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In the wake of the Taylor Swift ticket sales disaster that left scores of fans empty-handed or price-gouged, the Senate Judiciary Committee began questioning a series of witnesses on Tuesday to determine whether Live Nation, Ticketmaster’s parent company, wields a monopoly over the concert-going industry and should be dismantled.
“Let’s take the Taylor Swift fiasco as an example,” Jerry Mickelson, an independent concert promoter and the co-founder of Jam Productions, said at the hearing when asked why it’s so difficult for the average consumer to buy concert tickets.
“The fans had to sign up through a Verified Fan [service] to even buy a ticket,” Mickelson said. “Ticketmaster knew the demand was enormous, larger than most any other show. When they set the tickets up for sale, there’s two ways you can do that. Set the tickets up so that they are best available, which means that you’ll sell more tickets because the fans don’t have a choice, or pick-a-seat, where it slows the process down.