Ticketmaster cancels public sale for Taylor Swift tour after demand broke records and website

Ticketmaster has cancelled Friday'spublic ticket sale for Taylor Swift's upcoming tour, just days aftermillions of the pop-star's fans swarmed the ticket-selling site in search of pre-sale seats,causing periodic outages and lengthy wait times.

Earlier Thursday, Ticketmaster attempted to breakdown what caused the chaotic disruptions when pre-sale tickets for Swift's The Eras tour became available Tuesday, breaking records and parts of thesite itself.

"Due to extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand, tomorrow's public on-sale for Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour has been cancelled," the ticket-selling site tweeted.

It is the latest chapter in the drama overTicketmaster's sales and pricing practicesthat haveangered music fans and riled criticsincluding oneU.S. Senatorwho cite high prices, concerns about the amount of power the platform has and the lack of competition in the ticketing industry.

"The Eras on sale made one thing clear: Taylor Swift is an unstoppable force and continues to set records," Ticketmaster wrote in an explainer posted on its website, noting that many fans were unable to get tickets.

WATCH | Fans react to Ticketmaster's bungled Taylor Swift sale:

Taylor Swift fans to Ticketmaster: Now we got bad blood

2 years ago

Duration 2:02

Some Taylor Swift fans are expressing outrage toward Ticketmaster after a chaotic release of tickets for the upcoming Eras tour, marred with long waits, limited supply and technical difficulties.

Largest'Verified Fan' registration ever

During the pre-sale, the platform required fans to pre-register for itsVerified Fan system, which itsays is designed to help manage high-demand shows, sift out bots and limit overcrowding to keep wait times shorter.

According to the site, more than3.5 million fans pre-registered for the program, becoming the largest registration the platform has ever seen.

Ticketmaster says two million verified fans were put on a waiting list and 1.5 million were given the chance to enter the queue when the sale began.

But the company saida "staggering number of bot attacks" and fans without Verified Faninvite codes caused "unprecedented traffic" and saw fans waiting in online queues for up to eight hours.

Ticketmaster says more thantwomillion tickets were sold to fans on Nov. 15, the most tickets ever sold for an artist in a single day.

Fans angry overpre-sale problems, 'dynamic pricing'

This isn't the first time Ticketmaster has angered Swifties. Back in 2018,the price of tickets for her shows reachedas high as $1,500 US, and manyfans complained theyweren't even allowed into the programthat would have let them buy more modestly priced pre-sale tickets.

Swift's fans aren't the only ones upset with the ticketing company.

In July, people trying to buy tickets to see Bruce Springsteen waited hours in online queues and said they were concerned about Ticketmaster's dynamic pricing system,which alters the price of tickets based on demand.

Withall of the more modestly priced face-value tickets long gone, the cost oftickets to see The Bosssoared as high as $5,000 US.

This summer, Drake's OVO fest at Toronto's Molson Amphitheatre sold out almostinstantaneously. Shortly after that, seats on the lawn, thefurthest away from the outdoorvenue's Budweiser Stage, were listed at $900.

WATCH | Springsteen fans outraged at the cost to see The Boss:

Springsteen fans express outrage over Ticketmasters dynamic pricing

2 years ago

Duration 1:59

Bruce Springsteen fans were shocked to see ticket prices as high as $5,500 US for his upcoming tour. At the heart of the controversy is Ticketmasters dynamic pricing policy, which automatically surges some ticket prices when demand is high.

U.S. Senator speaks out

Among fans who spoke out about the platform's flaws was Democratic U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar, who wrote a letter to Live Nation Entertainment Inc, voicing "serious concern about the state of competition in the ticketing industry and its harmful impact on consumers."

"Ticketmaster's power in the primary ticket market insulates it from the competitive pressures that typically push companies to innovate and improve their services," said Klobuchar, who is chair of a Senate subcommittee on antitrust issues.

"That can result in the types of dramatic service failures we saw this week, where consumers are the ones that pay the price."

In her letter, Klobuchar asked Live Nation Chief Executive Michael Rapino to answer a handful of questions, including how much the company had spent to upgrade technology to handle demand surges, and what percentage of high-profile tour tickets were reserved for presales.

Ticketmaster did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Klobuchar's letter.

Live Nation and Ticketmaster merged in a 2010 deal approved by the U.S. Justice Department. The government can challenge a completed mergerbut rarely does so. In her letter, Klobuchar said she had been skeptical of the deal at the time.

Ticketmaster has also come under fire from artists themselves.

In the mid-1990s, the band Pearl Jamsaid the company broke antitrust laws, used its monopoly to charge exorbitant fees and later pushed event organizers into refusing artists access to other venues.

The group decided to tour without using Ticketmaster, but found the processtoo unwieldy and returned to the service after 14 months.