1. Call Pitchfork a music blog. Never mind that it's been around, as you point out in your article, since 1995—two years before the term "weblog" was invented, and four before Peter Merholz coined the shorter version; never mind that the only aspects of the site that vaguely resembles a music blog are the Forkcast and the News section, neither of which have the coronation power of a "Best New Music" from its reviewers. Who aren't bloggers (well, at least not for Pitchfork, anyway).

2. Use as your new media "expert" a futurist whose recent forays into the digital-music world ended in failure. Remember the guy who coined the term BlogJ? Yeah, his "blogs will be the next record labels" spiel is quoted here, although left out of the piece is the fact that his recent experiment in Web 2.0 widgetry went tits-up last week.

3. Fill your story with data-free anecdotes, because they make lovely window dressing. Music blogs apparently have "young readers." How is Sandoval aware of this? We don't know, because there aren't any actual numbers in the story at all aside from the number of unique readers Pitchfork gets a month (1.5 million) and the number of words Rolling Stone's Nathan Brackett thinks that the average Man Man blurb has (50).

4. On that note, never, ever press for details. Would you be interested to know that eMusic's Yancey Strickler (who, it should be known, is a friend), who's given space to pontificate on music blogging, writes a music blog for his employer, which could make for some interesting discussion of blogging-for-dollars in a story that mentions corporate influence? Want to know how BrooklynVegan "developed a reputation for being the must-read blog for concert information"? Like to know what, exactly, was inaccurate in the reporting about Stereogum's sale, as Scott Lapatine claims? Too bad, because Sandoval isn't interested in making those details known. (At least not yet! Maybe there's a sequel to this piece coming—Music Blogs II: Return To WordPress!)

5. Get an old-media type to comment on how the blog kids should get off his fact-checked lawn—and then fail to fact-check his comments. "The blogs do the really quick 50-word update on what a band's doing," Brackett tells Sandoval. "They'll write about (singer) Lilly [sic!!!] Allen releasing a new EP or (the band) Man Man is preparing an album. The way Rolling Stone competes is we pick up the phone and bring original reporting. We take advantage of our access. Most blogs don't have the staffs to pick up the phone." Well, most blogs also aren't subsidiaries of huge magazines that can be sources for repurposed content. And really, does recapping a reality TV show count as "original reporting" these days? I guess it's a good thing that I got cable in my office after all.

Music blogs: The new wall of sound [CNet]

For the last two days, Rolling Stone's abysmal blog—which is now nearly 17% readable—has been a non-stop cavalcade of Borat clips and Carol Channing references. We get the Channing love (Jann's a big Hello, Dolly! fan), but Borat? After months of press, you're only now getting to this movie? Why would you be hyping up Borat day after day unless there was some sort of....

Ah. Now we get it. Turns out Sacha Baron Cohen is on this week's cover—two weeks after the movie opened, demonstrating that RS' cultural radar is just as finely honed as ever.

We're guessing that the powers that be at Rolling Stone are trying to steer their writers toward a "less typin', more hypin'" approach. And as much as we hate for the blogosphere to become one big marketing machine, anything that keeps those bloggers away from their keyboards—and back at the KinderCare classes where they belong—can't help but be a good thing.

I see a lone horse, standing in front a barn, picking his guitar and starting this song. As each instrument is introduced, their player walks slowly out of the barn and lines up beside the horse. Once everyone is there, the [sic] literally start dragging the barn across the field, into the sunny part, where the hayloft can get warm, and the mice and spiders can finally see each other. When they get there, the cymbals are already cheersing [sic] (From a review of Rock Plaza Central's "I Am An Excellent Steel Horse")

Wait, so the horse is playing a guitar? For an audience of spiders? Also: The horse is playing guitar?

After the click-through, some more examples of Gramophone's confusing critical twists. We ask for your help decoding each entry—that is, if you can make it past the first sentence.

(Have you ever found a small flowering plant, near the beach? Just up from the ocean sand, something tufted and prickly and beautiful? Perhaps two small purple flowers? Three round yellow ones? Or a single, strange white blossom, ringed in rings of ringing orange? Yeah? Near the streaked pebbles and watercoloured mussel shells? Well I've not checked with Larkin Grimm, not checked Wikipedia nor even googled it, but still I will bet you more than a few quid(s) that this rough flower is a jasy tree.) (From a review of Larkin Grin's "The Jasy Tree)"

What? Why are you asking me about pebbles? What does that have to do with—

The moon is the colour of a coffee stain, [Tom Waits is] eating Telapia fischcakes and fried black swan, while dining with Scarface Ron. It's almost, in fact it is, quite hilarious how much Tom Waits is himself. And I wouldn't want it any other way. Although it's troubling that this is a perfect song to drink alone to. Looking from the bookshelf to the ceiling and back again, feeling the corduroy of the chair arms under your fingertips, trying to force tears out of your eye sockets, like so many fingers down your goddamn throat. (From a review of Tom Waits' "Bottom Of The World")

Wait, is the song sad? What the hell is a Telapia—

It is a throaty, burnished introduction: wobbling 'n weaving horns, a pile of shoes, a night getting slowly to its feet. And then, almost like a reggae tune, the drums take some unsteady steps and fall into place. Jingle jingle thump, jingle jingle thump, horns in line behind. And out from the curtains: it's Beirut. A smiling Balkan troubadour - part-gypsy, part-Wainwright, with a caravan full of Neutral Milk Hotel records and maybe Gogol Bordello's sparkling shoes. (A voice nourished on schnapps.) And if it doesn't make you wonder what follows (a track called "Prenzlauerberg"), well go home to your Wonderbread and Miracle Whip. (From a review of Beirut's "Gulag Orkestar"

Seriously: Jingle. Jingle. Thump.