Most of my comments have gone negative, almost none of yours have. Someone recently came by and downmodded everything I posted -- someone who isn't justifying it anywhere (which is about the level of justification MACs can give for their field). (I'm not going to insult you by suggesting you would dip to these tactics, of course; I have far too much respect for you.)

Yes, the scores have changed since I wrote that. And no, not due to me; like you, I generally avoid downvoting my opponents in a discussion. (I don't make it an absolute rule, but exceptions are rare.)

if higher-level students of music theory really do know the secrets of the music-mind relationship, why can't they take that skill, pair it with existing record companies' hype machines, and outcompete existing, non-academic hitmakers

Because that skill doesn't suffice for that task. In order to reliably produce "hits", you have to do a lot more than be able to imagine music in your mind; in fact, you have to do a lot more than imagine music in your mind that you yourself like (already harder). You have to have to have a detailed knowledge of the psychology of large groups of other humans, so that you can produce music that they will like (actually a lot more than "like"; you have to get them to "pass it on") in large numbers. That, as far as I know, is an unsolved problem. And if you think the field of music theory (or any field I know of) claims to have solved it, you're mistaken.

In any case, I agree that there can be information cascades in which fame builds on itself. The difference is that I find the fame derived this way uninformative, while you seem to be willing to defend this arbitrary, artifical set as indicative of a fundamental aspect of reality about music (rather than social phenomenon)

Just the opposite: I'm trying to identify particular groups of people whose opinions are atypically informative.

Joshua Bell agrees that his income -- and indeed, self-worth -- come from pre-validation, and not from some widely, objectively-discernable measure of his performance quality. Why won't you?

The pre-validation is ultimately a result of his performance skill. I agree with you to the extent that I may not necessarily prefer Bell's playing to someone slightly less popular. His fame has some information content; it may not be enough for my purposes.

Similarly, the fact that EKM is more "popular" than the Jupiter symphony wouldn't have been informative to me, because (as good as EKM is) I like the Jupiter symphony better. At most, EKM's fame might tell me that Mozart is worth looking into.