- Wacken fans performing mobile data analysis in front of Swifty
Metal fans at this year's 33rd Wacken Open Air (W:O:A) streamed and posted like there's no tomorrow for four days, using their phones more intensively than fans did at Taylor Swift's first German concert in Gelsenkirchen. According to telecommunications provider Vodafone, the data volume transferred was roughly equivalent to about 19,000 Hollywood blockbusters. The most data was transported on Friday, with 23 terabytes.
However, there were approximately 85,000 attendees at the multi-day W:O:A, while around 60,000 people were at the Taylor Swift concert. To compare the heavy metal festival with the concert in North Rhine-Westphalia, Vodafone refers to specific 15-minute intervals with the highest data throughput.
This highlights the difference between metal fans and Swifties. On July 17th in the Veltins Arena, about 175 gigabytes of data were transported in the Vodafone network between 6:45 PM and 7:00 PM. In Wacken, the busiest 15-minute interval was last Friday at 10:30 AM, with about 360 gigabytes flowing through the lines - twice as much as at the Swifties' concert.
At the Swifties' concert, metal fans presumably used their phones less intensively in specific 15-minute intervals, as only 175 gigabytes of data were transported compared to Wacken's 360 gigabytes during a similar period. It's intriguing to note that other data-intensive activities might have occurred among metal fans beyond just four days of W:O:A.
