The demand for tickets to Taylor Swift’s newly announced the Eras Tour was double that of the top five US tours of 2022 and the Super Bowl combined, according to official data published by Ticketmaster on the afternoon of Nov. 17. Ticketmaster used its Verified Fan feature, which requires registration for a chance to get a presale code, which allows users to buy tickets before the General Sale. This time around, it was a complete disaster. Fans should have received a better experience as a result of the proper use of the Verified Fan platform. Based on the volume of traffic on Ticketmaster.com during the Verified Fan Pre-Sale, which took place Nov. 15, Swift would need to perform stadium shows every night for the next 2.5 years to fulfill the demand for tickets.

The Ticketmaster and Live Nation personnel acted in an irresponsible and immature way when discussing the matter, repeatedly deflecting responsibility for the entire situation. Live Nation chairman Greg Maffei stated in an interview with CNBC that 14 million visitors, including bots, visited the website instead of the intended 1.5 million users with presale codes from the Verified Fan platform. Maffei dismissed this as “another story”. In an earlier attempt to change the subject, Maffei attributed the Ticketmaster.com meltdown to the volume of customers and higher demand for tickets.

Hours after Maffei’s interview, Ticketmaster announced on their official Twitter account that the General Sale for the Eras Tour, scheduled for the morning of Nov. 18, was now cancelled due to “extraordinarily high demands and insufficient remaining tickets to meet that demand.” This has left fans infuriated and full of questions due to the failure that was the Verified Fan Pre-Sale and the Capital One Cardholder Pre-Sale, which had to be delayed from Nov. 15 to Nov. 16 due to glitches and problems with the website. One Twitter user argued that Taylor Nation, Swift’s official PR team, does not have any statement posted regarding the cancellation and that they should have had an original method of communicating this to the fans. “The fact that all Taylor Nation has done is retweet the Ticketmaster tweet is a little ridiculous,” said user track2maroon. As of the evening of Nov. 17, there is no original statement or pronouncement from Taylor Nation or Taylor Swift herself regarding the pre-sales and the cancellation of the general sale.

From a technical standpoint, Ticketmaster’s procedure was a huge catastrophe and people need to be held accountable for it. Many TikTok users are sharing how they took days off of school and work to focus on purchasing tickets, just for it all to end in despair for many loyal fans. Long story short, this entire situation had a rocky start and is getting rockier as time progresses. All of the parties involved in this controversy are currently acting in imprudent ways. With no one emerging to take the blame for the chaos that was ticket sales, fans will continue to criticize Ticketmaster, and it is only a matter of time before Swift’s silence becomes way too loud.