Lets all gather around and talk about a time when the DJ Mag Top 100 poll mattered. The year was 2011 and people still made fun of you for listening to ‘techno'. Flash forward 7 years later and the jackass from your sophomore year high school math class who made fun of you is now rolling balls next to you at EDC telling you to get your X's up as Datsik plays at the Bass Pod. You don't correct him but you ask yourself – how did we get here?
I think DJ Mag is asking themselves the same question how their once beloved poll collapsed in on itself and became a perverse popularity contest full of rampant voter fraud and borderline unethical campaigns by artists. Unfortunately much of the industry clout is still found on these types of charts. Billboard launched their own version of the DJ Mag Top 100 which is active year round and actively changes. Naturally the campaigns have begun!
The Spam Begins
In a twist that literally everybody saw coming artists have started to spam push notifications and message campaigns in hopes of rising their rank on the chart. So who is it that started the first push to rank high on the chart system? None other than Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike. The duo who has seen massive success has gotten into some hot water the last few years for using scantily clad women at various international festivals with iPads to secure votes for the them in the DJ Mag Top 100. We hope that the chart evens things out and maybe even one day penalizes spam campaigning. That is in the far future though. For now, get ready because in terms of EDM politics, election season now will never end.
