(New York) The American pop star, Taylor Swift, criticized the Ticketmaster platform on Friday after the failures around the ticketing of his next tour, increasing the pressure on this American giant of the sector, often accused of monopoly.
Many of the singer’s fans have been complaining on social media in recent days about long waits, bugs, and skyrocketing prices during the early sales of the tour. eraswhich starts on March 18.
On Thursday, Ticketmaster even canceled the public sale which was to start on Friday, “due to particularly high demand […] and an insufficient stock of remaining tickets”.
“It’s really difficult for me to have to rely on an outside entity,” Taylor Swift reacted on her Instagram page on Friday, highlighting years of special relationships and loyalty with her fans.
“And it’s excruciating for me to see mistakes happen without being able to do anything,” she added.
Without directly naming Ticketmaster, the 32-year-old star adds that she has no intention of “making excuses to anyone”. “We asked them, on several occasions, if they could handle this type of request and we were assured that they could,” she adds.
“It’s really great that 2.4 million people were able to get tickets, but it pisses me off that a lot of them feel like they’ve had a nightmare to get them,” he said. – she continued, promising to do everything possible to make the situation better.
Investigation
This cacophony has revived criticism of the dominant position of this giant in the ticketing sector, which merged in 2010 with entertainment giant Live Nation.
Anti-monopoly and consumer protection groups have recently called for an investigation into this group, which they say allows it to “drive up prices, impose unnecessary and costly fees and exploit artists”. , independent venues and fans”.
Prices for rock legend Bruce Springsteen’s concerts, some of which had run into the thousands of dollars, had already caused an outcry earlier this year.
Friday, the New York Times announced, citing unnamed sources familiar with the matter, that the Department of Justice has opened an antitrust investigation into Live Nation Entertainment, resulting from the merger between Ticketmaster and Live Nation.
Regarding Taylor Swift’s tour, Ticketmaster said it sold 2 million tickets on Tuesday during presales, a record for an artist in one day.
Taylor Swift, one of America’s most popular singers, is back on tour after four years of waiting for her fans. With his tenth album, Midnightsreleased on October 21, it marked the history of American music by placing ten songs of the opus at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 ranking, a first.
Despite verification of fan accounts and a code system for purchasing tickets in advance, Ticketmaster complained of “a dizzying number of attacks by bots”, automated systems. The company says it received 3.5 billion queries.