Every now and then you get reminded that despite its veneer of sophistication the interweb can often be little more than a brawling saloon bar in the wild West or a braying lynch mob hungry for blood.
In the last day or so there’s been a little bit of controversy about what appeared to be a music critic for a daily newspaper putting up an unopened promo disc on ebay. I came across this story via Twitter and went to Stereokill (a site I’d not heard of before) to check it out.
The fact that the artist concerned, Imogen Heap, was taking direct action and trying to scupper the sale by upping the bid to millions of dollars appealed to me.
I’ve had experience of trying to persuade Ebay (not to mention Blogger, Myspace, Wordpress, et al) that a particular user is breaching their stated terms and conditions, often to no particular effect. Figuring that it's often easier to get blood from a stone, I was pleased to see Imogen taking it on this way.
Another artist whose work I'm fond of, Thomas Dolby, picked up on the Ebay battle in what I thought was a great post about music critics in general and has since reported today that the issue has been resolved.
What was interesting for me in all of this was the response to the story over in Stereokill’s comments section; veiled threats, demands for resignations, people offering all kinds of “helpful suggestions” as to how the investigation should be pursued and prosecuted.
It’s not what is being said so much as the tone of it.
By internet standards it’s all fairly tame stuff.
Yet I can’t help shudder when I read this kind of "hang 'em high" knee-jerk tosh which people always seem in such a hurry to spout off.
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