Eliot Spitzer, You're My Hero

A lot of people (including me) rant and rave about how control of the media has been taken away from the people, and no longer represents their interests.

Here's proof.

I've been tracking the radio payola scandal for a while now, and this is another big-yet-obvious revelation. According to this Yahoo News article, Sony and Warner have already agreed to big-money settlements, and today Universal did as well.

Why are they paying? Because they've been bribing radio station employees to rotate certain songs more heavily. They've also been engaging in "fraudulent call-in campaigns" to skew a song's popularity.

Some of the Universal artists whose songs were payola'd: Nick Lachey, Ashlee Simpson, Brian McKnight, Big Tymers, and Lindsay Lohan.

ALL SHITTY MUSICIANS.

On the downside, the stuff these labels were giving to radio reps and Program Directors was pretty tame (Yankees tickets, Miami hotel rooms, preferred seating at U2 concerts). I was kind of hoping it would at least be hookers and blow.