AOC launches (rather dumb) attack on Ticketmaster after Taylor Swift crash.
It’s not every day that a pop star’s fans are so rabid they break the internet. But that’s sort of what happened this week when the ticket sales website Ticketmaster crashed because so many Taylor Swift fans tried to buy tickets for her upcoming tour at once.
This has proven chaotic for many distressed fans. But it’s also got some progressive lawmakers up in arms, attacking the company and even calling for it to be broken up. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, for example, responded to the crash by tweeting: “Daily reminder that Ticketmaster is a monopoly, it’s merger with LiveNation should never have been approved, and they need to be reigned in. Break them up.”
The congresswoman is referencing a merger Ticketmaster conducted in 2010 with LiveNation, at the time its chief competitor and calling for it to be “broken up” through federal government intervention known as “antitrust.”
Ticketmaster may or may not be a monopoly. It now reportedly has up to 80% market share according to some sources, although its executives have claimed they only have about 30%. (To be clear, there’s nothing inherently wrong with a business having a near monopoly so long as it emerges naturally without special government favors or subsidies, like it appears to have in this case. Some industries can even be structured in a way where a monopoly is the most efficient way to supply the good.)
Regardless, for Ocasio-Cortez and others to blame the Taylor Swift crash on Ticketmaster’s possible monopoly is actually rather dumb. The number of vendors wasn’t the problem—it was the insane surge in customer demand that probably would’ve crashed any website or multiple websites.
This also may explain why Taylor Swift is trying not to be seen:
UPDATE: Ticketmaster cancels its public sale of Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour tickets.
More: Amy Klobuchar: Taylor Swift ticket sales snafus more important than FTX frau.
Unexpectedly!
(Updated and bumped.)