The Ticketing Monopoly
Taylor Swift hasn’t toured since 2018. Isn’t that crazy? One of the world’s top talents finally decided to bring an awesome series of events to her fans with another tour, and she broke the Internet (or at least a portion of it). But was there a problem before Taylor Swift decided to announce another tour? Is the ticketing system absolutely busted? Do tools like the one-and-only Ticketmaster limit who gets to go to events and control everything?
The Story So Far
Taylor Swift decided that Tuesday — November 15th, 2022 — would be the day her tickets went on sale for her upcoming tour, aptly named The Eras Tour. They did, for about 1 second, and then Ticketmaster decided that the overwhelming demand was too much, and they took the tickets off the market after saying millions of tickets had been sold. Since then, the US government has started investigating Ticketmaster, who merged with LiveNation in 2010, for their practices (basically saying, “Hey, are you guys a monopoly? If so, that’s totally not cool.”).
The tickets were flying off the shelves, and many, many fans were unable to get access to their favorite artist. Here’s why:
The Bot Dilemma
Look at you. Covered in skin, breathing, and thinking on your own. These are key differentiators between you and what seem to be Taylor’s biggest fans: bots. Oh, you want to go see the Chainsmokers this Friday at TAO? You’ll have to buy the tickets from secondary sellers because scalpers already grabbed all the tickets with their bots. Bots move faster than you (in an instant) and are so easy to make with a quick search on the Internet. Taylor’s true fans stood no chance on Tuesday with the bots overwhelming the site and their owners knowing that if they can snag the tickets before the true fans, they can mark up the prices (a lot) and make a pretty penny. Isn’t that great?
Who’s In Charge Here?
There’s a major red flag in the story above. Didn’t catch it? Here it is:
Ticketmaster decided that they were going to shut down the sale.
Who is really in control of these events? This is a two-sided problem. Fans had nowhere else to buy tickets, so they had to go to Ticketmaster. Taylor will use what appears to be the only solution (Ticketmaster) and is at their mercy when doing so because they know it. This is not how engagement, experiences, and events should be managed. The creator, artist, brand, etc., should be in control, and the technology should be a value-add that they use directly to make things better. This feels a lot worse.
The Government Dives In…Again
With all of this commotion, the US government has decided to take another look at Ticketmaster. This is not the first time Ticketmaster has been under fire from the government. In 2020, Ticketmaster paid $10M for entering competitors’ computer systems. This time, it might be a bit scarier for them. The amount of control they have over the ticket and event market has been talked about by the government multiple times (back in April 2020 and March 2022). The stage was much bigger here.
So, What Now?
TLDR for those who don’t want to read for 3–5 minutes:
- Taylor Swift launched her ticketing for her upcoming tour on Ticketmaster.
- Bots and fans overwhelmed Ticketmaster leaving millions unable to be a part of the experience.
- Ticketmaster took down the offering.
- The US government is coming.
- New platforms are coming too!
Yep, new platforms are coming. This opens the door for many of ’em. Keep an eye out for up-and-coming platforms that do more than just ticketing, as there need to be ways to get these bots out of the process. An example? Cloutchain.
This is a major disruption to a large industry that has been WAITING for something to happen. There will be a large shift in ticketing, fan engagement, and ongoing fan relationships as the companies that have become the dominating middlemen continue to come under fire for their practices.
