Someone's taking those little subscription cards and filling them out with your name, address, etc. You'll probably be getting a bill soon but don't panic. Just write them and tell them you didn't order it and it'll stop. You won't owe anything. It's just like those old CD/cassette music clubs. Someone signed me up as a joke, I told them I didn't order it and to stop sending then and I kept the ones they did send. But they were crappy CDs I'd never buy, so...

 Reply

and the few remaining print outlets are not really breaking artists anymore -- look at rolling stone, which has had products of tv (adam lambert and the jonas brothers) on its last two covers. music coverage is becoming more and more reactive, by dint of all profit-seeking content ventures having to play the pageview game in order to stay afloat.

it pains me to say this because of both the source and the fact that the whole process of "breaking" is teeny tiny when you compare it to the pop era of 10 years ago, but the online outfit who has most significantly "broken" musical artists in recent months is (ugh) perez. lady gaga and katy perry were certainly aided by his constant touting of them, thanks to the huge firehose of traffic he wields. (not to mention that back when amy winehouse first came to the states a washington post profile quoted her press agent as saying that the attention he gave to her proclivities was good for her brand.) those two have broken bigger than any pitchfork/blog-touted artist, although even then, in the grand scheme of things, lots of people out there have no idea who they are or what they sing, thanks to being able to cocoon themselves in radio that plays "the '60s '70s and '80s" or, even more often, their own ipods. (and perez has certainly backed horses that haven't taken off here -- much as i love robyn, his pushing of her didn't work out commercially, in large part because the musically savvy populace who she would have appealed to bought her album when it was an import a few years ago.)

 Reply

Now they can and there's no office politics to distract them.

This is why artists and others who take a non-pragmatic approach must be prepared to suffer for what they love. Everyone loves pretty things but the funds are limited.

 Reply

Correction: I fail to see how critics are a public service equal to librarians or teachers

Also, I don't see them as equals to artists that create original works. My opinion of critics is rarely favorable. Enlightenment on the social value of critics would be appreciated.

 Reply

Ya hearin' me now?

 Reply