After seeing the uglier side of Twitter firsthand, Nine Inch Nails‘ mastermind Trent Reznor appears to be abandoning the social networking phenomenon entirely.
The outspoken rocker contributed a post to the official NIN.com message board in which he proclaims his disappointment in the overall negativity of online communities, writing, “We’re in a world where the mainstream social networks want any and all people to boost user numbers for the big selloff and are not concerned with the quality of experience.”
Reznor’s initial interest in Twitter was of great benefit to fans - he used the 140-character blog to give Chris Cornell’s latest album Scream a good (and deserved) bashing, as well as to announce his collaboration with Jane’s Addiction and offer special tour packages to raise money for a heart transplant for Eric De La Cruz. It also gave fans access to Reznor on a more personal level. “I approached that as a place to be less formal and more off-the-cuff, honest and ‘human,’ ” he writes. “I was not expecting to broadcast details of my love life there, but it happened because I’m in love and it’s all I think about and that’s that.
“I decided to lower the curtain a bit and let you see more of my personality,” Reznor added. “I watched some of you get more engaged because you started to realize there’s a person (flaws and all) back there, and I watched some of you recoil in horror because I’m not what you projected on me. All expected. I’m not as concerned about “breaking” your idea of NIN at this point. It is what it is and I am what I am.”
This type of fallout is to be expected from any celebrity who chooses to make themselves appear a little more human, regardless of the medium. Reznor just happens to be a lightning rod for controversy these days, given his pioneering approach to music distribution (remember - he gave his last album away for free) and recent incendiary remarks about a few of his peers in the industry.
So who’s to blame for Reznor’s defection from Twitter, specifically? According to Reznor, it comes down to members of the online community Metal Sludge. “Metal Sludge is the home of the absolutely worst people I’ve ever come across,” Reznor writes in his post. (Metal Sludge is, predictably, calling Reznor a “miserable little goth bitch" in response.)
While Reznor didn’t say he was completely finished with Twitter, his formerly highly-active account has been silent since he routed followers to his NIN.com post. “I will be tuning out of the social networking sites because at the end of the day it’s now doing more harm than good in the bigger picture and the experiment seems to have yielded a result,” Reznor writes. “Idiots rule.”
