We Believe The Cellist: Google Smears @zoecello and All Independent Artists

As David noted in his recent post (“Zoë Keating vs YouTube: The End of an Artist’s Right to Choose Where Their Music Appears on The Internet“), Google started a whisper campaign to journalists against Zoë Keating as soon–if not even before–the story first broke on Digital Music News.  What is a “whisper campaign”?  It’s an anonymous effort by a usually skilled corporate PR department to discredit someone who is criticizing the corporation, an effort directed at journalists with whom the corporate flacks have a relationship and who are willing to publish unattributed statements that contradict the whistleblower who spoke on the record.

Aside from the first exchange with Digital Music News that was probably unintentionally on the record, this is exactly what YouTube is doing to Zoë, and it is exactly what Google does all the time.  Aside from very carefully scripted statements by Google executives, almost all of…