Assessing the Fallout From Mat Zo’s Twitter Saga

Much has been said over the last week concerning Mat Zo’s recent Twitter explosion. During the days-long social media rampage, he’s done everything from calling out individual artists by name, to spurring a massive discussion concerning the nature of the EDM industry. This all culminated today in a list that began to circulate around, detailing a small collection of DJs and their respective ghost producers. This in turn led to it being credited directly to Zo, and so yet another Internet rumor was born. The list in question:

Of course, with the Internet being what it is, this actually never came from Zo in the first place, despite the quickness of people to assume otherwise. To Mat’s credit, he wasted no time in straightening out the record:

https://twitter.com/Mat_Zo/status/605831791249719297

[divider]Reassessing the Damage[/divider]

So now that we have that out of the way, we can cut straight to the heart of the issue. We said earlier this week that in many ways, Mat may be the sanest guy in the room. Since then though, the tirade has continued on into a strange place. His Twitter stream has been an endless deluge of pontification, philosophizing, and self-deprecation, simultaneously trumpeting his message and telling people to ignore him, even going so far as to claim he “didn’t start this to to draw attention to (himself).”

In some ways, he’s right. We have no doubt that his goal wasn’t to draw attention directly to his front door as an artist. It’s fairly clear that his original intention was to start an honest discussion concerning the pitfalls of a less than honest industry. In that, we can absolutely respect his message. But over the course of all this, he’s continued to make a spectacle of himself, and in doing so served only to undercut his message.

https://twitter.com/Mat_Zo/status/605421045286207488

Most recently, he’s issued threats to delete his Twitter if he accrued over 65,000 followers, only to take back that promise, blaming a flood of Twitter bots he theorizes were orchestrated by his detractors. In the process, he’s gone on into a stream of consciousness to further emphasize his own self-importance. The only place this brings us is further away from actually discussing the matter at hand, while keeping the spotlight fixed firmly upon one person: Mat Zo.

[divider]Separating the Issues[/divider]

So let’s bring this out of the realm of Mat Zo’s Twitter account. To date, he’s said little that’s actually provided any real evidence, instead choosing to fire warning shots across the bows of artists like Markus Schulz, Armin van Buuren, and more. Instead, all we’ve seen is the posturing of a man with a large cannon threatening to unload, never quite lighting the fuse, and then getting angry when people ask him to get on with it and fire the damn thing.

And to ensure that we’re being entirely clear and free of suspicion: No, we’re not trying to “silence” Zo, or end his career. If things are actually going to change though, what we need is detailed proof, screenshots of correspondence, and actual, provable facts concerning ghost producers, sketchy behavior that currently exists behind closed doors, and actionable evidence of the mistreatment of smaller artists. Throughout every Tweet, retweet, and accusation spanning the better part of a week, all we have to go on is hearsay and secondhand rumors. But if the issue is going to be less about naming names and more about the discourse, then the abbreviated potshots at individual artists sans context need to either a) leave the discussion entirely, or b) substantiate with proof.