In November 2022, Ticketmaster and its parent company Live Nation were met with widespread public criticism over the ticket sales of Taylor Swift's Eras Tour. The pre-sale website crashed within an hour and somehow 2.4 million tickets were sold despite the outage, breaking the all-time record for the most concert tickets sold by an artist in a single day.
Ticketmaster claimed that "historically unprecedented demand with 14 million showing up" was the cause, but for so many, it felt like just another example of bad customer service and worse business practices.
Directed by Pieter Colpaert and Nicholas Fraccaro, this film shows how Ticketmaster and Live Nation have caused ticket sales to increase in price and give you no other option to buy tickets or see a show. This has led to the U. S. Congress attempting to revert the 2010 merger of Ticketmaster and Live Nation as it appears to be a monopoly that has led to high prices and worse service.
Swift's tour promoter, AEG Presents, remarked that as Ticketmaster has exclusive deals with the majority of U. S. live venues they had to work with them. Fans have responded by filing a variety of lawsuits.
This should be no surprise to music fans.
All the way back in 1994, Pearl Jam was one of the few bands to try and do something about it. Their complaint with the antitrust division of the U. S. Department of Justice claimed that Ticketmaster had a "virtually absolute monopoly on the distribution of tickets to concerts."
Nobody did anything 29 years ago and here we are today.
Former Ticketmaster CEO told The Los Angeles Times, "The public brought all this on itself. I have no sympathy for people whining about high ticket prices. They helped create this situation where artists have to make all their money on tour. Artists and the market set the prices, and you can't pay a Motel 6 price and stay at the Four Seasons."
This movie might not solve the problem, but it does lay it out well.
Ticketmaster claimed that "historically unprecedented demand with 14 million showing up" was the cause, but for so many, it felt like just another example of bad customer service and worse business practices.
Directed by Pieter Colpaert and Nicholas Fraccaro, this film shows how Ticketmaster and Live Nation have caused ticket sales to increase in price and give you no other option to buy tickets or see a show. This has led to the U. S. Congress attempting to revert the 2010 merger of Ticketmaster and Live Nation as it appears to be a monopoly that has led to high prices and worse service.
Swift's tour promoter, AEG Presents, remarked that as Ticketmaster has exclusive deals with the majority of U. S. live venues they had to work with them. Fans have responded by filing a variety of lawsuits.
This should be no surprise to music fans.
All the way back in 1994, Pearl Jam was one of the few bands to try and do something about it. Their complaint with the antitrust division of the U. S. Department of Justice claimed that Ticketmaster had a "virtually absolute monopoly on the distribution of tickets to concerts."
Nobody did anything 29 years ago and here we are today.
Former Ticketmaster CEO told The Los Angeles Times, "The public brought all this on itself. I have no sympathy for people whining about high ticket prices. They helped create this situation where artists have to make all their money on tour. Artists and the market set the prices, and you can't pay a Motel 6 price and stay at the Four Seasons."
This movie might not solve the problem, but it does lay it out well.