How is the digital age any different than the analog one, in this respect? If you want to posit a controlling "mafia," go back to payola in the '60s, Rolling Stone in the '70s, and MTV in the '80s. The current situation is far more diverse both actually and potentially. If Pitchfork's presence is distasteful to this guy - or anyone else - they can find a street corner and start screaming.

Internet popularity is a mandate. You can complain and try to set yourself above it - call readers "unthinking consumerist hipster sheep," or, as per this piece, try to make pantomime villains out of writers whose only crime is creativity - but the truth is, if its audience didn't want a site that looks and talks like Pitchfork to tell them what's what, there wouldn't be one. If people don't respond to a site, or a blog - or more importantly to the band(s) being promoted - there's no conversation here. If what's being discussed and embraced by a certain publication is distasteful to you, unsubscribe.

Time and again, these arguments boil down to people needing to feel unique, apart from the crowd, and superior. "Everyone else is a dupe, but I see what's really going on." Trouble is it never adds up.

shallowrewards