As the Swifties hovered over their keyboards, waiting to purchase tickets to Taylor Swift’s first tour in five long years, they were greeted with an unwelcome error signal: Ticketmaster’s website has gone down.
The pre-show for the “Eras Tour” began at 10 a.m. EST on Tuesday, and as Travis Clark reported previously, reports of outages on Downdetector.com began before the pre-sale and continued afterward, peaking at approximately 4,000 tickets before the pre-sale.
In the meltdown and ensuing brawl, fans took to TikTok and Twitter to air their grievances, likening the situation to an all-out “war” against the fandom.
Swift’s album “Midnights” made her the first female music artist in history to snag all 10 of her top 10 songs on the Billboard Hot 100 simultaneously. After her previous Lover Fest tour was canceled in response to the pandemic, fans have been especially eager to book tickets this time around. Earlier today, TicketMaster tweeted a statement saying that the company has seen “historically unprecedented demand” for tickets. If the user who tweeted about having 2,000+ people was actually trailing a few thousand, she was probably in a better position than many others; TicketMaster said in its statement that “millions” turned out to purchase pre-sale tickets.
Some of those given the green light for pre-sale reported being unable to access the “waiting room,” and when Twitter Ticketmaster Fan Support tweeted a message instructing those approved for pre-sale to use a text link instead of the home page, many said that It also didn’t work.
Swifties joked about a future in which Taylor Swift walked out on stage to an empty stadium “because the TicketMaster queue never moved” and the year 2043, when “the first manned mission is on its way to Mars. Taylor Swift’s virtual TicketMaster queue ‘Eras Tour’ remains paused “.
Below, you’ll find a few of the best reactions from Swifties as they broke down TicketMaster before the inappropriate sale.
taylor swift walking onto stage with no one in the audience, because that ticketmaster queue never did move. pic.twitter.com/BEjNEB1G6N
— sarah 🕰 (@thisismenotryin) November 15, 2022
live footage of ticketmaster deciding who does and doesn’t get presale pic.twitter.com/rXglHLveVL
— marg’s midnights (@BetttysCardigan) November 14, 2022
Being a Taylor Swift fan is fun except when it’s war.
— Alex Goldschmidt (parody) (@alexandergold) November 15, 2022
Who I am before November 15th and who I am after is between Ticketmaster and God
— ˏˋ zane ˎˊ˗ (@zaneugh) November 11, 2022
Where is Ticketmaster headquarters we’re bout to January 6th y’all pic.twitter.com/6PDsgPFhtx
— 👀 (@jenigmama) November 15, 2022
The Taylor Swift eras tour ticketmaster waiting room pic.twitter.com/Y5YBh9UWhQ
— Vulture (@vulture) November 15, 2022
the year is 2043. we all own flying cars. everything runs on solar. the first manned mission is en route to mars. ticketmaster’s virtual queue for taylor swift’s eras tour remains paused.
— John Michael (@JohnMAbbott) November 15, 2022
to the people who got tickets within the first hour and don’t have to spend the rest of the day fighting for their lives on ticketmaster just to secure taylor swift eras tour tickets pic.twitter.com/DX15DhtQFv
— shana (@archielizabeths) November 15, 2022
Swift’s tour is scheduled to kick off in 2023 and includes 52 dates in 20 cities. General admission tickets start at $49 and VIP tickets start at $199, though tickets are already selling for hundreds and even thousands more on ticket resale sites.
