The Sold Out/Not Sold Out Page

Huckster Jeff Jensen, marketing reporter, quoted in Globe & Mail, November 30, 1997.

Commercial Alert

"If someone is willing to pay off the debt on the Vatican bank, I can get the pope to do a commercial for them"  Barry M. Greenburg, head of Celebrity Connection, which specializes in linking celebrities to pharmaceutical companies.

There is, perhaps, a degree of consensus that the typical post-modernist artifact is playful, self-ironising and even schizoid; and that it reacts to the austere autonomy of high modernism by impudently embracing the language of commerce and the commodity. Its stance towards cultural tradition is one of irreverent pastiche, and its contrived depthlessness undermines all metaphysical solemnities, sometimes by a brutal aesthetic of squalor and shock.

Terry Eagleton, "Awakening from Modernity", TLS

• Obama.  Okay, it's hard to imagine any politician on this list, but he managed to win the election without stooping the usual mudslinging and negative attack ads ... relatively speaking.  And he has taken the right positions on the important issues-- war, torture, the Constitution, the economy, health care.  Well, as right as seems possible nowadays.  So far, he has followed through on important campaign promises.  One minor negative-- and it probably wan't his personal decision-- the musicians at the inauguration faked it.  [Jan 31, 2009]
• Serpico - Should have been added years ago.  I just watched the movie for the second or third time, and then googled him on the internet-- the movie is surprisingly accurate, compared to the usual Hollywood BS.  [2008-05]
• Bob Dylan - back on the list in gratitude for allowing Todd Haynes to use his songs and life story in the bio-pic "I'm Not There" with no conditions. No approval. No representatives hovering over the set to ensure that his holi Bobliness's reputation be not smudged. This was wonderful thing to do. I hope he becomes the first rock'n'roller to win a Nobel Prize, and I hope he performs "Ballad of a Thin Man" at the ceremony.
• Christopher Hitchens -- appears to be the only journalist in the world who dares to challenge the homogenous belief that Mother Theresa was a saint.  That's got to take some guts, in addition to integrity. I'm not saying he is right.  I think he might be.    [2004-07-13]
• Jessica Lynch:  She may be the poster girl for this category for some time to come!  Resisting what must have been enormous temptations to pad her story and cash in, Jessica Lynch, from the moment she regained consciousness, has steadfastly insisted on the truth about her story, her capture by the the Iraqis, her hospitalization, and her "rescue".   Sure, she's appeared on talk shows, Letterman, and she is hawking a memoir, but she could rightfully insist that she never asked for any of it. [2003-12] 
• Andy Kaufman.   I never knew much about him until I recently watched "Man on the Moon", other than a faint memory of some of his tiresome routines on Saturday Night Live, and his role as Latka on "Taxi".   But he had some amazing and provocative concepts and tried to present his vision of performance art without compromise.  He often angered and aggravated people, but that was part of his vision.  "Man on the Moon", incidentally, is not particularly good.  [2004-01]
• Jeffrey Wigand: whistle-blower, former Vice-President of Research and Development at Brown & Williamson Tobacco, now a teacher in Michigan. Wigand became disillusioned when he discovered that Brown & Williamson were not interested in producing "safe" cigarettes, but only in increasing the levels of nicotine delivered to the average smoker, to increase their addiction.  [2003-12]
• 60 Minutes investigative news program that, for 30 years or so, has provided television consistently interesting, relevant, and provocative journalism.  Oddly enough, they do pretty well in the ratings.  Someone will have to explain to me why, if the media is so "liberal", 60 Minutes remains an utter anomaly among a host of tawdry, tacky, scandal-mongering hacks, like ABC's 20/20. [2003-06-01]
• SAS According to a recent 60 Minutes segment, SAS owner Jim Goodnight has resisted many offers to take his company public because he feels that today's corporate executives have short-sighted interests and will likely lay off staff and cut benefits in order to increase share-holder values, at the expense of the company's long-term performance. SAS provides their employees with extremely generous benefits-- on-site massage, tennis courts, golf club memberships, health care, day care, etc., and has never laid off anyone.   [2003-05]
• Hugh Sloan former Nixon staffer who refused to lie during the Watergate investigation, and who never wrote a book, authorized a movie, or sold his memoirs afterwards because he felt it just wouldn't be right to "cash in".  Instead, like you and I, he got himself another job and worked at an honest profession for the next 30 years.  He and Jessica Lynch should do lunch.  [2003-06-01]
• James Taylor -- won't sell his tunes to advertisers.  Just won't.  Simple.   Stay honest.  [02-10-10]
• John Sayles, director of the brilliant "Matewan". [2000-01]
• Robert Crumb, extraordinary cartoonist and chronicler of bent souls.   [1998-09-19]  Alert! Crumb has recently been persuaded to market himself more efficiently.  This apparently means getting a website up and running and selling t-shirts with his drawings on them.  Let's hope not... [2005-04-22]
• Parker Posey, quirky queen of the independents, turned down some promising Hollywood roles in order to continue working in those interesting and unusual independent films she is becoming famous for, like Party Girl, Waiting for Guffman, The Anniversary Party.  [2003-03-22]
• Paul Thomas Anderson, director of Punch Drunk Love, also Magnolia and Boogie Nights.. [2003-03-23]
• Todd Solonz, director and writer of Happiness and Storytelling.  [2003-12]
• Ani DiFranco (folk-singer, refuses to sign with a major label so she can retain full artistic control of her material).  Guess what: she actually makes more money than many established acts, because of the way the music industry rips off up and coming talent (by siphoning their "royalties" away on dubious promotional expenses and agency fees.) [1997-11-01]
• Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter  While other presidents flack themselves to any tacky organization willing to put up $25,000 or so for a guest speaker, he actually gets out there and works, with his own hands, for Habitat for Humanity.  The best former president in the United States.   [1997-11-01]
• Mad Magazine: after all these years, still doesn't take advertising. See "Sold Out" below.
• Reclusive author J.D. Salinger ("Catcher in the Rye") who has never appeared on Oprah Winfrey or in a GAP ad. [1997-11-01]
• Bill Watterson (creator of Calvin and Hobbes) who refuses to license his cartoon characters for lunch boxes, t-shirts, and other assorted paraphernalia [1997-11-01]
• singer/song-writer/poet Leonard Cohen .   [1997-11-01]
• Neil Young: after flirting with popular success with After the Goldrush (1970) and Harvest (1972), withdrew from the trappings of pop stardom but continued to put out his own, idiosyncratic, authentic and uncompromised rock'n'roll.  [97-11-1]   Alert:  Young is now touring with Stills, Nash, and Crosby.  On the surface, it looks like a classic case of "cashing in" on expired talents, wallowing in baby-boomer nostalgia, in order to replenish those empty bank accounts.  Crosby, Stills, and Nash certainly have not done very well since their brief heyday of back  in the early 70's.  Neil Young, however, has a pretty robust solo career going.  Ticket prices are outrageous:  $30 - $200 U.S. for the Chicago show, and they are only available from those vampires at Ticketmaster.  They are also selling the usual accessories ("bomber" jacket: $99) on their web site. Not a good sign.  I'm considering demoting him.  The only thing preventing it right now is the perception that Young, who doesn't need the money, is doing it for his buddies, Nash, Stills, and Crosby, who are all irrelevant and broke.  [2000-01-29]
• NEW  Trey Parker and Matt Stone.   South Park is obscene, vulgar, tasteless, and politically incorrect.  Is that why you don't see Kenny out there selling life insurance with Charlie Brown?  Or is it because Parker and Stone really believe that the real obscenity in this world consists of rich, powerful, cosmetically-enhanced celebrities pimping for GM and Novartis?   [2003-05]  Note that Parker and Stone were involved in producing a remarkable film about developmentally delayed adults, "How's Your News".  [2004-06]   On the other hand, "Team America" was disappointing. Disappointing, but not "sold out".  [2004-11]
• Independent film-maker Jim Jarmusch (Ghost Dog: the Way of the Samurai, Dead Man, Down by Law) [2000-03-12]
• Valeen Schnurr - Columbine Shooting Victim.   It was claimed, shortly after the shootings at Columbine High School,  that the killers, Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, asked Cassie Bernall if she believed in God.  When she answered "yes", we were told, they shot and killed her. It never happened.  At least, not to Cassie Bernall.   And the "satanic" killers didn't shoot the girl who did say "yes".  It was Valeen Schnurr who affirmed her faith, after she had been wounded.  When she answered "yes", the killers turned away and went after somebody else. Valeen has learned from bitter experience that people prefer stories that harmonize with their prejudices-- that Christians are persecuted in some way in the public school system in the U.S. because they can't open the school day with an official authorized state-sanctioned prayer to the Christian God.   [1999-11-10]
• Monty Python's Flying Circus  They had constant battles with the American distributors of their show over controversial content, and refused to cave in.  Well, at least, not until "Spam-a-Lot".  John Cleese also does ads and corporate shindigs now.  Hmmm. [1997-11-01]
• Nirvana (Kurt Cobain) [1997-11-01]
• Pearl Jam, keeps fighting those monopolistic concert ticket pimps (Ticketmaster et al) who charge outrageous "handling fees" for distributing tickets to major concerts. [1998-09-01]
• Counting Crows  [1997-11-01]   Embroiled in major battle with record company over control of the content of their next album. [1999-05]
• Adbusters (check out www.adbusters.org). [1997-12-01]
• Pete Seeger and the Weavers: he may be washed up and quaint but he aint sold out.  [1997-12-01]
• Jim Bouton, former Major League pitcher, and author of "Ball Four", one of the most interesting books on baseball-- or any sport-- ever written.  Now a Republican Congressman.  Which is sort of sold-out, I guess, but until I have a particular incident to hang on him I'll stick with his authentic, honest book as the deciding factor.  [2003-03-24]
• CBC Radio - Can be boring sometimes, but still more interesting than 99% of AM and 90% of FM. No advertising.  [1997-11-01]
• Graham Greene, best author never to receive a Nobel Prize, reportedly blocked by U.S. because of his sympathies with left-leaning Central American republics. Someone please explain to me why William Golding received a Nobel before Greene?  [1998-01-01] 
• Director John Sayles (Passion Fish, Mattewan, Brother From Another Planet, Secaucus Seven, Sunshine State) [97-11-01]
• Ralph Nader, Consumer Activist and hopeless presidential candidate.  I don't like what he's doing [2004-07] but he's got one terrific point:  what right do the Democrats have to demand that he not siphon off votes from them, if they refuse to run anybody who is really all that different from Bush? [1997-11-01]
• Vaclav Havel, poet, play-write, and politician.  Recently joined Clinton for a concert by Lou Reed at the White House.   [1998-02-01]
• Byte Magazine: the only major computer magazine that is comprised of more information than advertising, and actually dares to challenge Microsoft's hegemony [except this].  [1998-10-01]   WARNING: was just purchased by CMP.  Editorial staff was fired. [1999-06]    Gone.  Hard to not believe there is a conspiracy here somewhere to kill off any computer magazine that dares to speak the truth about Microsoft.  [2002]  Is this the reincarnation of Byte?
• Maximum PC Magazine: only current magazine not entirely slavish to Wintel tripe.  Punchy, irreverent, and sometimes useful.  [2003-06]  Watch Note:  now takes Microsoft Ads.  Coincidentally, has made some favorable comments about Windows.  Well, Windows 2000 might deserver a favorable comment or two, but .... [2008-05]
• Former Canadian Prime-Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau.   While other former leaders disgrace themselves doing everything short of pimping to earn some big bucks, Trudeau quietly works at a respected law firm, walks to and from work each day, and leads a dignified life as a respected elder statesman.  When his son, Michel, was killed in an avalanche, the press, recognizing class when they saw it, hung back and refrained from exploiting the tragedy.  Even they understood that Trudeau, having never invited the press into his private life even when it would have been advantageous to do so, deserved his privacy.  [1999-11-10]
• Cowboy Junkies - One of the most original acts of the past decade, consistently produces music of integrity and distinction.  At a recent concert in Guelph, they were unpretentious, authentic, and original.  Margot Timmins came out to the lobby after the show and mingled with her fans for a good half-hour, posing for pictures and signing autographs and generally behaving like an all-round decent human being.  Pretty impressive for a woman who was named one of the ten most beautiful in the world by People Magazine a few years back. I guess it didn't go to her head.  [2000-01]
• Linux - open source and free, and the best web-server software bar none. [2000-10]
• Fidel Castro: you gotta love the beard, and the seven-hour "state of the union addresses. John Kennedy wanted to get rid of him in 1961; George Bush wanted to get rid of him in 2001. Sure he's wrong about a lot of things-- after all, he is a dictator--but, in an era encompassing jerks like Anastasio Somoza and Rhios Montt, Duarte in El Salvador, the Argentine Generals, and Pinochet in Chile, he has long been the least self-aggrandizing dictator in Central or South America. Even the U.S. State Department has admitted that, given fair and free elections, he would be re-elected every time. And if it weren't for the absurd, illegal, and outrageous U.S. trade embargo, it would be quite a prosperous little Socialist country, thank you. That's why people like Jesse Helms hate him with an undying blood-curdling passion. Can you imagine having a country about 70 miles off the Florida coast demonstrating every day that godless socialism works-- not perfectly-- but it works? Helms does have one point though-- why is the U.S. cozying up to China, with it's massive human rights abuses, if Cuba is still embargoed, ostensibly, because of it's communist government and human rights abuses? [1997-11-01] Update: Castro has lately been locking up dissidents again. Cuba claims that U.S. intelligence is sponsoring these dissidents-- some of them do have computers and communications equipment from the U.S. But since the U.S. maintains an illegal embargo against Cuba and has indicated over and over again that it would love to crush little Fidel with all it's might, if it weren't for the possible bad PR, I'm giving Fidel the benefit of the doubt on this one. He stays on the not list. [2003-05]
• Actress Isabelle Adjani, star of Queen Margot, the Story of Adele H., and Camille Claudelle. [1998-02-01]
• The Danish Women's Curling Team: during the 1996 Winter Olympics, the Danish women's team, with no regular practice rink in their own country, managed to make it all the way to the finals, where they lost to a superior Canadian women's team. So why did they seem to be having such a great time? Because they couldn't believe they made it as far as they did, and because they came to have fun, meet people, and play their best. I was able to e-mail one of their players-- frankly, because I thought she was cute--and received a kind, courteous, personal response. In a world of drug-addled steroid abused mono-maniacal over-rated athletes, they were a breath of fresh air and I love them. And no matter how much pressure from the Olympic Committee they are not, repeat NOT going to compete in bikinis, no matter what the ratings are for beach volleyball. [1998-03-01]
• Peter Norton, software czar. Peter Norton (creator of Norton Utilities) purchased private letters written by J. D. Salinger to Joyce Menard (his lover for nine months) at auction, and immediately announced that he would do with them whatever the 80-year-old Salinger wants him to do with them, including returning them to the author. For that act alone, he is an honorary permanent member of the not sold out list. [1999-06-25]
• Former Los Angeles Dodger pitcher Sandy Koufax.   No endorsements. None. The benchmark for class among athletes. Even supposed icon Joe DiMaggio lent his mug to a coffee maker. In a few years, while Michael Jordan is regarded as a Nike poodle-flack and Wayne Gretzky as a Wheaties bin, Koufax's name will be pure gold. How much would you bet that his own children will sell out his image after he's dead?   [2000-06]
• The Hewlett and Packard families.   The heirs of the HP fortune, and controllers of about 12% of the company, are fighting a proposed merger with Compaq because it is driven by pure carnal stock-lust-- and the thrill of laying off 14,000 workers.  HP isn't always very cheap and not all of their products are great, but it's one of a very few corporations that actually lists the welfare of their employees as one of their values.  [2002-05]
• George Harrison -  The Beatles were never not commercial, but there's a big difference between four decent blokes trying to make a good living doing what they do best, and the grasping, manipulative crassness of someone like Madonna or Michael Jackson.  The Beatles had class and taste (unlike Elvis) and George was compassionate and earnest, and actually responsible for more than a few good films [he co-produced Terry Gilliam's  Time Bandits].  He mustered the first "pop-stars for humanity" concert (Bangladesh, 1972).  [2001-12]
• J.K. Rowlings (author of Harry Potter books )  Or has she?  Rowlings has an "arrangement" with Coca Cola but will not allow Potter paraphernalia to be marketed on Coke bottles or fast food restaurants.  Jury is still out.  I'm giving her the benefit of the doubt for the moment.  But this not to imply that the Harry Potter series is anything but good commercial pap.  There is nothing particularly daring or controversial about this series in spite of the hissy-fits thrown in the Bible belt.  But her decision to protect her "franchise" by not allowing it to be cheapened by the trinket sellers is laudable.  [2002-12]
• Frank Zappa: uncompromising musical style with a thumb-your-nose at the world attitude.   His prepared statement to the Congressional committee investigating the evil in rock lyrics is a tour-de-force of satire, parody, and civil libertarianism.   He wonderfully points out that the real goal of PMRC ratings is to sanitize heavy metal music, rather than steer children to alternative forms, like classical, folk, or jazz.  Is this really doing a service to our children?  [2003-01]
• NEW  The Clash:  The surviving members, including Paul Simonon, will not play at their induction into the Rock'n'roll Hall of Fame because tickets for the event are $1500 a seat.  Simonon says the Clash should play to their public, people who could never afford tickets at that price, before re-uniting for an exclusive event, even if Bruce Springsteen did offer (as rumoured) to play with them, in place of recently deceased Joe Strummer.  [2003-03-22]
• Michael Moore: I don't personally agree with using awards ceremonies to make personal political comments, but you've got to admire his guts and his conviction, and his remarkable film "Bowling for Columbine".   [2003-03-24]
• John McCain:  Too bad... nice while it lasted.   No other U.S. politician was really more of a threat to the status quo, until he got slimed by George Bush's cronies during the North Carolina primary in 2000.  Led the successful fight for campaign finance reform.  Unfortunately, it looks like both parties are already developing ingenious methods of circumventing the new restrictions on soft money by creating pseudo independent state apparatuses to handle the cash.  [2003-03-24]  Update: 2003-04.  McCain is one of few politicians who opposes a proposed leasing deal with Boeing that would allow the air force to acquire new fuel tankers.  The military has never before leased equipment for the simple reason that it cost more to lease than to purchase.  The real goal, I suspect, is to generate steady income for Boeing, since, at the end of the lease, the air force will still need tankers, and Boeing will still need money.  [2003-04]
• Tony Blair:  I don't agree with Blair on Iraq.  In fact, I think he's dead wrong, and I think he's been fed a line or two by George Bush (see "Sold Out" list below).  But I think Blair really believes in what he's saying.  I think he really does have a vision of the future in which the western democracies intervene against dictators that abuse human rights and oppress their own peoples.  It appears that he is willing to pay a heavy political price for his principles, and that, my friends, is "not sold out".  Let's see what he does once Bush proceeds to sell the Iraqis and the Kurds down the river after Saddam is deposed, and once Afghanistan collapses again into chaos and brutality.   [2003-03-24]
• Shania Twain: might or might not be "sold out" for other reasons, but deserves a little note of eternal gratitude: at the 2003 Superbowl she did not lip-synch.  [2004-02-01]
• Keith Moon: late, of the Who, when asked to perform to a synchronized recording on the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, showed his contempt by drumming out of rhythm with his sticks.  [2004-02-01]
• Kid Rock -- according to New York Times, showed up at the American Country Music Awards show with a manikin and a tape recorder, to register his contempt for lip-synched performances.

Sold Out

• Rolling Stone List of Sell-outs.
• Oh My God!  Tell me this is a joke.  Wow.  Bob Dylan right back into the Sold Out list in spades.  This is so monumentally stupid I almost can't believe it.  Did Bob need the money that badly?  How about if we all start a Facebook group-- let's get as many people as we can to agree to chip in as much money as necessary to keep Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen, and others from selling out.  The Facebook group will agree to match any offer from any commercial sponsor to any of a small list of designated artists for whom selling out would wreck irreparable harm to our wounded psyches.   This is totally depressing.   But wait-- is it about the money-- Dylan, who still owns his own song publishing rights, can't be that desperate.  More likely, it's the PR value, man, reaching a whole new generation with his uncompromising message of truth, honesty, and personal integrity.   [January 31, 2009] Thanks Craig for calling this to my attention.  I think. 
• Add to Bob Dylan:  will. i. am., who joins him, in this  disgrace.  Yeah-- it's probably the PR value.  [January 31, 2009] 
• Cat Power - covered Cat Stevens (!) "How Can I Tell You" for the diamond industry, in Britain.  How can I tell you, Cat, that you just sold out.  2008-05
• Leslie Feist.  It's cool to sell out to Apple. 
• and what does li do? Cool -- it's a point.
• John McCain.  Well, if you really want to be the Republican nominee for president, it appears that you just have to get down on your knees and get behind James Dobson and Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell and pucker up.....   [March 2007]
• Andrew Young - Former civil rights activist and United Nations representative has learned the errors of his ways and now tries to convince churches that Walmart really, really does care about it's employees.   But then again... after incredibly insensitive remarks about how Jews, Koreans, and now Arabs run insignificant little mom and pop stores that sell wilted lettuce and stale bread.... Walmart faced a decision:  hire a pr flack for the pr flack, or dump Young.  [2006-08-22]
• Peter Gabriel - sells "Big Time" to the "World Wrestling Entertainment".  [2006-01-28]
• New:  Eminem.  I'm a little shocked.  But there he is, defying all the authorities... to sell you an iPod?  Is there anyone who can't be bought?  [2005-10-22]
• Paul McCartney, sells out to some kind of investment fund.  Once again, this belongs to the category of astonishingly irrational sell-outs since Sir McCartney is already incredibly rich-- why does he need to trash his own good name?  Again?   Who knows?  Probably because he thinks people still give Lennon credit for most of the good Beatles' songs.   [2005-09]
• Kerry Livgren (Kansas) sells out "Dust in the Wind" to some car-maker (Subaru), trying to convince you that other SUV's are only so much ephemera.  The irony is that, given today's energy situation, all  SUVs might just end up in the same gust of transient dust.  Even more ironic: "Dust in the Wind" tells us that "all your money won't another minute buy".  As clumsily phrased as it is, it obviously doesn't apply to earnest singer-songwriters and their musings about eternal values.  [2005-07-22]
• The Who (again): to Saab.  Is Pete Townshend running into problems paying his therapist?  [2005-07-13]
• The producers of "Spamalot".   Partly inspired by the Monty Python sketch, this Broadway production has cut a deal with the makers of Spam, and with Yahoo.   Considering that the original Python sketch savagely ridiculed the incessant repetition of annoying, meaningless phrases-- advertising, in short-- the irony is stunning.  [2005-04-22]   But then again... when asked if "Spamalot" represented a kind of sell-out, Eric Idle enthusiastically chirped, "yes, of course."  Gotta love him.  But being witty about it doesn't excuse it.  [2006-08]
• Terry Bradshaw (GlaxoSmithKline).  I'm a celebrity.  I was sad.  Now I'm happy.  Try this drug.    [March 2005]
• Shawn Colvin (GlaxoSmithKline - Wellbrutin, Paxil) [March 2005]
• Lorraine Bracco (The Sopranos) for Pfizer (makers of Zoloft).   Lorraine plays a psychiatrist on Sopranos.   Unfortunately, some people are easily confused by television.  She must really be a psychiatrist, right?  So if she recommends a drug, it must be good, right?   It's a pity Pfizer didn't consider someone from  "Arrested Development" instead. In case you're wondering, anti-depressants generate about $10 billion in annual sales for drug manufacturers in the United States alone.   [March 2005]
• Hot Flash: U2 Sells Out!  I'll bet Bono thought he could get away with huckstering iPods because of the cool factor.  Is it crass if you're hip?  Yes, especially since you shouldn't need the money.  Bono & buds get a tiny measure of compensatory good will for the good things they generally do with their money, but still.... [2004-10-27]
• Elton John: sells out again, this time to XM satellite radio.  Did he even write a song, "Answer in the Sky" specifically for the Delphi XM MyFi device, a new digital receiver?  [2004-10-27]
• Clash (???):  Jaguar has licensed "London Calling" for a recent ad.  Damn you all. And no, it's not some third party that acquired the song rights that did the sell-out.  To my surprise, I found out that "Train in Vain" had also been sold to Nike.  So you listened to "London Calling" and "Guns of Brixton" once upon a time and you were awestruck by the raw, uncompromising energy, the sense of commitment and passion... and you bought it.  And now you're twenty years older and you're shopping for a new car, and....   Ha ha ha!  Fooled you!  You actually bought that earnest political posturing???  Sucker!!!  [2004-08-22]
• Christopher Guest:   "A Mighty Wind" is supposed to be a parody of the early 1960's folk music scene.  Without a doubt, the great, central issue of folk music in the 1960's was political involvement and the civil rights movement.  Now, you can pay it an affectionate homage, or you can satirize it, but you just can't ignore it.  Guest does ignore it, because, I suspect, he doesn't want to offend anyone on either side of the political spectrum.  Conventional corrupt Hollywood "wisdom".  The lowest common denominator.  He wants to sell as many tickets as possible to this movie.  As a result, there is something unbearably fey about the trite "Kiss at the End of the Rainbow".  Parody, you say?  No, it isn't-- Guest obviously believes in the song too much to really skewer it as he should have-- look at the reverence on the faces of the other performers at the tribute concert.  They're not hamming it up or skewering the earnestness-- I think they really thought they had written a kind of "You Were on My Mind" (Ian and Sylvia seem to be the models for "Mickey and Mitch".   Does the audience realize that it's the director flattering himself?  There's no acknowledgement of the horrible triteness of the song.   That said, incidentally, the subject is so rich that it's impossible not to enjoy the film. It just could have been so much better.  (Why, for example, were there so few black folk singers around to join in on those songs about racial injustice?  Or how about something alluding to Bob Dylan doing Victoria's Secret ads?)  [2004-07-20]
• NEW Halle Berry, to Walmart. Berry, along with Paula Abdul, appeared at a Walmart function and did the "Walmart Cheer", raising the question of whether this outfit is a store or a cult (it's both).  Berry can add this to her other achievements, including making the most annoying Oscar acceptance speech since Sally Field for "Norma Rae". [2004-06-30]
• With all due respect, Ray Charles sold out to do a diet Pepsi ad in 1990.  I wonder if his performance of "America the Beautiful" at the Republican Convention in 1984 was not also a bit of a sell-out, considering that he would have been performing to benefit people like Newt Gingrich, Trent Lott, Strom Thurmond, Dan Quayle, and Tom Delay.  At the very least, it had to be a very depressing moment in the history of race relations in the U.S., though it might have been regarded as the opposite had there been any subsequent shift in Republican policies towards minorities.  On the other hand, could have been a marvelous moment if, at a press conference afterwards, Charles had had the inspiration to shout, "What?  You mean Ronald Reagan is white?!"  [2004-06-10].
• John Malkovich, >K. D. Lang and Daniel Libeskind, all sold out to Conde Nast's "Never Follow" campaign.  They were told to follow and they did. [2004-06]
• David Bowie, again, to Audi as well.  [2004-06]
• William H. Macy, actor, to Audi.  [2004-06]
• Bob Dylan-- >again-- for Victoria's Secret.  Yes, he's already sold out a few times, but this is a new low: it's not just a song.  It's his Bobness himself, in the ad.  Can we be sure that all the people around Bob are telling him that it is now cool to sell out?  [2004-06]
• Azar Nafisi, Iranian author, to Audi.  Am I a celebrity yet?  Nafisi wrote a memoir about life under the Ayatollahs in Iran, called "Reading Lolita in Tehran" which sold a mind-boggling half a million copies..  The Ayatollahs couldn't buy her silence, but Audi could buy her integrity.....  Note-- Weasel Words:  Nafisi says she is not being paid.  Instead, Audi will sponsor literary events in five cities on her behalf.  That is still "selling out".   Hilariously, the campaign, sponsored also by Conde Nast, is called "Never Follow".  It is one thing to be a sell-out.  It's something else again to be a shameless sell-out.  And what's with the expensive European car sponsors edgy pop talent syndrome?  [2004-06]
• Pete Townshend/Who:  "Happy Jack" heard recently in a Hummer ad.  [2004-05-26]
• Robert Duvall recently seen doing an ad for a cell phone company.  [2004-03-25]
• Green Day again-- selling their tunes as well as various verbalizations to cellular phone companies to use on their cell phones.  Can't people just record what they want and put it on their own cell phone?  Not any more.  [2004-08-18]
• Flash!  Green Day Sells Out!  What a disappointment!  They were so promising!  Couldn't resist those Pepsi dollars to lend their cover of Bobby Fuller's classic "I Fought the Law" to the Pepsi/iTunes Superbowl ad, that is itself a sell-out of sell-outs because it shows a bunch of teenagers who were sued by the RIAA for downloading music and, guess what-- they have learned their lessons.  They will now only download legally, from iTunes, at a buck a tune.  Pepsi is such a poseur.  Ooooh, look at us, we're so cool and rebellious.  More like yuppified putrid phony panderers.  Get yourself a Diana Krall instead.  I want to be a minority!!!  [2004-02]
• Trustees of Jimi Hendrix' Estate: allowing his name to be used in another Pepsi ad, on the Super Bowl.  A young "James" Hendrix has to choose between a Pepsi and a Coke on different sides of the street in front of different musical instruments: an electric guitar (Pepsi) and an accordion (Coke).  That's about as low as you sink: crassly exploiting the image and reputation of a deceased, uncompromising artist.  Pepsi should be boycotted on grounds of tactless bad taste alone.  [2004-02]
• Janet Jackson, Beyonce: lip-synching performances that audiences have every reason and right to believe are "live".  I want in.  I want an opportunity to record someone else's work, or my own work all tarted-up in a recording studio, and get out in front of a large crowd and pretend to be singing it live while performing a complex series of breathless dance moves.  [2004-02-01]
• Britney Spears:  Yeah, I'll bet you're shocked.  Will the teeny little Brit-wannabe's out there even care that she lip-synchs through parts of her "live" performances?  She denies it (liar) but her own manager, Larry Rudolph was smart enough, apparently, to realize that scandals grow in festering non-disclosures, not in revelations of bad behavior.  In fact, Americans generally admire bad behavior as long as it is only to make money.  [2004-02-01]
• The Simpsons (yes, again) - with an ad on the Superbowl for Mastercard.  Disgusting and hypocritical.  [2004-02-01]
• John Mayer, singer/song-writer, for Apple Computer, helping Steve Jobs huckster the new iPod and some admittedly cool composing software.  Big mistake, Apple: Mayer's going nowhere anyway.  [2004-01]
• Rush Limbaugh-- radio pimp of the right, for rank hypocrisy.  While proclaiming righteously on behalf of traditional values, law and order, and a drug-free America, was himself totally hooked on pain-killers and sedatives.  Oh I get it!  It's not drugs per se that you're opposed to...  [2004-01]
• Directors Joe Carnahan (Narc, Blood Guts Bullets and Octane) and Wong Kar-Wai (Dut yeung nin wa)- BMW [2003-06-05]
• Field Trip Factory and National Theatre for Children: These mind pimps provide corporate sponsored field trips and dramatic presentations to children which, thinly disguised as "educational" programs actually train children to become mindless little consumers, under the auspices of school boards in the United States.  No, I don't believe "pimp" is too harsh a word.  These children are a captive audience entrusted to public education for, presumably, the development of their minds.  They don't have the maturity to discern the hidden corporate agenda behind these presentations, the blatant consumerist mentality, and the manipulation they are subject to.  Shockingly, this sell-out is performed with the knowledge and approval of parents, school-boards, and teachers.  It's disgusting.  [2003-06]
• Strom Thurmond: Another good old "family values" arch-conservative Republican, apparently fathered an illegitimate child named Essie Mae Washington-Williams-- with a 16-year-old black maid named Carrie Butler-- 78 years ago.  Well, those are traditional values, aren't they?  [2003-12]
• Dick Cheney:  there's nothing amazing about the fact that the guy is helping to steer government business to the corporation he used to head, Halliburton, Inc.  Cheney says, hey, I don't work for them now.  Ha ha!  Where do you think he's going to work in 2004, once he and his boss get dumped from the White House?  Anyway, this is what we've come to expect from Republican politicians and White House employees (who have been leaving the White House in droves lately to cash in in the private sector or as lobbyists.)    What's shocking is how the media seems to downplay the story, as if they either can't believe their own eyes, or they really are toadies of the corporate right.   Halliburton was awarded enormous government contracts to rebuild Iraq's oil industry without competitive bidding.  As I've always said, the last thing the Republican right really wants in this world is free enterprise with competition.  What they're really after is is deregulation (see FCC recent rulings) so big corporations like Microsoft and Clear Channels and Enron can get bigger and kill off the competition.  [2003-06]
• School Boards in Maryland and elsewhere who accept corporate sponsorship for field trips.  Do you think these kids are going to Field Museum of Natural History or Art Institute or Williamsburg?  Are you crazy?  That would be unpatriotic!  They're going to Toys'R Us and Petco and grocery stores, where the long process of turning them into little rabid consumers gets a big boost from idiot principals and school boards who think coupons for free goldfish (Petco) are a good substitute for Manet or dinosaur fossils.   [2003-06-01]
• The Estate of Nick Drake sold "Pink Moon" to Volkswagen.   It should be illegal for heirs to intellectual property to demean the memory of an artist like that.  [2003-05]
• William Bennett - moralistic and pietistic pundit who regularly savages liberals and Bill Clinton for immoral values like "toleration" and "diversity" while praising corporate toadies like Bush for his good old-fashioned elitism and moral rigidity.  It has now emerged that Bennett has lost about $8 million gambling at casinos over the past ten years.   Bennett claims that since he never preached that gambling was one of those modern immoral vices he hates so much that he therefore isn't a hypocrite.  Thanks for your viewpoint, Mr. Wholesome Family Values, and I'll bet your family is grateful that you make so much money you could afford to drop $8 million trying to find out if you were lucky or not.   And I'll bet your wife is also sure that all those "wholesome" young ladies who hang around casinos had nothing to fear from a fat pietistic moralizing pontificator of the right, because you were too busy losing money.   And if there's nothing wrong with it, why did you announce you wouldn't do it anymore?   [2003-05]
• Walter Cronkite, Aaron Brown host segments by WJMK Inc. which purport to be journalistic pieces on drug or health care companies.  In fact, they are nothing more than super-slick advertisements for drug firms. Drug companies paid WJMK Inc (and then denied it) to feature their products, and they had editorial control over the content of the segments, while claiming they were "educational".     The companies included  AstraZeneca, Bayer, Bristol-Myers Squibb, and  Novartis.  Reported in New York Times [2003-05-07]
• Thinking it Over: Morley Safer also did segments for WJMK Inc.  but concluded that the segments "did not meet the standards of CBS news".  When did he conclude this?  Before or after he got paid?   Is he "un-soldout"?  I don't know.  Cronkite also claims he will withdraw if it shown that the drug companies pay for those segments.  But why would you even have been tempted?  [2003-05]
• A company called Heathology also hires journalists to do little promo pieces for our decadent drug-addled medical establishment. [2003-05]
• Spike Lee - ads for IAM.  I like Spike Lee and IAM very disappointed. [2003-04]
• National Geographic - Do you believe this?  Yes indeed, National Geographic is putting out a swimsuit issue!  I am not making this up.  They'll put some exotic spin on it-- like "bikinis made of indigenous materials from around the globe" or something, but it's still a swimsuit issue.   The pity of it all is that there are a thousand magazines out there competing to sell images of nubile near-naked teenagers to voracious consumers, but, until a few years ago, there was only one big, expensive, respectable magazine devoted to bringing exotic cultures and locations to it's readership.  Now it's gone. Alas. [2003-04]
• The Smithsonian, in exchange for $10 million, will brand a new building devoted to the history of transportation "GM Hall".   Since this is obviously advertising for GM and since the Smithsonian established it's good name at the expense of the public through taxes,  and since most of the costs of the building are borne by the taxpayer, this promotion is paid for with public funds, and this amounts to a taxpayer subsidy of General Motors, even with the $10 million. Ten million bucks does not buy the name and reputation of "the Smithsonian".  Well, soon it will....   [2003-04]
• Bob Woodward, in exchange for privileged access to the White House and the first family, has written an utterly fawning, iconographic book about steely-eyed uber-cowboy   George W. Butch, and never once overtly relished the fact that had he not been politically congenial to the White House, he would have actually had to work for a living, possibly as a journalist.  [2003-01]  Update: Woodward's new book, "Plan of Attack", according to reviewers, continues to paint a flattering portrait of Bush while blaming his staff for the mistakes made around Iraq and terrorism.   When I get a chance,  I'll read it and post a review.   [2004-06]
• Kurt Vonnegut Jr., doing car ads for Hyundai.  Some guy searches for a first edition of one of Vonnegut's novels and then, in an obscure bookstore somewhere, finds it.  As he checks out to pay for it, Kurt Vonnegut Jr. is in line ahead of him and autographs it for him.   Pathetic.  Absolutely pathetic!  There are some days you don't want to wake up, like the day you find out that Kurt Vonnegut is doing a car ad.   [2003-01]
• Tony Blair - conservatives have created a climate of ridicule in which it is impossible for a genuine left-wing candidate to win an election in either the U.S. or Britain.  Blair is the product of that.  He spouts the mushy feel-good humanities of liberals, but loves to bluster like an old-time war-horse to show that he's not a wimp.  And who do you think is going to benefit the most from future American trade beneficence once Iraq gets crushed and the oil starts to flow?  [2003-01]
• Reinstated as a Sell-Out: Tony Blair:  Well, here's a rare flip-flop for you.  I was impressed with the way Blair seemed to articulate a real case for the Iraq war, free of the hypocrisy and outright lies of the Bush Administration.  I was premature.  It now appears that Blair, like Bush and Powell, grossly distorted the information from intelligence agencies about Iraq's supposed weapons of mass destruction, and "encouraged" British intelligence into providing the "correct" analysis to justify the war.  He also appears to be buying into that insane idea that privatizing government functions produces lean and mean and more efficient government services.  [2003-06-01]  
• George Bush Jr., of course.  I mean, get real.  This guy sold out when he sold his first companies to Arab oil interests when they were ready to go bankrupt-- rescued by Dad's hot connections.  Then he persuaded Texas tax-payers to fund a stadium for the team he partly owned, the Texas Rangers, so your lowly Starbucks employee could help subsidize Alex Rodriguez' $25 million a year, all the while representing a party of which a cardinal virtue is said to be "self reliance", and which is driven by an irrational hatred of welfare mothers.  And for the party of militarism, while Bill Clinton was draft-dodging, Georgy took the "honorable" way out with a deferment into the National Guard, for which he appears to not actually have even bothered serving.  He gave a speech at Bob Jones's Racist University to coddle the extreme right while pretending to be a "moderate" and a "compassionate conservative".  He screwed John McCain to win the primaries by allowing his staff to suggest that McCain had had a coloured child out of wedlock (the girl was actually adopted), misrepresented his views (as "moderate") during the election campaign while concealing extreme right leanings and his fundamentalist religious beliefs,  and then fought a no-holds barred battle for the Florida electoral votes while relying on a the sheer hypocrisy of a Supreme Court that, dominated by conservatives appointed by Reagan and Bush Sr., has always held high the principle of States' Rights, and then jumped into the election fray to award the outcome to Bush.   In office, he is merely the most powerful puppet in the history of the U.S. Corporate Welfare Lobby, handing billions of dollars over to the rich while defunding any program that actually benefits anyone in the working classes.  His latest proposal: the removal of taxes from income generated by investments.  By golly, why should rich people pay any tax at all?  [2003-01-01] 
• Kelsey & (wife) Camille Grammer - Glaxo-Wellcome, makers of Lotronex (for Irritable Bowel Syndrome). .   What they do is appear on talk shows to hold frank discussions of their terrible afflictions.  Often they slyly don't mention the particular drug that they are being paid to sell, while knowing full well that it is the one most likely to be recommended by doctors.  See?  I'm not selling anything.  [2002-11]
• Rob Lowe:  healthtalk.com   It is really, really disgraceful when celebrities give "interviews" with corporate toadies about some health issue in a manner that deliberately obfuscates the fact that they are paid flacks for a particular pharmaceutical company that is trying to sell it's expensive patented drug to you.  Audiences are clearly deceived into thinking that Rob Lowe just happens to know a lot about cancer drugs and has some kind of valuable expertise on the subject and that his implied (they are very subtle) endorsement of the product is based on research and information, and not on the remuneration he receives for making such appearances.  It's positively sinister-- check here to see how it's done.   For example, the Crone's Disease segment is sponsored by "an unrestricted educational grant" from Elan Pharmaceuticals. [2002-11]
• John Cleese I like John Cleese a lot.   The funniest man alive, and his eulogy at Graham Chapman's memorial is an unparalleled example of a refusal to pander to sentiment.  But he does ads and training videos for corporations, so he is trading on his celebrity status for money. [2003-01-01]  Almost redeeming himself, Cleese recently observed (in connection with Mel Gibson's "The Passion"), that if someone made a film in which Dick Cheney was whipped and crucified, it might make him feel sorry for him but wouldn't change his views on Cheney's politics.  [2004-08-18] 
• New and Crushingly Disappointing! Terry Gilliam.  Makes me want to cry. One of the most daring and controversial directors of our time now does Nike ads for World Cup Soccer.  When you read interviews with this guy about the attitude of Hollywood towards his films, and then he does Nike ads.... I'm disappointed.  I hoped I could find an excuse-- maybe it was just a company he is part of, or maybe just some technical involvement.  But no-- he directed the ads, and they feature his trademark hallucinogenic epic scale imaginative humour.  Not even the maker of Brazil gets a break here. Sold out.  [2003-01-01]   "I did one for Nike, and before that it was Orangina. I can't complain, I just feel kind of dirty afterwards." Terry Gilliam  Then don't do them.
• Danny Glover - selling drug treatments for anemia.  [2002-11]
• Trent Lott - to the extreme right. [Nov 2002]  Lott's infamous endorsement of Strom Thurmond's 1948 segregationist run for President merely reveals what everyone should have known for years, or at least since those pictures ran of him glad-handing the leadership of segregationist group years ago.  What makes this a sell-out is the way the Republican Party tries to sell itself as a party of moderation and prudence, but actually often caters to extremists who donate money and time at the grass-roots level.  Update January 2003:  while claiming to have chastised Lott for his overtly racist comments, the Republicans have, in fact, simply tucked him away as chairman of some committees.  He's still there.   He's still powerful.  He's still active.  This is how the Republican Party operates: they cater to their racist, extremist core, while pretending to be moderate centrists dedicated to common sense and fairness.  [2003-01]
• Lynda Carter - Novartis Pharmaceuticals (for irritable bowel syndrome)  [Dec 2002]
• Bob Dole - Viagra [Nov 2002]
• Kathleen Turner (drugs)  [Nov 2002]
• Lauren Bacall (drugs) [Nov 2002]
• Debbie Reynolds - adult diapers [Nov 2002]
• Barenaked Ladies - "One Week" has been heard on a car commercial recently. Mitsibushi.    [2001-12-01]
• West Wing  Aaron Sorkin's handling of the World Trade Centre attacks catered to that Middle-American xenophobic parochialism- "we're a good country and such decent people and we never do anything but promote democracy, progress and human rights abroad.  Why do they hate us?  Because we're free!"  Sorkin-- ever hear of the Shah of Iran?   Somoza?  Pinochet?  The Cuban embargo?  Rwanda?   West Wing babbled endlessly about America's stellar democratic values without once acknowledging that, abroad, American diplomacy and military force supports dictatorships where-ever they are beneficial to American corporate interests.  We supported Pinochet, and Somoza, and even Saddam when it suited us, and we supported the Shah of Iran before his own people finally threw him out.   We have a high degree of tolerance for China's horrible human rights abuses, and we're willing to look the other way while Putin exterminates the opposition in Chechnya and Georgia, and while Columbia devolves into tribal warfare.  And that's why they hate us.  [2002-10]
• Carole King, Robbie Robertson, Sheryl Crow , Willie Nelson to the GAP.   [2002-10-10]
• David Bowie - Microsoft.  [2003-05]
• Aerosmith - for The Gap.  The Gap seems to have set out to single-handedly sell out every pop artist in the country.  I'd wager they've even tried to get Leonard Cohen, Mr. Uber-Kool himself, to do "Hallelujah" in denim. [2002-10]
• Madonna - already sold out, but does it again, for Microsoft this time.  [2001-12].
• Rufus Wainwright - Ad for The GAP [2001-12].  Gap ads are so clever it's tempting to overlook them.... nah....
• Suzanne Vega - "Tom's Diner" heard as background to an advertisement for a car. [2001-06-01]
• Barbara Bush - yes, the first mother, charged Kent State University $45,000 for a speech.  What exactly is the mother of the president an expert on?  Who the hell cares-- she's a celebrity!   Give her your money, now!  The same student activities committee initially denied funding for an annual memorial event for the four students killed by National Guardsman during anti-Viet Nam war protests in 1970 and then offered them an insulting $2,500.  Why memorialize students who gave their lives in opposition to an unjust war when we can have the president's mom!  Zowie!  On the other hand-- the point of a memorial is usually just to make the memorialists feel good about themselves anyway. [1999-01-01]
• Mad Magazine, hold-out for fifty years, has just announced that it is going to start accepting advertising.     Mad Magazine, under founder William H. Gaines, refused to compromise it's low-brow though incisive satire of American society at any price.   But now it is owned by Time-Warner-AOL.  Shed a tear or two for one of the very last uncontaminated venues in America!  Does this confirm my belief that not only will Corporate America refuse to ever provide any services free of coercion, but it must also stamp out any other venue that does? [2001-03-21]
• The Supreme Court - by making the dumbest, most transparently partisan and self-serving ruling in recent history-- awarding the presidency to George Bush Jr. without a state-wide recount.  Not even all of the seven Republican appointees bought it.  Years of mostly distinguished, courageous, respectable rulings through the 1960's and 70's washed away with a single blatantly self-serving vote.  Will future rulings win back the respect that Miranda or  Brown vs. Board of Education earned the court in the 1960's and 70's?  Not if there are any more Rehnquists out there...  This court is busy undoing all of the progressive rulings made by the Warren court.  [2001-01]
• Bill Clinton - pardons for dollars, pardons for dollars...    But I add Clinton with reservations.   Yes, he absolutely sold out, but his most enthusiastic critics, including assholes like Dan Burton, are raving hypocrites and liars.  Unfortunately, that doesn't earn Clinton any grace marks for distributing pardons to selected friends and contributors.   What does it take to get "justice" in the U.S.?  $$$$$$ and friends in high places.  [2001-01]
• George Bush Jr.  Well, how can someone who is already owned lock, stock, and barrel by the big corporations "sell out".  His $1.8 Billion tax cut is the biggest gift to the wealthy in the history of mankind.  It is also part of that clever covert strategy of the Republicans to drive the government into bankruptcy so the Democrats won't be able to create any programs that benefit the working class and the poor. [2001-01]
• PETA - recently ran an ad featuring New York Mayor Rudy Guiliani with a milk moustache and the question: where did the cancer come from?  Yes, we know that your organization thrives on grabbing the media spotlight, and one of your other ideas of having celebrities pose naked ("I'd rather go naked than wear a fur") was cute.  But Guiliani really has prostrate cancer and this ad is tasteless, cheap, and tacky.  [2000-09]
• The Boston Marathon - in 1980, the Boston Marathon was one of the last great races run for the pure love of the sport.  There were no big cash prices, no big sponsors, no corrosive influence of American capitalist stooges.  However, when famous runners began to forgo Boston and enter contests like the New Jersey Marathon instead, the organizers reluctantly agreed to bring in the logos and sell out.  Why?  They didn't really have to.  They just got all excited about the prospect of big bucks floating around their tiny little heads like swamp gas.   They became deluded.  They thought that they would make it more of a success by bringing in the big corporate sponsors.  Instead, they have made it just as tacky and disgusting and contemptible as the other major sports.  [2000-09]
• Al Gore: tried to recruit the right-wing Cuban-American vote in Miami by shamelessly siding with the American relatives of Elian Gonzalez, who want to kidnap the boy and keep him in Disneyland. [2000-05-01]
• Sting - the self-styled greatest singer in the world now flaks for Compaq [1999-11-28]
• Thomas Nelson Books, publisher, allegedly, of Christian Books, signed a deal with the parents of Jon Benet Ramsay for their self-serving and exploitive account of her death and the bungled police investigation. [2001-12]
• David Crosby: after being arrested for carrying concealed weapons and drugs, he has now fathered the two children of Melissa Etheridge and Julie Cypher (Cypher carried the child), through artificial insemination.  That's not the sold-out part: it's their media blitz.   They all say they want the child to grow up in a spirit of openness and honesty.   And, of course, Crosby could use the PR to help sell tickets to the CSN&Y tour.  My question-- why bother with the artificial insemination?  Doesn't Crosby stand for truth, beauty, and integrity?  Well, evidently not, but still....   [2000-01-29]
• Peter Fonda - Encyclopedia Britannica (web site) [1999-11-25]
• SEAL - also Encyclopedia Britannica (web site) [1999-11-25]
• Wayne Gretzky.  Even if you allow that it is part of the business of being an athlete to sell the associated crap they flog at you at every sports arena, Gretzky has really gone over-board trying to make as much money as quickly as possible before his name loses recognition value.  Ironically, that is one of the reasons his name is going to lose value more quickly than it would have otherwise.   Wayne, why don't you shock the entire world and announce:  "I have enough money.  I don't need any more money.  My dignity is more important to me than more money.  I'll speak to my public about things I really believe in-- not what I'm paid to believe in."  [2000-01-25]
• C. Everett Koop, former respected and formerly respected Surgeon General of the U.S.  Koop set up a website (DrKoop.com) to give advice on medical issues to the general public... without telling anyone that he would receive commissions on the sales of products and services he recommends.  He recommends specific hospitals for the quality of their care without informing the reader that those hospitals paid $40,000 each to be mentioned.  (After public criticism, the web pages now discloses that fees have been paid.  If we tell you that we sold out, does it mean we didn't?   No.)  Worse-- Koop has been testifying before Congress on behalf of drug companies seeking to extend their patents, claiming to represent the interest of public health when, in fact, his "foundation" has received millions of dollars in funding from these same companies.  Once hailed as a model of professional integrity (when, as Surgeon-General, he bucked his own government on AIDS issues), he has now become a cheap huckster. Koop -- take a hike!  [1999-09-03] 
• Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson: they are endorsing George Bush Jr. for president in spite of the fact that he is not strongly opposed to current abortion laws.  Why?  Because none of the real anti-abortion candidates can win in the 2000 election and they know it.   Hmmm.  Sounds like the kind of pragmatic politicking these guys have claimed was responsible for America's moral "quagmire".  Where are your principles, gentleman?  Where's your faith that God will reward the virtuous (with electoral victory, if not a Nobel Prize)?  Why aren't you backing Gary Bauer?  As if we didn't know....   [1999-11-10]  Correction:  it is now apparent that though Bush barely mentioned "abortion" during his election campaign, he is quietly giving the extreme right in his administration a free hand to throw every possible legal impediment in it's way, including instructing government departments to remove references to a health study that found no basis for the claim that abortions cause health or emotional problems in women.  This was a stealth issue for Bush-- and it still means Falwell and Robertson sold out, because they were complicit-- they knew Bush couldn't win an election campaigning against abortion.  [2003-04]
• Norman Rockwell - the icon of pure American small-town virtue did ads for Jell-O and Crest, among others.  Of course, he was, essentially, a commercial artist from the getgo. [1999-11-10]
• Peggy Salinger, daughter of the reclusive author of teen angst classic "Catcher in the Rye".  Peggy is writing a memoir.  How many admirers of Salinger's uncompromising principles and integrity will sell out themselves and snap up the book?  [1999-06-25]
• Homer Simpson (Matt Groening) - now appears in an INTEL ad.   So the master of shuckster satire sells out himself.  Doesn't anybody see this as utterly hypocritical and pathetic?  I do. [1998-11-21]  Thanks Adrian for the tip.
• Don Cherry and Ron Maclean --- recently seen in TV ads. [1998-03-01]
• Steve Miller ("Fly Like an Eagle"), for USPS.  Thanks again, Adrian.  [1998-11-22]
• Scott Adams (creator of Dilbert) - all over the place, selling out and cashing in.  Adams, claims he's not being a hypocrite because Dilbert doesn't really criticize commercialism or greed as such.  No, but he criticizes hypocrisy and crassness and phoniness, which is essentially the same thing. It's always a sell-out when you allow people who are commercial and greedy to exploit a property you have created for an artistic or satirical purpose.  Does it take a big stretch of the imagination to picture a cartoon in which Dilbert talks to Homer Simpson, for example, and says, "So you want me to buy this product because you're a famous cartoon character?  That makes sense..."   [1998-11-21]
• Gary Trudeau (author of "Doonesbury"), to Starbucks Coffee.  All net proceeds go to fight illiteracy.  Gary-- just write a check.  Besides, I have a feeling that once people get used to seeing Zonker Coffee Mugs and Doonesbury T-Shirts, Trudeau will extend the franchise a little and really cash in.  [1999-06-11]
• Tony Bennett--- promoting Philip Morris tobacco in Thailand, helping them circumvent Thailand's strict laws against tobacco advertising. [1998-11-11]
• Gary Shandling - he is suing his former agent for $100 million because he didn't pay enough attention to Gary's career.  Too bad.  Shandling's sitcom, the Gerry Shandling Show,  was the best on television for many years.[1998-03-01]
• author and Nobel Prize winner Toni Morrison, who has appeared on Oprah, pretending to be totally confused by this new invention, "television". [1998-03-01]
• Joan Baez (alas) joins Bob Dylan flogging Apple Computers, on the back of the Utne Reader, May-June 1998.  [1998-04-20] 
• David Brinkley:  now "spokesman" (read "flack") for Archer Daniels Midland [1998-05-15], the same company that just got convicted of price fixing, and which Bob Dole toadied to while in the Senate.   How cheaply we sell our souls nowadays!  David used to be one of the most respected news-flacks on American television.  You now have to question every editorial slant of every broadcast he ever did.  Obviously, if he has proven congenial to one of the most ill-behaved corporations in the U.S.... well, there you go.  [2000-01-25]
• Author Douglas Coupland: recent ad in Harpers -- "Absolut" Coupland (Absolut Vodka) [1998-05-22]  Apparently Coupland donated the money to a wilderness fund.   Does it still count as a sell-out?  Well, the basic idea of selling out is that you earn a reputation for honesty and integrity doing one thing and then try to trick people into believing that some other thing has the same honesty and integrity, even though it hasn't earned it through the normal means available.  Coupland could have just donated his name and image to the literacy campaign.  You tell me.  [1998-07-08]
• Mark Mcgwire  DEMOTED.   Old entry: baseball slugger and all-round classy, unpretentious guy, donates $1 million a year to causes in support of abused children [1998-03-20] and turns down endorsement offer after endorsement offer. Just doesn't think he needs that much more money, I guess.  Refuses to buy back his own record-setting home-run balls, inspiring average Americans to offer the balls back to him for free.  Can you believe it?   So, to the extent that you can say that any millionaire athlete is not sold out, McGuire is it. [98-08-18]  New entry:  Sorry, Mark.   Just read that you and Sammy caved in and are now doing McDonald's ads.  Creatine milkshake anyone?   What a shame. [1999-06-01]
• Sesame Street, PBS.  For 30 years, Sesame Street has been shown without commercials or commercial endorsements.  However, funding cutbacks from PBS, because of a hostile Republican congress, have driven it to accept $1 million from "Discovery Zone", a playground equipment manufacturer.  Fifteen-second ads will be broadcast at the beginning and end of each episode.  Thank the congressional Republican caucus, who hate public television with a passion because, a) it's high-brow and intellectual and everybody knows that those aren't Republican values, and   b) it doesn't judge everything by it's potential for commercial exploitation, and that certainly isn't a Republican virtue.  c)  it competes with the crass shit put out by commercial networks who don't even pretend to care about the educational value of television shows aimed at children.  [1998-10-6]
• The parents of Cassie Bernall.  It was claimed, shortly after the shootings at Columbine High School,  that the killers, Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, confronting a terrified Cassie Bernall hiding under a table, asked her if she believed in God.  When she answered "yes", we are told, they shot and killed her.  A martyr was born.  Her parents are cashing in with a book on the newly minted saint.  The trouble is, it never happened.  It wasn't Cassie Bernall, but Valeen Schnurr who affirmed her faith, after she had been wounded.  When she answered "yes", the killers turned away and went after somebody else.  Cassie Bernall's parents know this, or should know it, and the police know it, but Bernall's parents decided to proceed with their book anyway.   [1999-11-10]
• Other Parents of victims of the Columbine Shootings: they are all suing.  Who? The police, the school, the families of the gunmen, everyone....   Yes, even each other.  Most of them waited until the last possible moment, just before the expiration of the allowable time period, to file their suits-- hoping to attract as little publicity as possible.  Yes, the lawyers will all soon be rich.   Whose going to give all these lawyers all that money?  Republican law-makers who continue to allow guns to proliferate wildly?  The police who refused to approach the scene of the carnage until four hours after the gunmen were dead?  The gun dealers?  The manufacturers of the guns?  The companies that make video games?  The shareholders of the companies that make guns and video games?  Dream on.  You and me and all the other taxpayers, that's who will pay, as usual. [1999-11-10]  Note:  the lawyers for the family of teacher Dave Saunders received over a million dollars.  [2004-05]

To qualify for the "Sold Out" list, an artist, writer, politician, or other well-known person need only indicate that he or she is willing to trade personal integrity for wealth, fame, or power. That includes selling his work or his "good name" or face or any other body part to a corporation to be used to sell a product.  

There is nothing wrong with earning money-- that's not what "sold out" means.  A company like SAS makes very good money indeed.    It's when a person or company compromises general moral and ethical principles because they have become greedy, power-mad, or just plain corrupt, they have sold out.

Some people, I will admit, don't buy the whole concept. What's the big deal about an artist making a little extra money hawking a product for some mindless corporation? Well, if it doesn't matter, why does it bother you if I keep track? And, actually, the fact that anyone has to explain what's wrong with it is a little mind-boggling. Is consumerism so enmeshed with popular culture now that people can't tell the difference, or don't care? (See quote by Jeff Jensen above).   If you believe that there is any legitimacy to the idea that artistic work should have an element of honesty and authenticity to it, how can you possibly not care if an artist is welling to lend his work to an endeavour that is fundamentally deceitful?