After researching publicity and journalism in the music industry for a full semester, I have one key takeaway: Relationships are important. The relationship between a journalist and a publicist is essential for both parties to experience any kind of success.
This idea was supported by all three of my interviews, as well as by the secondary research I conducted. Publicists need journalists to care about their artists so consumers will know about those artists; journalists need those artists to produce content that consumers want to read. Tracey Pepper, Steve Knopper, and Jaime Rosenberg all agreed: You can’t get anywhere without a good relationship.
However, this raises some ethical questions, many of which I wasn’t expecting going into this project. The ethical questions are what is fueling my London research. How are those relationships built? Where is the balance between friendship and professionalism? And how does relationship building in the United Kingdom differ from relationship building in the United States, if at all? These are just some of the questions I now have as I prepare to head overseas.
Lil Wayne’s story ran on Pitchfork.com, and it became a component of my research this semester.
After doing my interviews and reading through secondary research, I decided to see if the websites I visit on a regular basis fall victim to ethically questionable practices. I chose articles on Pitchfork.com, Spin.com, and Vibe.com, and I analyzed those articles to see if a bias was able to be seen. Much to my surprise, I saw that all three chose catering to artists and specific target audiences over reporting facts. My goal now is to find harmony between these findings, where ethics are questionable, and what my interviewees said – which is that journalists and publicists should try to be ethical in everything they do. I believe that not only can my additional research questions be answered in London, but that I can do research there to see if this is a practice that transcends the United States as well.
I’m excited to continue my research. I’m currently working on arranging interviews with writers from websites including The Line of Best Fit and This is Fake DIY, as well as executives from Warner Music Group. London itself will be exciting, but the research answers that lie just overseas are thrilling!
