I was reminded of the uproar regarding an interview with UMG CEO Doug Morris back in late November by a post at My Global Hustle Blog.

Everybody’s calling him clueless* in some form and I usually take that route when dealing with such entities but if you’re really wanting to understand what’s going on and why choices that appear clueless have been inevitable for major labels, read the following:

The Innovator’s Dilemma: The Revolutionary Book that Will Change the Way You Do Business

The Innovator’s Solution: Creating and Sustaining Successful Growth

Seeing What’s Next: Using Theories of Innovation to Predict Industry Change

I refer to Christensen and associates work from time to time and, now that I’m on the third book, I’ll have to say it’s taught me more about the current troubles of the music industry, without ever mentioning it, than any of the online writers I respect and that’s saying a lot.

I would hesitate to point these books out because they speak directly to the current competition among online hip hop media outlets except for the fact that most of those people will scoff at the notion.

And thank goodness for that.  It gives the rest of us a little room to build before big money hip hop media catches up and things get really nasty.

*I should note that in the Wired blog post and probably in other writings the term cluelessness was used because Morris said he didn’t know much about technology and didn’t know who to hire to take the company forward using technology.  Considering how hard it is to evaluate and hire somebody with decent knowledge of PHP or WordPress, why do people find it surprising that it’s hard to evaluate and hire someone to lead a major initiative when any technical person at that level can bs their way through any tech discussion with a non-technical person?