Taylor Swift fans furious as bots crash Ticketmaster

Molly Ziesenheim, Arts and Entertainment

Taylor Swift fans, or “Swifties,” are outraged at Ticketmaster for crashing several times during the two separate pre-sale events. 

Millions of fans went on the website or app to buy tickets for her upcoming “Eras” tour during the TaylorSwiftTix presale. This caused the site to crash.

Ticketmaster is expected to receive more backlash following the general sale first pushed to Friday then canceled.  

In a blog, Ticketmaster explained the source of the issue: bots.  “The staggering number of bot attacks as well as fans who didn’t have invite codes drove unprecedented traffic on our site, resulting in 3.5 billion total system requests – 4x our previous peak,” Ticketmaster said. “Never before has a Verified Fan on sale sparked so much attention – or uninvited volume.”

In a tweet Tuesday following the crashes during the first presale, Ticketmaster attempted to explain the sources of the problems.

https://twitter.com/ticketmaster/status/1592579481449168898?s=46&t=WyI_OJyVW7cNa6Tx0ubrbQ

Many fans were upset with this answer. They feel Ticketmaster should have been better prepared for the number of people, as they were the ones sending out pre-sale codes.

With just 1.5 million verified fans eligible to purchase tickets, Ticketmaster had 14 million people “hit the site” according to NPR.

As a result, the CapitalOne pre-sale was moved back a day in an attempt to fix the crashes. Unfortunately, the same problems arose. Fans waited hours in the queue, only for the site to crash. This resulted in millions of fans not getting tickets.

This has caused backlash against Ticketmaster from fans, celebrities, and even politicians. 

U.S. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez took to Twitter with an eye to the 2009 Ticketmaster merger with Live Nation.

https://twitter.com/aoc/status/1592587226801934336?s=46&t=WyI_OJyVW7cNa6Tx0ubrbQ

Swift has made no public comment on the ticket fiasco as yet.