Ticketmaster is the Big, Bad Wolf

I’m 17 years old and I’m staring at the clock on the top right of my computer screen in my third period history class. It reads 9:58:00. Only two more minutes. My palms are sweating and my feet are tapping. A notification from my friend Lauren pops up on my screen. “Good luck”, she said. I swipe it away as soon as possible so I can watch the seconds tick down. 9:59:00. I look up to my teacher’s desk to ensure that he’s not getting up anytime soon. I immediately snap my head back. 9:59:30. I triple check that nothing else on my computer is open. 9:59:50. My mouse hovers over the refresh button. I refresh once more and it takes longer than usual. 9:59:59. Here we go. 10:00:00. I refresh again. The circle spins around the tiny “t” for what feels like ages. I refresh again. Once more, the circle spins and dances around the “t” until it forms an x. My legs start shaking furiously. I refresh again. Finally, the third time’s a charm. I paste my code into the box like I practiced 10 times before in the browser of another tab. The seat map of Barclays Center occupies my computer screen. With each second that passes, the blue fades away. I click on the first pair of tickets I find available. “Sorry, another fan beat you to these seats”. I try to select a new one. “Sorry, another fan beat you-”. I check again to make sure no one’s suspicious of my activity. I try again. “Sorry, another fan-”. Shoot. There’s nothing left. I refresh. And refresh again. And again. And all hope is lost. There goes my chance to see my favorite singer, Ariana Grande, at the only show she’s doing near where I live.  

As years pass and my concert obsession grows bigger, so does my fury for Ticketmaster. If you haven’t had the joy of getting familiar with it, Ticketmaster is an online ticketing platform that sells tickets to concerts, sporting events, theater shows and more. However, the majority of user frustrations lie within their process for ticketing concerts. For a platform that claims they “strive to put fans first,” myself and others would certainly disagree. Since my horrible experience trying to get Ariana Grande tickets in 2019, Ticketmaster has put various measures in place to “put fans first”. There is a verified fan program where users sign up in advance to get a presale code and can only access the sale through their account. There’s fan-to-fan resale to ensure that the tickets that are bought second-hand are legitimate. There are non-transferable tickets so that scalpers can’t resell. Despite each effort that Ticketmaster claims will help the fans, we never win. Ticketmaster has proven to me time and time again that money will always be put first. 

Recently, there has been an uptick in the qualms against Ticketmaster due to the bloodbath that was getting tickets to Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour. I was one of the lucky few, despite her playing multiple nights at stadiums around the country, to get a presale code. My sister kindly gave her presale code to my aunt in Seattle. She woke up at 6 am to try and get tickets to the show for me and my cousins. When the clock hit 10, my computer updated automatically. The screen read 2,000+ people ahead of me in line and I immediately panicked. I was on the site for 5 minutes and nothing budged. I rushed to twitter and was met with a storm of people complaining about how Ticketmaster was already broken from the traffic on the site. Crafty Swifties delved into the code on the site to decipher how many people were ahead of them in line. There were a few glimmers of hope when I saw tweets like “I GOT THEM” or “I’M SEEING TAYLOR”. However, my screen wasn’t budging. My aunt Facetimed me 10 minutes later. She said, “sorry honey, I forgot to call because I was talking to your cousins but I got you guys some tickets,”. My jaw immediately swung to the floor. All I could muster out was “oh my god”. She told me that she was number 50 in line and she was nervous if she would even make it in. Eventually, when I composed myself I asked her if she realized how lucky she was. Almost every time that I’ve entered a ticket sale I’ve been met with the “2,000+ people ahead of you” notification. She said she just went with her “feng-shui number” of 139 and got us tickets in the fourth row of that section. She asked if that was okay. My jaw fell even further to the floor. I started crying. Those were fourth row seats to the section right in front of the middle of the stage. To this day, that is one of the best views I’ve ever had at a concert.

I have rarely been as lucky as my aunt was that day. Disappointment is the norm for me with Ticketmaster. That experience begged the question: If they knew how many presale codes they gave out, how were they unprepared for the traffic to the website? Without fail, why do I have errors each time I try to buy tickets when they go on sale? Ticketmaster currently has a monopoly-like power over the ticketing industry with its ownership of Live Nation. Therefore, the majority of tickets sold at major venues are sold through them. How is it that these user errors are not fixed? How do bots slip through the cracks and steal tickets out from under real fans? How does Ticketmaster not correct the mistakes? To many fans like myself, Ticketmaster is the enemy. However, it is the only thing between us and seeing our favorite artists live. That is why they can get away with the errors. They can get away with charging fans exorbitant prices with features like platinum tickets, where there is no difference from a regular ticket, just the insane price increase. Fans look past all of this because, in order to see our favorite artists, we have to. 

I have never grown out of my fangirl phase. Nothing brings me more joy than hearing my favorite songs live and experiencing them with a crowd of people who love the songs too. This is why, despite my anger and deep frustration with Ticketmaster, I continue to sit down at my computer and enter the arena. When I’m able to jump through the hoops and get the tickets I want, there’s no greater feeling in the world. However, that’s because it’s so rare. I’m used to playing whac-a-mole with Ticketmaster for hours after the on-sale time just in the hopes that I’ll be lucky enough to score. Even when I do, a sense of defeat remains. At the end of the day, Ticketmaster wins every time because they get the ticket sales. It just doesn’t matter who’s filling the seats. 

Aly Cohen