Well, we can all object to "vicious abuse, prurient speculation about [musicians'] personal lives, and other similar unseemliness" - I'd object myself. What happened on that thread, though, was that a few anonymous posters said they thought certain musicians aren't very good - to which you responded with the most extraordinary stream of ad hominem vituperation. Frankly, the viciousness was all yours.

Moreover, just about all the negative comments on that thread came from blow-in GUESTs, and not from this mysterious "inner circle". And I see you're still refraining from giving any details about who you're talking about - but it certainly isn't "Catherine Foster", "Dorothy Peterson" et al, because we've never seen them before and probably will never see them again.

As for the imbalance between being nice about amateurs and nasty about professionals, I think it's inevitable. I've heard some truly dire performances at my local singaround, but I'm not going to name and shame them on here - only a few people would know what I was talking about, and what good would it do? I will talk about really good amateurs, because that way other people may get to hear them. Conversely, I don't feel inhibited about saying that Jim Moray's voice isn't to my taste, because I know that what some guy with a pseudonym says isn't going to affect Jim's career one way or the other.

As for the "A says B is great, B says A is brilliant" syndrome, are you saying that this is surprising? Or that it doesn't happen among paying musicians? Or what?