Topic: Pitchfork

[Slack]

Anyone following the Pitchfork saga?  I have a personal interest in it - my youngest son works for pitchfork, he was hired 3 months before Conde Naste bought it.  There are 2 divisions within pitchfork writers/critiques/ publication (the main part) and Events.  Son is in charge of Events… the major one being in Chicago.  In any case the following quote resonated with me as I think us weenies feel similarly… maybe in a more historical context.

"Kaskie told me that Pitchfork’s editors saw themselves as “stewards of a subculture.” , and that the sale was intended to protect its identity, not erase it.”

I think it relates to the other thread on algorithmic stealing of songs, posted by Stuart.

https://www.semafor.com/article/02/04/2024/inside-conde-nasts-breakup-with-pitchfork

[Stuart]

Hi Slack:

I've been aware of the direction things were going, but not really following the "saga," as you put it. It was alluded to in the title of a piece by Ezra Klein last week that had a link to a podcast by its founders, and there was another link to an article about the overall trend that's putting an end to some of our old favorites that we thought would be around forever. Here are three links to gifted NYT articles:

http://tinyurl.com/3pw38dj2

http://tinyurl.com/ykxkcctj

http://tinyurl.com/5b2xhsdp

I agree with you that one of our goals or perhaps our mission is to be custodians of culture and history. But we don't consider the music we primarily focus on and the people who made it to be historical and/or cultural curiosities. It was great music when it was "current" and it's great music now--and "mainstream" to those who listened to it when it was current. But I'm not telling anyone here anything they don't already know.

Anyway, I hope your son is able to keep his position and that there are brighter days ahead--all around.  And thanks for sharing the article.

[Rivers]

I agree with you that one of our goals or perhaps our mission is to be custodians of culture and history. But we don't consider the music we primarily focus on and the people who made it to be historical and/or cultural curiosities. It was great music when it was "current" and it's great music now--and "mainstream" to those who listened to it when it was current. But I'm not telling anyone here anything they don't already know.

Sounds like a great mission statement update to me!