I believe today's pop music is horrible because the companies that put the crap out in the first place discovered that MTV drones will buy it out of conspicuity. In addition, I believe that they (the companies, firms, etc) hire people to go out and buy and/or listen to today's pop (keeping in mind that its crap) so that it'll appear at the top of the charts out of nowhere. Then other people will buy it and listen to it while pretending to like it. If the respective company's management observese that they've made made back the cost of capital (cost of production, employment, manufacturing, etc etc), they will eventually reinvest that money and do the same thing all over again.