Congress To Maintain Antitrust Listening to On Ticketmaster Amid Taylor Swift Tour Mess

Topline

A Senate committee will maintain a listening to on Ticketmaster and the dearth of competitors in ticketing markets, after Ticketmaster canceled the overall sale of Taylor Swift tour tickets final week amid “traditionally unprecedented” demand for them, garnering ire from followers and politicians alike.

NSAI Songwriter-Artist of the Decade honoree, Taylor Swift performs onstage throughout NSAI 2022 … [+] Nashville Songwriter Awards at Ryman Auditorium on September 20, 2022 in Nashville, Tennessee.

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Key Details

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) said Tuesday “the competitors downside in ticketing markets was made painfully apparent when Ticketmaster’s web site failed lots of of 1000’s of followers.”

The Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Competitors Coverage, Antitrust and Client Rights plans to “maintain a listening to on how consolidation within the dwell leisure and ticketing business harms clients and artists alike.”

A date has not been set for the listening to, and witnesses have but to be introduced.

Huge Quantity

2.4 million. That’s what number of followers bought tickets final week for Taylor Swift’s “The Eras” tour, which kicks off in 2023, Swift mentioned final week. These tickets had been bought throughout pre-sale occasions, held by Ticketmaster. When the corporate, which is a subset of Dwell Nation Leisure, mentioned it was canceling the general public sale, it mentioned it was doing so due to “terribly excessive calls for on ticketing methods and inadequate remaining ticket stock to satisfy that demand.” mentioned in an interview that in pre-sale, the positioning was arrange for 1.5 million chosen followers however 14 million tried for tickets.

Key Background

Throughout pre-sale, followers skilled website crashes and hours-long waits for tickets. Swift criticized Ticketmaster and Dwell Nation in a Friday assertion, although she didn’t title both firm by title, saying her group requested the teams a number of occasions “if they might deal with this sort of demand and we had been assured they might.” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) was one of many first politicians to talk out in opposition to Ticketmaster, which merged with Dwell Nation in 2010, calling the businesses a “monopoly.” Klobuchar authored a letter to Ticketmaster elevating antitrust considerations about its practices earlier than asserting the congressional listening to. The New York Occasions reported Friday the Division of Justice has been investigating Dwell Nation for months about its practices and exploring whether or not it has a monopoly over the dwell leisure business, although this investigation began earlier than the Swift debacle.

Chief Critic

Dwell Nation Chair Greg Maffei mentioned final week that Ticketmaster was chosen to promote tickets to Swift’s tour, however Dwell Nation is just not selling “Eras.” In a press release issued Saturday, Dwell Nation said it “doesn’t interact in behaviors that might justify antitrust litigation, not to mention orders that may require it to change basic enterprise practices.” The corporate mentioned Ticketmaster “has a major share of the first ticketing companies market due to the massive hole that exists between the standard of the Ticketmaster system and the subsequent finest main ticketing system.” In a statement as to how traditionally excessive site visitors prompted the problems relating to the “Eras” sale, Ticketmaster apologized to followers.

Tangent

“Eras” is Swift’s first tour since 2018, a timeframe throughout which she’s launched 4 new albums, together with her new album “Midnights,” which is why demand for the reveals is so excessive.