While I agree that the article too easily discounts the weight of one's talent in achieving success I think the main point to take away is that the need for social conformance heavily skews our own perceptions. Imagine if a Youtube video was to start with 10k fake upvotes, I bet that video would be upvoted by the vast majority of users regardless of whether they liked it or not.
Buying a bunch of fake listens/votes on platforms like SoundCloud, Beatport etc. is actually a very common way of building an audience in the dance music genre nowadays. Nobody likes it but almost everyone does it, because it's the most effective marketing strategy on a small budget.
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While I agree that the article too easily discounts the weight of one's talent in achieving success I think the main point to take away is that the need for social conformance heavily skews our own perceptions. Imagine if a Youtube video was to start with 10k fake upvotes, I bet that video would be upvoted by the vast majority of users regardless of whether they liked it or not.
Buying a bunch of fake listens/votes on platforms like SoundCloud, Beatport etc. is actually a very common way of building an audience in the dance music genre nowadays. Nobody likes it but almost everyone does it, because it's the most effective marketing strategy on a small budget.