too well.” The two sides of the aisle came together during the hearing, both to dunk on Ticketmaster and to quote song lyrics as often as possible.
The senate questioned Live Nation’s (Ticketmaster’s parent company after a controversial merger in 2010) president Joe Berchtold — Sen. Richard Blumenthal first told him to look in the mirror and tell himself, “I’m the problem, it’s me” — and the president reiterated Ticketmaster apologizes to both Swifties and Swift herself for the fiasco. He blamed the problem primarily on bot attacks and told the Senate he welcomed more legislation dealing with ticket prices and scalpers, agreeing there should be more transparency about additional hidden fees.
It’s not the first time the Senate has investigated Ticketmaster but this incident may be the straw that breaks the proverbial camel’s back. The Judiciary Committee seems poised to decree Ticketmaster a monopoly and may undo the Live Nation merger in an effort to reintroduce some competition into what many believe is no longer an open market. In addition, some members of the committee supported “common sense” legislation that would limit ticket fees from reaching a set price amount, as well as make concert tickets non-transferable in order to discourage scalpers.
At the time of this article, the Dept. of Justice continues to investigate Live Nation and we can only hope “Karma” prevails.
