MySpace Messes

In the past few years, MySpace has done one other important thing aside from become a haven for sex predators: It has been a huge outlet for both inspiring musicians and major stars to pimp themselves as much as possible. And obviously, this has led to MySpace being utilized as some barometer of success for up-and-coming musicians and even high-profile stars. \nAn integral portion of MySpace music pages are the play counts on the artists’ profiles, which allow the general public to see how many times a song has been played. The play counter seemed like a great way for us to see how popular a song or artist was; there was no malarkey or misinformation thrown out by a record company or publicist.\nUntil recently.\nNow it seems that there are products out there that artificially bump the number of plays of an artist’s play counter just so they appear to be much more popular than they actual are. TuneBoom Pro is able to increase the play count of a song for an artist as many times as the artist wants. \nThis all comes for a price, of course. The product charges the aspiring cheater prices that aren’t too lofty: $147 for a 1,000 play bump, $417 for 5,000 more, and $747 for a 300,000 jump. Even for a poor, down-on-their-luck musician, that’s a fairly cheap price, especially when it comes to increasing their chances of making it big. And if that’s too pricey, there are reportedly at least 40 other products that do exactly the same thing.\nSome might say this is not a big deal because MySpace does not rule the music industry by any means. But its influence is much more overarching than people think. We’re all aware of the ridiculous numbers of users the social-networking giant has, but the site is becoming the go-to tool for A&R people to find the next big things. \nTherefore, this revelation is extremely disenchanting when it comes to thinking about the credibility of the music industry. Sure, it’s safe to assume seedy people in the industry are willing to do anything to get their hands on more money, but I truly never thought it would come to this. \nWhen logging on to MySpace, you expect that all the artists’ groupies or friends have juiced up their play counts, but for major record labels to stoop this low is despicable. As creepy as it is, MySpace is supposed to be a place where anyone can discover new talents and make a call about them without having the filter of mainstream propaganda. This development proves MySpace isn’t any different than MTV or your local pop-music radio station. The industry people believe that we should hear whatever they see fit and bumping up play counts that lead to artists climbing “Most Popular” lists is exactly that. \nIf record companies are willing to corrupt something as seemingly unimportant as MySpace play counts, it completely proves any cynical view about them. What’s worse is that their influence is so strong now that most people won’t ever hear about this, or frankly even care. Next thing you know it’s going to come out that record labels control what songs play on the radio. Thankfully, it hasn’t yet come to that.