Ｔ・スウィフトさん、チケット大手を批判　販売混乱は「苦痛」

【ロサンゼルスＡＦＰ＝時事】米ポップ歌手テイラー・スウィフトさんは１８日、自身のツアーのチケット販売で大きな混乱が生じたことを受け、チケット販売大手チケットマスターを批判し、大勢のファンがチケット購入に苦労したことは「苦痛」だと述べた。（写真は米ポップ歌手テイラー・スウィフトさん）
　チケットマスターで行われたスウィフトさんの「ジ・エラズ・ツアー」のチケット先行販売では、サイトの不具合や長い待ち時間といった問題が数日間にわたり続き、１８日に予定されていた一般発売が前日になって急きょ中止された。
　スウィフトさんはインスタグラムへの投稿で、これまで築いてきたファンとの関係を外部の団体に委ねることはとても難しく、「ミスの発生をなすすべなく見ているのはとても苦痛」と説明。チケットマスターに直接言及はしなかったが、「これほどの需要に対応できるかどうか何度も尋ね、できると約束されていた」と苦言を呈した。
　また、「２４０万人がチケットを購入できたのは本当に素晴らしいけれど、多くの人がチケット入手のためにクマの襲撃を何度もかわしたような気持ちになっていることは、本当に腹立たしい」と表明した。
　チケットマスターは、「異例の高い需要とチケット在庫の不足」により一般販売を中止したと説明。先行販売では、必要なコードを持たないファンがチケットを購入しようとした他、「驚異的な数のボット攻撃」もあり、アクセス件数はそれまでの最多記録の４倍に当たる３５億件に上ったと釈明している。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2022/11/21-10:40）

Taylor Swift on Friday lashed out at Ticketmaster over the botched sale of her upcoming tour, saying it was excruciating to learn that thousands of her fans had struggled to buy tickets.
The US pop mega-star's The Eras Tour was due to go on public sale Friday. But after days of glitches and long waits for those attempting to buy early pre-sale tickets, the public sale was abruptly canceled on Thursday.
It's really difficult for me to trust an outside entity with these relationships and loyalties, and excruciating for me to just watch mistakes happen with no recourse, Swift wrote on Instagram.
Without naming Ticketmaster directly, Swift said she and her team had asked them, multiple times, if they could handle this kind of demand and we were assured they could.
It's truly amazing that 2.4 million people got tickets, but it really pisses me off that a lot of them feel like they went through several bear attacks to get them.
Ticketmaster, a dominating force in the ticketing industry, blamed extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory for the public sale cancelation.
It cited a staggering number of bot attacks along with fans without pre-sale codes trying to purchase early tickets -- meaning their site experienced 3.5 billion system requests, they said, four times the company's previous peak.
It was not immediately clear whether the sale would be rescheduled, or how many unsold tickets remained. Ticketmaster did not respond to an AFP request for clarification.
Swift wrote Friday: And to those who didn't get tickets, all I can say is that my hope is to provide more opportunities for us to all get together and sing these songs.
The Eras Tour marks Swift's first time back on the road since 2018's Reputation tour.
The multiple Grammy-winner has promised fans it will be a journey through all of my musical eras of my career.
The tour is set to kick off March 17, 2023, in Glendale, Arizona, with stops including Houston, Atlanta, Chicago and five final domestic shows in Los Angeles in early August.
International shows will be announced at a later date.
- 'Unchecked monopoly' -
The American ticketing industry, which the company Ticketmaster overwhelmingly dominates, has for years left concertgoers frustrated by hidden fees, soaring costs, rampant scalpers and limited tickets due to presales.
The havoc over Swift's tour has spurred comment from a number of US lawmakers, including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Richard Blumenthal, who urged an investigation into the state of competition in the ticketing industry.
In 2010, Ticketmaster merged with event promotion behemoth Live Nation, creating what Congressman David Cicilline this week dubbed an unchecked monopoly.
On Friday, the New York Times reported that the US Justice Department has opened an antitrust investigation into Ticketmaster's parent company.
The probe, focused on whether Live Nation Entertainment has abused its power over the live music industry, predates the botched sale of Swift's tour, two people with knowledge of the matter told the Times. The paper did not name them.
Neither the Justice Department nor Live Nation immediately responded to AFP requests for comment.
Live Nation recently has reported soaring demand after several pent-up pandemic years, saying ticket sales are up 37 percent compared to 2019.