One of my all-time favorite quotes is this one: “The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There’s also a negative side.” It’s credited to the late Hunter S. Thompson.

Wsjmusicbus

Well, the industry is living up to its reputation quite well, thank you very much, if the news on The Journal’s front page today is any indication.

YouTube kool kids, you’ve been had. Tricked, scammed, bamboozled.

Note to music industry (and this label’s part of the Disney brand, for crying out loud!): the new world of marketing and promotion on the web is about transparency and honesty and disclosure. Not cheap Hollywood tricks and lies.

And the nice little rich girl from Brentwood, Marié Digby, ought to be ashamed of herself, too. This kind of front page exposure in the WSJ is definitely not what she and her parents had in mind.

You have to hand it to the Journal, though. My hat goes off to reporters Ethan Smith and Peter Lattman for bringing this one to our attention.