Ticketmaster is the primary ticket provider for Taylor Swift’s upcoming The Eras tour. However, Ticketmaster has faced major technical issues and long virtual queues during the pre-sales for Swift’s concerts, preventing many fans from purchasing tickets.
The High Demand for Taylor Swift Tickets
Taylor Swift is one of the most popular music artists in the world right now. She has not toured since 2018, so there is massive pent-up demand from her global fanbase to see her live in concert again. Her U.S. stadium tour is expected to be one of the hottest tours of 2023. Over 2 million people pre-registered for a chance to buy tickets in the pre-sales through Ticketmaster’s Verified Fan program. This overwhelming interest has put strain on Ticketmaster’s systems.
Problems During the Pre-Sales
During the pre-sales on November 15 and 16, 2022, Ticketmaster’s website and apps experienced multiple outages and glitches. Fans reported error messages when trying to purchase tickets. Wait times in the virtual queues often exceeded several hours, with no guarantee tickets would still be available once reaching the front. Ticketmaster cited “historically unprecedented demand” as the reason for the technical problems.
The Bot Problem
Many fans blame Ticketmaster for not being prepared to handle the surge in traffic. However, Ticketmaster states that bots and scalpers trying to scoop up tickets are partly to blame for bogging down the system.
Bots Flood the System
Bots are software programs that can be programmed to repeatedly attempt ticket purchases. They are used by scalpers trying to buy as many tickets as possible to resell at higher prices. Ticketmaster estimates that 20% of traffic on its site during the Swift pre-sales was bot-related. With millions of fans trying to get tickets, hundreds of thousands of bot requests overloaded Ticketmaster’s servers.
The Constant Refreshing
Bots are designed to continuously refresh Ticketmaster’s pages hoping to access newly opened tickets or grab tickets released from other users’ abandoned shopping carts. All this reloading put enormous strain on the website. Ticketmaster says billions of system requests were recorded during the pre-sales, often exceeding over 3.5 million system requests per minute.
CAPTCHAs Try to Stop Bots
To combat bots, Ticketmaster uses CAPTCHAs on its website during high-demand sales. CAPTCHAs require users to prove they are human by completing visual puzzles or identification tests. However, sophisticated bot developers have found ways to bypass many CAPTCHA systems. Ticketmaster admitted their CAPTCHAs “did not adequately address the staggering number of bot attacks.”
Solutions Ticketmaster is Exploring
With Taylor Swift fans angry and disappointed, Ticketmaster is actively exploring ways to improve its systems for future sales.
More Robust Bot Detection
Ticketmaster plans to strengthen bot detection efforts by advancing CAPTCHA technology and identifying suspicious patterns of activity. They may require all traffic to pass bot-detection filters before accessing sales pages. This method blocked over 2 billion bot attempts during the Swift onsale according to Ticketmaster.
Timing Staggered Sales
Staggering sales times and dates made it difficult for bots to overwhelm the system all at once. During the Verified Fan presale, Ticketmaster purposely spaced sale times over 2 days and divided ticket inventory into staggered groups. While bots still infiltrated, this tactic did limit their impact.
Queue-It Waiting Room
For very high-demand onsales, Ticketmaster will direct fans into a virtual waiting room provided by Queue-It. This system efficiently queues users and only allows a certain number to proceed through to ticket selection at a time. Queue-It helped control traffic during later Swift onsales and is being looked at to handle other major tours.
| Solution | Description | Effectiveness |
|---|---|---|
| Stronger bot detection | Use improved CAPTCHA, activity pattern analysis | Blocks billions of bot attempts |
| Staggered sales | Spread sales over multiple days/times | Limits bots overwhelming system at once |
| Queue-It virtual waiting room | Queues users, staggers entrance to sales | Smoothed out traffic |
Conclusion
In conclusion, Taylor Swift’s popularity and high ticket demand, combined with bots/scalpers attacking the system, created a perfect storm that Ticketmaster was unprepared for. For future high-profile sales, Ticketmaster is testing solutions like enhanced bot mitigation, staggered timing, and virtual waiting rooms. These measures may help Ticketmaster’s systems handle extreme traffic surges more smoothly. However, even with improvements, Ticketmaster will likely struggle to keep up with the phenomenal demand that a touring megastar like Swift creates amongst her fans. Swifties may have better luck getting tickets as the tour proceeds, once early frenzy dies down.