Coolfer has a nice response to the blog buzz study, Does Chatter Matter? The Impact of User-Generated Content on Music Sales, by Vasant Dhar and Elaine Chang, though he does refer to Chang only as a "former student" [pet peeve regarding the disappearance of second authors, but I digress].

Nevertheless Coolfer does briefly point out some of the limits of the study that most media outlets will ignore and he links to the sources.

Key point:
"Of course, a predictor may not be a cause for future sales. The researchers talked about this a bit and theorized that an unobserved variable (such as the quality of the artist) could cause both blog chatter and sales increases."

Which means that NYU’s press release headline is inaccurate but that’s how science becomes common knowledge.

Nice work, y’all!  Except for that headline writer.

Press Release:
Blog Chatter Can Triple Future Sales of Music Albums According to New Study from NYU Stern

Info & Full Study:
http://archive.nyu.edu/handle/2451/23783

Link Suggested for Citation:
http://hdl.handle.net/2451/23783

Related Study by Elaine Chang:
I Heard It Through the Grapevine: The Effects of Online Word of Mouth on Music Sales
Note: This is her undergrad honors thesis.  I think we’ll be hearing more about Ms. Chang in the future.