News: The Wall Street Journal has a front page article exposing YouTube singer Marie Digby as a fake of sorts. She is a fake amateur.
The WSJ uncovered the fact that Digby had a recording contract with Disney’s Hollywood Records back in 2005. Digby, however, never revealed her professional status on her YouTube channel or MySpace page, nor did Hollywood Records on its YouTube channel.
Analysis: Being accused of being a “fake amateur” singer–wow, now that’s interesting. I guess it’s better to be an amateur on YouTube than a professional singer.
This is much different from the “lonelygirl” incident where the question was whether the person was real or fictitious. Here, there’s no doubt Marie Digby is a singer and a real person, so I don’t know what all the fuss is about. Why is the Wall Street Journal spending front page coverage to this story? It’s only helping spread publicity for Marie Digby (which seems counter to the thrust of the WSJ article).
UPDATE: I answer in another post whether Marie Digby did anything wrong.
The reason for the front page coverage is neither a waste of front page coverage nor a personal attack on the singer herself. Ms. Digby has unquestionable talent. But instead of a record label promoting an artist they have signed and spent money on in traditional fashion, (i.e. appearances, radio time, and the like) they chose to promote her as an unsigned artist. They spent money on creating this image as an amateur. This raises the question of whether artists and companies can use the expanding avenues open to true amateurs to get free publicity for themselves and whether consumers will hold them accountable for mis-leading statements. It seems unfair to hold Ms. Digby accountable for doing what her label asks of her in a market that is in financial turmoil due to falling record sales but who else can be held accountable. The internet has given traditional media sources a run for their money and now they are fighting back with stunts like this one. I doubt we will see any kind of apology for mis-leading consumers instead most likely they accuse everyone involved of unfair coverage etc. I truly wish talented artist such as Ms. Digby the best but I am curious to see whether consumers will put up with being manipulated by labels. If Ms. Digby’s career tanks because of this stunt then what has the label lost. The cost of promoting new talent this way is negligible. And while the artist pays a high price certainly, the label might just drop them and try it again with someone new. Starving artists are plentiful and this lesson has certainly cost them very little. But consumers are just now beginning to create our own space for media on the internet, are we willing to put up with grassroots outlets that are not-so-secretly manipulated by the companies?
i agree with beekersavant. from the quotes i see she mislead everyone and acted like she was an indie. her posting says she was unsigned, when she was actually under contract with disney. lying is lying at least for most people not from hollywood. she and the DJs knew exactly what was going on and she played the part. tell me most people wouldn’t say that is totally bogus. i mean to go on radio and tv and pretend she was discovered on youtube when she has been signed since 2005! another disney kingdom made up character. that she’s from brentwood makes the hollywood label even more ironic. its not illegal but it crosses the line. maybe she should run for president. or be the next hannah montana and cover milli vanilli songs. or maybe she should just go back to brentwood and shop.
You all act like she has dealt you some kind of miss justice by being signed. If you came to her site and you liked her music then nothing has changed, the fact that she is signed does not changed the reasons why you liked her music in the first place. In less you are one of those people who goes with something simply because it goes against what everyone els is doing, because you want to pretend to be the outsider?
Anyways, she was signed in 2005 to Disney… Big deal! She used youtube to get her music out there and despite peoples warped opinions this is not some kind of sin for her or anyone who is not amateur. She is good and before youtube I had never even heard of her, I doubt anyone who comments here will be able to say that they had known about her since before youtube or myspace, so what is the problem with a person who wants to be heard using those avenues provided to them to be heard.
The internet is free and it worked to make this girl famous. The power of the internet, not the recorded label or radio stations. The power of the people made this girl, and if you changed you opinions and reasons for doing that now simply because you think she is some kind of fake amateur. Then I think you should ask yourself who is really the fake in this whole thing, the girl or all the fans who said they liked her music and that she deserve a chance but as soon as they found out she was signed… They cried and screamed and asked “How can you give it to her, she is not a real amateur” and their true nature was exposed. Not that of a person with an opinion, but just a person who goes with whatever appears to be outside the box, the blackjack gum of the internet, the people who smoke to make them look cool, and wear their sunglasses at night because they think they are making some kind of statement.
[...] Did YouTube singer Marie Digby do anything wrong? News: By now, you’ve probably heard about the brouhaha about YouTube singer Marie Digby who posed as an unknown amateur singer on YouTube, even though she has been an unknown professional singer signed by Disney back in 2005 and had Disney handlers helping her all along the way on YouTube. The Wall Street Journal broke the story on its front page this week, and I’ve summarized the account here. [...]
It’s remarkable how so many people have assumed that the WSJ article is accurate because it’s in PRINT. While it may come as a shock to many of you, as someone who has known Marie* for years ,this young woman never intended anything other than to share her music with the world.
She wanted people to judge her music for what it Is – without a label …for the purity of music and because she loves doing it -it’s her life. Marie* put those videos up on YouTube herself -there was NEVER any elaborate ruse for the public …only a young woman singing her heart out in her own backyard. The WSJ article was a very unfair depiction of Marie* and SO inaccurate.
You can’t believe what was written just because it was published.
honestly, I feel had, fooled.. I think it’s unfair to the poor struggling musicians out there , who have the same talent…
I totally agree with DC, it’s abosolutely ridiculous that everyone believes everything that was said in the article when nothing the author of the WSJ came with any kind of proof. The author’s ONLY so called proof was that she was signed in 2005. Now, was she a signed artist? Yes. Was she an unknown artist? Yes. Did her record company do anything to promote her? No. Did she use her connection to the record company to her advantage? Questionable, supposedly she used a computer supplied by the label. All in all it sounds to me like she was trying to get her name out there on her own. NOW, to the conspiracy theorists out there think about this: If this was all a big plan to generate interest and a way to drive record sales by the record label, then don’t you think they would have had an album/cd ready, waiting and sitting in the wings ready to be released? The ideal thing would have been to strike while the iron is hot, but . . . this isn’t the case. Where was the master plan? Or were these marketing experts just not that bright? What exactly makes her not a struggling artist when her music label hasn’t really done any promotion for her. She’s been signed for almost two years, but you only heard of her because of youtube… and not because of her label.
First of all, everyone please read the WSJ article very carefully. The writer reveals facts he has uncovered about Ms. Digby and Hollywood records: (1) Digby signed with Hollywood Records in 2005 (she’s a professional) (2) Digby on her youtube site in 2007 put “None” in as for her Record Label (3) Digby’s appearance on Carson Daley was requested and booked through her record label, and not the other way around (4) The LA station DJ said he saw Digby on youtube and that is why he booked her. He declined to be intervied by the WSJ (5) Digby’s appearance on a local LA radio station was actually found out by WSJ to be booked through her record label. Anyway, there are more facts in the article. You can either believe Digby and and her label are lying, or the WSJ is lying. What articles are out there that is saying WSJ is faking it’s whole article??
Ms. Digby should quit defending herself with lie after lie. She only has to tell the truth one time, and she is clean. If she is living a lie, she will forever have tell lie again and again.
Ms. Digby is one of the greatest singer I’ve heard.. and its not her fault to known by many people through the internet, it’s free. no one should judge her.. she’s just sharing her music and all the people heard it liked it.. eventhough they are saying she’s signed with a record label or somthing, big deal!! her music is great.. her music is the important thing.
Go Marie Digby!!! Keep rocking!!!
People stop hating her i’m one of her friends and biggest supporters stop runing her name and get a life. Some of these things are really alful things to say about here and its just child like. its grade school guys stop acting like 4 and 5th graders.
I’ve known this girl for a long time and she always was in love with her music like LIME said she jsut wants to share her music with the world and she never posed as something she wasnt, shes nice, kind and caring and she never lied to anyone. So gewt your facts straight.
M.D.F., it seems she acted as if all this tv appearances and etc was a surprise. she was dishonest. she could come forward and clean her image. instead she kept covering her lie. thats not honest. i was thinking in buying her album. now i wont. and i hope no one does too. honesty is gold these days. ppl should stand for it.
Well, i guess we’d really like to hear the truth about Marie’s Youtube postings…ie, did she knowingly posed as an indie at the behest of her record company OR were the posted videos her very own idea to begin with.
The way i see it, she wanted to create a buzz for her work which weren’t making much headway thru more conventional means, thus, the idea (hers or otherwise) to post some cover songs on Youtube with the hope of getting noticed. And even if she didn’t mention or chose not to mention she was a signed artist, i believe all she wanted was to get her music OUT there and share it with the world and be successful in her career.
Come on, don’t tell me all of you never did ‘something deceptive’ to gain a leg-up in life. Are we all so morally pristine that we can harshly judge Marie for her so-called ‘less than honest’ self portrayal? (if it were indeed true)
If she really went out to decieve us, i guess we can feel ‘cheated’ BUT ultimately, she will be judged by her music and how she conducts herself in the public eye. So why so much hate directed towards her when we ourselves aren’t exactly blameless to begin with?
As for me, i’ll willing to look past these ‘grey areas’ because she is such a beautiful and talented person who obviously loves what she’s doing…something i am sure millions of people will agree with. With or without Youtube’s help, i really believe she would’ve made it anyway because she’s just too driven and talented not to.
Honestly, i have seen her perform and even got her autograph and I can say she is undoubtedly a gifted singer/songwriter with a very gracious attitude. Despite her hectic schedule, she smiled and apologized for having to rush thru her performance and the autograph signing later. I just hope she remains ‘down-to-earth’ and true to herself in whatever she decides to do in her career.
Thank you Marie for sharing your music with us, no matter how it got there in the first place.
Their are lies of omission, however, this is ‘not’ a case of that. The idea that an artist requires full disclosure that they are signed, is ludicrous. Until their record is out, being signed means very little. Until then, they have to play the field, like other artists. Even then, there is no need for them to state they are signed. Being signed has nothing to do with posting music videos! It’s the artists who can be duped by the record companies. Other’s should realize they don’t know everything about a person who is merely singing a song on a video!
And, the Wall Street Journal article was based on supposition, and much of that was clearly false. The article contained errors of fact, the poster they quoted wasn’t typical as they asserted.
And, if you’d feel duped because an artist was signed, I suggest you read Marie Digby’s response below. It’s the artists who sometimes are duped.
http://popdirt.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=64089
http://popdirt.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=64110
(I like what I have below more than my last post – Editors, feel free to remove this lin, and delete the previous post if you want).
The Wall Street Journal got this story wrong.
Marie Digby herself says the idea of using youtube was entirely her own, and the timing of her videos coincides with her story.
Note also, the Wall Street Journal article contained factual errors. The post they cited as typical was not representative of what was said in the topic at all.
Marie Digby never lied. There is no comparison to the lonelygirl case, and by the way, she didn’t lie either, at least not as far as I have seen.
It always struck me that there is a special term in journalists, i.e. “Investigative journalism.”
Here’s the other, more accurate side of the story in Marie Digby’s own words.
http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=4165438&blogID=307265009
Ok, I now have even more information than before:
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) article was wrong about Marie Digby. Marie Digby never lied. Too anyone who followed her videos, Marie Digby has always been herself.
The article stated:
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“Ms. Digby’s MySpace and YouTube pages don’t mention Hollywood Records. Until last week, a box marked “Type of Label” on her MySpace Music page said, “None.”
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However, she had joined MySpace in 2004, roughly 2 years before she was signed, and she merely didn’t bother to update a setting, and she’d probably forgotten that setting even existed. I signed up for a MySpace music page, and it could even be missed when first signing up. And, since months after she recorded her CD, there was no indication it was ever going to be released, I wouldn’t expect that it would even cross her mind to change her status to signed, even if she was still aware of that setting. Note, her CD didn’t come out until approximately 2 years after she was signed, and approximately 4 years after she joined MySpace.
The article went on to state:
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“After inquiries from The Wall Street Journal, the entry was changed to “Major,” though the label still is not named.”
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Makes sense to me. There is no point in naming a record label when there is no indication they are going to release your CD. And, given that, who she was signed with has just as little relevance as that she was signed. (Note, the CD, titled “Unfold” finally came out on April 8, 2008. Buy it, it’s wonderful).
The Wall Street Journal article also contained:
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‘Most of Ms. Digby’s new fans seem pleased to believe that they discovered an underground sensation.
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In fact, the vast majority of the posts were about her music, and not about “discovering” her. For most of us viewers, a huge number of people had already seen her videos when we found her, which were posted long before the WSJ article, so we could hardly claim to have ‘discovered her.’
The term “feigning amateur status”, used in the WSJ article is completely ridiculous. Marie Digby posted music videos, and expressed enthusiasm, and hope. She was largely unknown outside of Los Angeles.
Marie Digby has posted that a Wall Street reporter talked to Marie Digby for about an hour, but they never asked the questions that would have cleared this up. Instead, they took one response, which merely meant that her signed status wasn’t relevant to her goals (and frankly, would have seemed ridiculous in the videos), as meaning she was hiding it.
There were radio station interviews, before the WSJ article, where she mentioned being signed. If she were hiding it, she would have hid it there too.
I gather Marie Digby’s family is rather well off. She never mentioned that in her videos either. I wouldn’t say she was, “feigning middle class status,” but I’m sure some people would! Sad!