{"id":70237,"date":"2022-11-17T01:06:48","date_gmt":"2022-11-17T01:06:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tahrir2day.com\/news\/2022\/11\/17\/taylor-swift-ticketmaster-crash-draws-ire-on-capitol-hill\/"},"modified":"2022-11-17T01:06:48","modified_gmt":"2022-11-17T01:06:48","slug":"taylor-swift-ticketmaster-crash-draws-ire-on-capitol-hill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tahrir2day.com\/news\/2022\/11\/17\/taylor-swift-ticketmaster-crash-draws-ire-on-capitol-hill\/","title":{"rendered":"Taylor Swift Ticketmaster crash draws ire on Capitol Hill"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Tickets for Taylor Swift’s next US concert tour haven’t even gone on sale yet – but already many fans hoping to see her live have been disappointed.<\/b><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Mother Nancy Abulmagd spent hours in a virtual queue behind thousands of other people trying to snag seats for her 11-year-old daughter and her friends, only to have the website crash repeatedly and ultimately turn her away empty-handed. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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And Nancy was one of the lucky ones – she’d won a lottery that allowed “verified fans” to enter a presale four days before the purchase, which was open to all. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI got so close three or four times that the website broke. It was excruciating,” says the 41-year-old, who lives in New Jersey. \u201cThe experience was really draining. It messed with your emotions and sucked up your whole day.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Ticketmaster, the company that sells the tickets, said the problems stemmed from a “historically unprecedented demand” for the singer, who first appeared on the scene in 2006 and has delivered a steady stream of hits that have crossed fame and romantic entanglements explore.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Their latest album “Midnights” has conquered the charts worldwide. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Millions of Swifties, as their fans are known, competed in presale for tickets to their 52-city U.S. tour, and hundreds of thousands secured seats, Ticketmaster said. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The company says the pre-sale system is designed to help stop ticket dealers \u2014 known in the US as scalpers \u2014 and bots from grabbing seats.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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But the disruptions in the process have reignited anger at the company, which has long faced complaints that it is abusing its power over the industry.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In an episode earlier this year, comedian John Oliver described it as “one of the most hated companies in the world” – blaming it for the high prices, exorbitant fees and tight availability faced by those hoping to get gigs and to attend other events.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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“They’re kind of at their mercy,” Nancy said, adding that the company could have handled the sale better given the demand for Taylor Swift tickets. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Pearl Jam raised concerns about Ticketmaster’s role as the largest ticket seller as early as the 1990s. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Since then, the power of the company has grown steadily. In 2010 it bought Live Nation, which operates many of the country’s venues and has an artist management business. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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US Democratic lawmakers, who have called for the merger to be reversed, intervened again amid the chaos of the Taylor Swift presale.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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“Ticketmaster’s excessive wait times and fees are totally unacceptable, as today’s @taylorswift13 tickets demonstrate, and are a symptom of a larger problem,” wrote Congressman David Cicilline, who chairs the House Competition and Antitrust Committee. “It’s no secret that Live Nation-Ticketmaster is an unexamined monopoly.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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“A daily reminder that Ticketmaster is a monopoly, its merger with LiveNation should never have been approved and they need to be governed [sic] in,\u201d wrote leftist Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. “Break them open.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The Justice Department on Wednesday did not respond to a request for comment on the Taylor Swift affair. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Ticketmaster is already subject to government oversight, oversight that was imposed when the LiveNation purchase was approved.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Oversight was expanded a few years ago after regulators found the company had breached the terms of the agreement.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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And last month US President Joe Biden – who has expressed concern that monopolies are becoming more prevalent in the economy – said his administration would review concert ticket fees. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Krista Brown, senior policy analyst at the American Economic Liberties Project, is part of a coalition of artists and others who launched a campaign last month calling on the government to break up Ticketmaster.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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She said she’s confident the outrage from Taylor Swift’s massive fan base will increase pressure on the government to act.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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“If there were healthy competition in this area, [these problems] just wouldn’t be there and customers or fans would have other services to turn to,” she said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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But whether that’s any consolation to fans hoping to catch a glimpse of Taylor Swift in concert is another matter. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Before the general public can try again, the company is opening purchases to people carrying credit cards from Taylor Swift tour sponsor Capital One.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Ticketmaster did not respond to a request for comment from the BBC asking how many tickets were expected to be available.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Swift, who has added 25 shows to her tour in response to popular demand and sometimes feuds with corporate giants, has remained quiet on the matter so far. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Nancy said she plans to try again as part of the public on Friday. But she doesn’t hold out much hope. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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