I really want to believe this piece about women music shoppers using the internet to circumvent the bs snobbery of snobbish clerks, but I'm just not so sure. I mean, I think that most of the online retail shops in the US are still mostly male in downloads and subscribers. Anyway, this is part of the larger world of 'voting with dollars' that I'm deeply suspicious of, in some ways. It reminds me of all the rhetoric around New Orleans after the flood, that if only they could get tourism back in place, it would bring in money for the horrific rest of the city. Am I supposed to believe that women downloaders will change the mainstream music industry's condesending attitudes towards female fans? Does the music industry have a condescending relationship towards female fans? Or is it just the people at yr local Tower, self-imposing their boring 50s stereotypes of the audiophile know-it-all asshole on all people not similarly inflicted with boring leftbrain listy minds?

SSP (shameless? self-promotion):

Perhaps if you are my friendster friend you've seen that my photo is kind of ridiculous. It involves me 1) wearing a cocktail dress (a document in and of itself) 2) holding a cordless mic 3) at a podium 4) while I'm giving away an award. What the photo doesn't tell you is that it was in Las Vegas, at the MGM Grand, in a venue that apparently only hires waitresses if they have modeling contracts. Har har. Anyway, this only happened because I am involved with this show. And yes, it is that silly.