If you are going to run a place of employment where co-workers under the age of 18 are going to be a regular thing, background checks NEED to be part of the regular hiring practice. If all or nearly all of your employees are adults, then background checks are pretty much optional, but when you are filling your payroll…

They literally saw his behavior and didn’t fire him and call the cops.

Where I work we fired some older men simply for acting sexist, like refusing to listen to women supervisors and making sexist comments.

The minute he made a lewd comment to a 14 year old he should have been fired. He kept harassing her because management ALLOWED it to happen, allowed him to get away with it. The harassment escalated because no one put an end to it. He was emboldened. The harassment never should have been allowed to continue in the…

There’s a lot of focus on the background check here, but that’s not really the problem, because background checks are just another extension of the carceral state that prevent reintegration and increase recidivism. The problem is that management was warned about his behavior and then did absolutely nothing.

This feels more like some misogyny at play. “The little girl won’t fight us!” The back catalog was a dead asset the minute Taylor said she was going to re-record them. The leverage she gained with the streaming services might have them promoting her new versions over the originals. That’s truly going to hit the bottom…

She gets a lot of grief from the kinds of people who can’t seem to fathom the notion of celebrities (or people in general) not being perfect, but Taylor Swift is a god-damned beast and I’m here for it. 

I doubt she had much of a choice if she wanted a major label contract. This arrangement is not at all uncommon, The Beatles being the most famous example. But often once an artist hits it huge and has money of their own, if the label wants to sell then they sell it to that artist. Stiff-arming Swift was the original…

I work in finance and deal with private equity groups all the time. The fact that one would make a purchase of this magnitude without knowing conclusively that she wouldn’t re-record the same damn songs is mind-boggling. The amount of due diligence involved in selling a company to a private equity group is usually…

I have no feelings about Swift either way, but I loved the story from Imogen Heap (I think) about working with her. She was expecting a bubblegum star to show up and be like "write me songs, lol", but Swift was like "Here are extensive notes and lyrics, here are all the hooks I've already written, I'm already playing…

I have a friend who listens to basically nothing but Scandinavian black metal and hard bop jazz (I know, right), and he thinks this is the most badass move since Prince decided to no longer be Prince in order to screw his former label. Respect.

Next time I’m buying stereo equipment, Taylor’s Version albums are going to be my reference material. The dynamic range on these records is so wide, it’s clear they were mastered for private on-demand listening, not radio. Really lovingly produced, beautiful recordings.

The path to fame and super stardom is far more difficult without a major record label. Most record labels will not sign a new unknown artist without ownership rights over the music said artist releases under them. And once you sign it is very difficult to get out of contracts early (and if you do you still don’t own…

Taylor Swift continues be such a fascinating person and I mean that in the most respectful way possible.

In addition to this, the new release versions are pretty definitively seen as the superior recordings.

This Jez blog reads like it’s not just the private equity firm that underestimated her and Jez is finally figuring out what the rest of the world did ages ago - including those of us who aren’t fans of her music at all but still respect the hell out of her. You’d think a supposedly feminist blog would have better…

My mom died a few years ago from cancer and while driving her home from a particularly obnoxious visit with a doctor I told her that I hated how they talked to her like she was an idiot. She looked at me and said “All my life people thought I was just a dumb blonde. Turn’s out the joke was on them”

Embarrassing is absolutely the right world for underestimating her.

Addiction is a bear of a problem for some people, and recovery sometimes involves backsliding.

Don’t listen to the other self righteous jerk. People can change and grow to be better. Your perspective is helpful to this conversation.