My inbox is crammed with e-mails telling me how fucking slow the Radiohead site is running. Shades of the U2/fan club/ticketing debacle?

One thing I never forgot is a quote from Bob Reitman, who used to be GM at A&M. He looked me in the eye and asked, "Are you a writer or a publisher?"

I’m a writer. I’m incidentally a publisher.

Radiohead is a band. And right now they look like shitty businessmen.

They didn’t anticipate the crush? They didn’t buy enough server power? They aligned themselves with incompetents, people who hadn’t DONE IT BEFORE?

The Web… Funny how music rules it and the old wave bands are so retarded when it comes to it. LAY OFF THE FLASH! If it takes that fucking long for your page to come up, PEOPLE WON’T COME BACK! What do you want more, an award-winning design or return visits?

The Grateful Dead’s record company was run so ineptly that they went back to a major. Maybe Radiohead didn’t want to align with iTunes because the band only wanted its music sold as an album, but then why didn’t they make a deal with Amazon, SOMEBODY WITH ENOUGH INFRASTRUCTURE!

That’s what Apple and Amazon do all day. Fulfillment. Rag on TicketMaster all you want, but believe me, it ain’t easy to process all those requests. They ARE providing a service, however overpriced you might believe it is.

As are major labels. Chances are, if you’re savvy enough to do everything they do, you’re a shitty musician. They’re COMPLETELY DIFFERENT SKILLS!

If the majors had been smart, which they’re not, they would have become the distributors of choice. Made deals with EVERYONE! That’s their role. Releasing music and getting paid. No one does it better. It’s just now they want the lion’s share of the money and don’t want to account honestly regarding how much money came in. But, if there were a new company, operating transparently, on low margins, it would gain traction. Radiohead should not be doing this themselves. Sure, they’re breaking the mold, but they appear to be AMATEURS! And no matter how much you love them, your perception is eroded, they go down a notch in your book. You want to pay AND THEY WON’T TAKE YOUR MONEY?

Talk to Paluska. When he had those Phish festivals, not only were prices reasonable, THERE WERE ENOUGH TOILETS! The music might be the excitement, but it doesn’t get to shine unless all the other elements are in place.

Granted, the album’s not coming out for ten days. You can keep logging on. But as an e-mail said to me, what does this portend for the DELIVERY OF THE ALBUM? Is that gonna be as fucked up as the ordering?

This needed to be seamless. They should have been able to purchase enough server/computing power today. Someone there, whoever’s in charge, if there is someone in charge, has dropped the ball. Hire someone who knows what he’s doing. PRONTO!