Ticketmaster's concert sale debacles have left hordes of pissed-off fans in its wake for years

Since Ticketmaster's merger with LiveNation in 2010, the ticketing giant has left fans burned when they can't get a seat.

• Ticketmaster has been having issues selling tickets since its merger with LiveNation in 2010. 
• Taylor Swift's Eras Tour debacle is the latest in a series of events that left fans broken-hearted.
• As of Friday, the DOJ is investigating the ticketing giant to see if it has abused its power.

After Taylor Swift's millions of fans nearly broke the Ticketmaster website this week, the ticket-selling giant announced general sales for her highly-anticipated Eras Tour, scheduled for Friday, would be canceled. 

It's just the latest disappointment for music fans since Ticketmaster acquired LiveNation in a 2010 merger that now has major control over the live music industry. 

"The merger has led to substantially higher ticketing fees by Ticketmaster, less innovation in the market, and probably a reduction in concert promotions," David Balto, the former policy director of the Federal Trade Commission and a public interest antitrust lawyer, told Insider.

Ticketmaster did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment. The company tweeted Thursday that "due to extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand, tomorrow's public on-sale for Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour has been cancelled."

The chaos left fans devastated. Swift on Friday sought to quell frustrations, saying that Ticketmaster sold 2.4 million tickets to her 52-show stadium tour that kicks off in Glendale, Arizona in March, and added that it "pisses me off" that so many of her fans struggled to secure seats. 

"I'm not going to make excuses for anyone because we asked them, multiple times, if they could handle this kind of demand and we were assured they could," Swift said.

She added that she is looking into alternatives so "this situation can be improved moving forward." But Swifties aren't the only fanbase that has been burned by Ticketmaster in the past. Here's a look back at how fans got here.

Ticketmaster and LiveNation merged in 2010, leading to the ticketing giant we know today

Ticketmaster first moved to acquire events promoter LiveNation in 2009. At the time, Balto warned against the merger, testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee that Ticketmaster "holds a monopoly in the ticket sales market," and that the merger with LiveNation would lead to "less choice and higher prices," Insider's Juliana Kaplan previously reported. 

The merger between Ticketmaster and LiveNation ended up going through in 2010, albeit with the Department of Justice requiring that Ticketmaster "license its ticketing software, divest ticketing assets and subject itself to anti-retaliation provisions" to move forward.

With Ticketmaster as the only concert ticket seller, Balto predicted reduced competition among sellers would lead to higher resale prices.

Ticketmaster said that over 2 million tickets were sold in a single day for Swift's tour, and "90% fewer tickets are currently posted for resale on secondary markets than a typical on sale." Even so, tickets are popping up on resale sites for a small fortune, a struggle that music lovers today know all too well.

Before the LiveNation merger, Ticketmaster acquired its only other major competitor, Ticketron, in 1991. 

As of 2018, Ticketmsater sells tickets for 80 of the top 100 arenas across the US, meaning Swifties are not the only fans to experience this glitch. 

The BTS Army faced Ticketmaster's wrath just last year

In September 2021, BTS announced its first round of shows since the pandemic: A four-concert stint in Los Angeles. 

But, similarly to the issue Swift fans faced this week, after major problems on the site — including long queues and quickly sold out seats — during a four-day tiered presale, Ticketmaster, in a since-deleted tweet, canceled the general sale for BTS fans, too, Insider previously reported. 

Once on the seat selection page, users faced error messages, barring them from grabbing any available spots. 

As one fan wrote for Insider, fans on Twitter were reporting thousands of empty seats at all levels of the arena, even though she, and many other fans, were not given access to the open spots when she logged in for presale. 

Fans of Bruce Springsteen, Olivia Rodrigo, and Adele are no strangers to Ticketmaster's struggles 

When tickets for Olivia Rodrigo's first US tour went on sale last December, fans were met with "technical difficulties" on the Ticketmaster website, which many assumed was a result of overwhelming demand, causing many to lose out on the opportunity to see the rising star. 

Tickets to Bruce Springsteen's latest US tour were going for thousands of dollars on Ticketmaster when they went on sale due to the platform's "dynamic pricing," option, which raises prices to meet demand. According to Rolling Stone, fans watched $400 tickets change in price to $5,000 before their eyes. 

Tickets for Adele's Las Vegas residency sold out in minutes, with resale prices as high as $37,000 reported. Face value tickets were selling for $85, The Daily Mail reported at the time. 

The site crashed during presale for 21 Pilots' June 2021 tour and again for Lorde's Solar Power tour later that month, Exclaim reported. 

When tickets sell out, fans (and politicians) fight back 

Swift's latest Ticketmaster debacle has left fans devastated that they won't get to see her on her first tour since 2018, with many taking to Twitter to express outrage at the ticketing giant. 

"'It's me, hi, I'm the problem, it's me' - @Ticketmaster," one user wrote.

"Due to extraordinarily high levels of not being able to do their one job, Ticketmaster has been cancelled," another said. 

The news sparked the attention of Washington, with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Amy Klobuchar calling on the Department of Justice to investigate the monopoly that is Ticketmaster. 

On Friday, the DOJ officially opened that investigation, the New York Times first reported, with the intention to look into whether LiveNation has abused its power over the live music industry.