Itunes, Billboard, and the marginalization of black music and black audiences in America

People questioning rap sound exactly the same as my grandmama questioning rock & roll. It's sort of cute.
― nicky lo-fi (nicky lo-fi), Thursday, October 12, 2006

so sticking up for rap means I'm not a rockiest, I guess? I hope fancy symbol dude caught that.

nicky the issue, in a nutshell, is that Billboard has made a variety of changes in how it puts together its charts over the past several years to factor in downloads/streaming in addition to the traditional radio play, and the demographic differences in who buys music on iTunes vs. who listens to the radio, etc. has seemed to diminish the presence of hip-hop and R&B on singles charts far more than any decline in the general popularity of those genres. a lot of other issues and nuances have been covered in this thread, if I had started it I probably wouldn't have made the title as focused as Rev did or used the phrase "black music" but I totally get why he did.

Another way of putting it: radio stations whose audiences are overwhelmingly black now disappear statistically, and they appear on the record as if their audiences like the same music which is favored by white audiences on iTunes. In fact, they don't, but history will record the hegemonic music as being beloved by all, and future production and programming decisions will be based on this egregious distortuon.

I would just like to go on the record as being a racist. Thank you all.

you are a goon, after all.

alright, thanks, that part I was pretty close on. I guess I'm just such a cynic about about the music biz that I assume whatever they do is because they think it will make more money.

so that it will always be catering to people with money. an example of this goes back to the 'race' records of the 20's and 30's

great blues, jazz, and gospel music the industry thought would not sell to white people, so they marketed to blacks only

http://www.pbs.org/jazz/images/exchange/racerecords.jpg

when white people started to buy, they not only stopped that marketing to black people, but even influenced a change in the style of jazz (the rise of the white big bands)

You do realize this thread is intended to track pretty much the exact same phenomenon, though?

is this the rolling macklemore thread

fancy cymbal dude

http://www.tbrucewittet.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/Zildjian-Gen-X-Cymbals.jpg

xp yes, no, Macklemore, "Same Love"

who the hell is macklemore?

hoo boy

im in the uk.

A Macklemore is what we in the scientific community would describe as a cornball.

the best thing about bands like Mumfords and Macklemores is that their names just inherently sound like punchlines.

i have a thread i bet nicky would enjoy

the best thing about bands like Mumfords and Macklemores is that their names just inherently sound like punchlines.

and Phillip Phillips!

I'm feeling particularly apocalyptic today.

yeah i don't think i even have the energy to rage against Billboard's latest change like i did the last one, even though this one is clearly even worse

this is insanity, truly

What happened?

http://www.billboard.com/articles/news/1549388/baauers-harlem-shake-debuts-atop-revamped-hot-100

Counting Spotify streams clearly makes some kind of sense, counting Youtube views is just insane, especially if they are weighted as highly as they appear to be based on that article. "Gangnam Style" would have been number one for months if this had been implemented sooner.

it's just going to lead to more hegemony, which i think is the opposite of their intention?

yeah my whole thing at this point is i'm not even so against counting streaming/youtube/etc in charts as how heavily they weigh it, how it can just trump every other factor and put something at #1. (xp)

labels are going to pour even more money into stupid-ass 'lyric videos'

Spotify listeners at least are generally listening seriously as opposed to for lolz

Lame either way

I mean, it's also #1 on iTunes so it's not like only YouTube but it's absolutely asinine that it's rated as 3.5 times more popular than the next most song ("Thrift Shop" which clearly deserves to be #1 on popularity though not song merit).

it's just going to lead to more hegemony, which i think is the opposite of their intention?

― J0rdan S., Wednesday, February 20, 2013 8:40 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Spotify top tracks stay the same for ages, pumped up kicks is probably still number one

I can thank The New Paradigm for today's marvel: walking into the student union to watch 500 undergrads performing "Harlem Shuffle" or whatever it's called in the pit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMyFgOmu0w8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMyFgOmu0w8

surprised you didn't post the marvelous Stones video

I've never really fuxed with the Stones tbh

Cultural stuff aside: wouldn't it be really easy for labels to game the system by having computers running scripts to keep refreshing youtube videos?

I mean I know there was payola in radio but at least there's some honor & dignity to giving free cocaine to dudes that look like martin mull

*furiously refreshes papoose youtube*

mean I know there was payola in radio but at least there's some honor & dignity to giving free cocaine to dudes that look like martin mull

why Martin Mull when Clive Davis is the industry prototype?

I'm a lot more interested in the cultural stuff than the numbers shit at this point and it feels like af-am culture is getting an ever-increasingly raw deal. :/

Cultural stuff aside: wouldn't it be really easy for labels to game the system by having computers running scripts to keep refreshing youtube videos?

― in a chef-driven ambulance (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, February 20, 2013 10:07 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

theoretically the same has been true since they've been putting Spotify stats in charts, you could just play a song over and over and over. i kind of imagine the effect is negligible, but then YouTube stats have been famously hacked/juked many times, this seems to be just asking for shenanigans.

Like it feels like black people have been pretty central to the american cultural discourse at all points in my life except the past few years.

mean I know there was payola in radio but at least there's some honor & dignity to giving free cocaine to dudes that look like martin mull

why Martin Mull when Clive Davis is the industry prototype?

― the little prince of inane false binary hype (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, February 20, 2013 9:12 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I meant djs

"wouldn't it be really easy for labels to game the system by having computers running scripts to keep refreshing youtube videos?"

why would the labels pay for it when fans do it for free

I was thinking more in the early stages, just to push it towards hot counts where it might get featured on the front page or suggested videos

I mean, sure, never underestimate the power of people to throw money at things (well, some things), but that's the unspoken wink behind all the fan-activation stuff, premieres, etc.: "support view-spam the shit out of this!" and obviously I don't have raw numbers / more certainly couldn't hurt, but it seems kids with too much spare time do a pretty good job of this on their own.

come to think of it, I'd probably be more surprised if labels weren't already doing this / just now started.

"support the artist! AS MANY VIEWS AS YOU CAN HANDLE!" that is.

yeah i mean before "Gangnam Style" the most viewed music video on YouTube of all time was Bieber, and i think that was less 'he has the most fans/they watch his video over and over' and more 'his fans are so rabid that they're hell bent on driving up his views and making him #1'

I definitely had a friend who had a temp job that involved phoning in requests to TRL back in the day. soooo...

haha wow