:dozey:

 

"New York Times" Writer Nees A Lesson In MySpace 101

 

Of all the disastrous MySpaces I've seen, Coldplay's current page does not exactly merit a second thought. It's simple, tasteful, professionally designed, and easy to read. Perhaps the only thing remarkable about it is how good it looks for a MySpace. Yet New York Times media critic Virginia Heffernan seems to think it's some sort of menacing pariah of the online world, a crudely cobbled-together middle finger to all those who crave browser-crashing Flash from their favorite artists' online presence. Her piece in yesterday's NYT Magazine is borderline embarrassing to read if you've ever so much as visited a MySpace page, not to mention rife with misconceptions about how the site actually works. But in the end she finally gets down to the bottom of Coldplay. Sort of. (Not really.)

 

Mine is the 21,120,387th visit to Coldplay's MySpace page. I am not greeted warmly. The British band — which is known for giant pop hits, a sheen of fakery and the marriage of its lead singer to Gwyneth Paltrow — does not exactly rush out to greet me. The page is rudimentary and indifferently decorated, like the apartment of four couchbound soccer addicts who barely look up when a girlfriend comes in.

 

So Coldplay is

that

kind of band. I thought it might be the other kind. MySpace offers only two design choices for pop acts who create pages there, meaning every single pop act in the world (almost). You can create a lazy, placeholder, MySpace-is-idiotic page, barely shuffling your feet to the social-network tune, like a goth kid at a school dance. Or you can kick out the jams, expand the brand, offer free downloads and revel in the sound and light of multimedia narcissism. What's an attention-hungry, ridicule-averse rock band to do?

If Coldplay were really "that kind of band" —the kind to nonchalantly brush off the importance of a flashy MySpace—their page would look like Bright Eyes' standard-issue "maintained by Saddle Creek" profile, which is a lot closer to "a goth kid at a school dance" than Coldplay's slick layout.

So in the last several years, virtually everyone trying to sell music has found it necessary to keep a presence on MySpace. It's there that music fans and A.& R. people alike play new songs, watch music videos, check concert information and chat with cybergroupies. And no matter how intensely rock stars balk at every part of the commercial-studded site that is controlled by Rupert Murdoch, they cave in and post a page. (Oh, yes, even the musician identified as "Bob Dylan — NEW YORK, New York — Classic Rock/Folk Rock — www.myspace.com/bobdylan" has one.)

So Bob Dylan's record company set up a MySpace under his name. You don't say!

How, then, to interpret Coldplay's standoffishness? On its MySpace page, the backdrop is plain white with a close-up of red-and-black brush strokes. Then, in the collagist style that holds MySpace in a chokehold, this black-white-and-red-all-over image is overlain with orderly boxes. One box is a banner ad. It reads, in turns: "Violet Hill video," "We're playing another free concert . . . ¡Barcelona!" and "Preorder new album on iTunes." These words seem to be scratched in a streak of the red paint in essay-exam handwriting that looks somehow both rushed and forced.

What Heffernan describes as "standoffishness" is really just the work of a pro web designer looking to make the page easily accessible to the wide variety of people who tend to enjoy Coldplay—the kind of MySpace that wouldn't seem daunting to a 50-year-old mom who heard some songs from the band's new album during a feature on All Things Considered. Why this rather obvious fact isn't apparent to a professional media critic for the flipping New York Times is anyone's guess.

Two other boxes are sparsely furnished. One brings to mind the postcollegiate bedroom of a guy who keeps nothing but a futon and a clock radio. Scroll down and it frames a photo of the band, sitting (it seems) on the kind of tufted, circular sofa you might find in the waiting area of an old train station. I turn to the commentary on this photo in hopes of an ID — "Ah, Victoria Station!" — but I'm scolded in a red MySpace typeface: "You must be someone's friend to make comments about them." Hmm. Quite.

This paragraph reads as if Heffernan is a Victorian-era English gentleman who's taken a time machine to present day and, upon recognizing the couch from Victoria Station, yearned to connect with his own time period, but was cruelly denied by modern technology. Quite distasteful indeed!

Why does Martin bow and scrape in this cringing way on MySpace? (Compare Coldplay's page with that of Nas, another performer with a hit record; it's all filmic strutting, with center-stage Nas in the superhero role, the Zeus role, the Christ role, the Barack Obama role.) One explanation for Martin's assertive humility is that Coldplay's music, for all its thundering and sparkling atmospherics, is often about one man's wretched interior life. A lone individual's grandiose psyche is typically the terrain of a solo artist, not a band. The fact that Martin has deputized his bandmates to help him carry out his own schemes and self-expression — like a full mariachi band called in for a romantic serenade — is maybe a little uncomfortable for him.

 

Coming from my computer's built-in speakers, Coldplay's music would sound tinny if I weren't also staring at Coldplay's screen-size MySpace "environment" — the scribbles, the spare illustrations. Because it lacks the conviction of a real, florid MySpace page, the environment is obscurely embarrassing. Yet, in a straightforward way, it underscores the embarrassment of Coldplay's music — the mawkishness, suppressed arrogance, halfheartedness and squeamishness about rock stardom. When illustrated by the graphics here, embarrassment seems like an entirely worthy theme for very hard soft rock.

 

For the first time, staring at the bad MySpace page and listening to songs on a computer, I understand Coldplay's music.

For the record, Nas' MySpace—which takes 45 seconds to "initiate"—is the very definition of hot mess, with text spilling out all over the layout, endless video content, and header animation that sends lesser browsers like Safari into hysterics. It's not exactly the pinnacle of web design, and arguably much less user-friendly than Coldplay's page.

The one thing Heffernan seems to get right here is that Coldplay's MySpace is supposed to reflect the band's sound and personality. But it's not "mawkishness, suppressed arrogance, halfheartedness and squeamishness about rock stardom" that come through; it's bland stylishness and mass appeal—which, here, are reflected by the band's unwillingness to crash users' browsers for the sake of having an animated graphic at the top.

 

http://idolator.com/398499/new-york-times-writer-nees-a-lesson-in-myspace-101

Tosspots! :dozey:

WTH! Is the times so bored that it has to take jabs at coldplay's myspace page? Surely there's something more interesting to talk about...

Yet another completely pointless article.:dozey:

lol wtf? why so much hate i dont understand? such a losers.

:dozey: should i even bother reading...

I haven't paid attention to it and I haven't read it all, it's too long. Actually, it shouldn't have been put on this website. Just ignore it.:thinking:

i want to say one thing about this NewYorkTimes,what ever they do

 

they're not coldplay fans ok.

 

So they'll criticize everything whether its useful or not,each and every thing coldplay do.

 

Always getting Chris's wife into criticizing coldplay,then why aren't they even bothered about other guys then even they're married like him too.:rolleyes:

 

They're getting attention for criticizing Coldplay,i want to say that its a pretty stupid newspaper in the world ever.:P

 

 

and Yeah i agree with you Patricia it shouldn't be posted here at all.

 

its useless to post here.

 

We have to post the news which is really important.Not like this.

Yeah, it really shows what losers coldplay haters can be, going to these lengths to criticise the band. Good grief.

You know Coldplay is really doing well creatively and commercially when all the New York Times can talk about regarding Coldplay is their Myspace.:rolleyes:

whahaha mimi, your comments crack me up

as for the article :dozey: plain boring and stupid! why would anyone bother to make it but hey, they must need jobs for interns!

seriously the whole intention is that you come to the coldplay original site anyways...

I haven't paid attention to it and I haven't read it all, it's too long. Actually, it shouldn't have been put on this website. Just ignore it.:thinking:

 

Shouldn't it now? ;)

 

It's an piece that illustrates how ridiculous the NYT article is, isn't meant to be taken seriously.

so they couldn't be bothered reviewing the album, but they will take the time to review the myspace page? interesting journalistic choice there :rolleyes:

Perhaps it's easier to criticise the myspace page, than the album :P :idea2:

Get a grip people. Mich is just posting Coldplay related news items...don't kill the messenger...

 

:)

It's a slow news day, huh, NYT? :dozey:

We get it, NYT hates everything about Coldplay. They need to come up with some new material.

FUCK THE N.Y.T. THEY FUCKEN SUCK.............ENOUGH SAID:smug:

It's a slow news day, huh, NYT? :dozey:

We get it, NYT hates everything about Coldplay. They need to come up with some new material.

 

New York Behind The Times??:rolleyes:

:laugh3: what.. did New York Times hire Perez to write their news? :rolleyes:

Living in NYC - Im coming to see the demise of The Times and at the same time The New Yorker. I thought both had credibility. NYT's article on CP's myspace page = waste of time. If they want to lose readers (well i gave up a long time ago) - theyre on a good path.

 

More disgusting is the New Yorker's cover with Obama dressed in Muslim attire and Michelle looking like a terrorist. Made me nearly sick to my stomach.

 

I guess New York hates Obama and CP. See - they all loved Hillary - and I believe Chris mentioned Obama's name at one point or another. Gotta be a conspiracy.

 

I just wonder what the hell is wrong with New York lately esp when it comes to news (or what we pretend it is).

This is exactly why I've been a fan of the Post for years.

 

They don't pretend they're anything but trash, and it's a much more entertaining read than the bleeding-heart liberalism of the Times.

Yes once again that pesky Gwyneth Paltrow woman has mucked something up. My god will Chris have to be homeless and living in a dumpster before he realizes she is destroying his my space page! :rolleyes:

It's like they looked at every little thing that could possibly be construed as something negative and turned it around on the band. WTF. Talking about their freaking myspace PICTURE?

 

What a pathetic way of just wanting another go at Coldplay.

Get a grip people. Mich is just posting Coldplay related news items...don't kill the messenger...

 

:)

 

 

Nah! its a article criticizing Coldplay, its not a coldplay related article at all.

 

its just a hell of criticism.:veryangry:

 

And about killing the messenger what is the need for us to make out each and every person we don't like?

 

we can rather not mind about them,its enough for us than to make them get out.:rolleyes:

The article actually DEFENDS Coldplay if you read it. The article is taking the piss out of NYT :P