JK sorry if I sound cynical here but am I alone in thinking you are the master of manipulating others? I notice a sudden increase of views on Vile Pervert coming as several run it down. You put up here, every now and then, negative or insulting posts which provoke many outraged reactions. You don't seem to mind whether people love you or hate you, as long as they talk about you and boost interest in views and sales. You almost seem to enjoy poking the hornet's nest with a stick. I remember you trying to get one of your hits banned when you realised more airplay cut down sales. I watched Vile Pervert when someone on another site started running you down (loved it by the way). But then I looked at the insults more closely and got the feeling you were encouraging them and their opponents. Don't get me wrong. I don't mind. But it just struck me that you cleverly engineer others into an explosion of discussion so as to gain interest from passers by.

he's just very butch.

No Monty, I simply am too busy in present and future to worry about the past. Little Joe once said I should put up Jimi Hendrix's letter thanking me for playing him Hey Joe and suggesting he cover it. I asked "why?". The pleasure came from doing it, not from others knowing it or anger from others choosing not to believe it. But you are right; negative comments can be hugely helpful. When I was released from prison The Sun (Editor Rebekah Brooks - whatever happened to her?) ran a front page campaign "Don't Give King A Thing" listing all my product. I earned over £100,000 that week, thanks to her crusade! (Bank statement below). And yes, it is incredibly easy to wind up people. Yes, it doesn't bother me (as someone said in reply to one of the insulting posts "you really don't get JK, do you?"). December and January have been very good months. Simply enormous views for Vile Pervert; less for Me Me Me and The Pink Marble Egg is just starting, but word is spreading (partly thanks to the knockers). Books doing fine on Amazon, music doing great on iTunes and others (as Alex discovered, the new way is to do it all yourself without giving loads away to labels etc... Radiohead, Coldplay and others are all doing it now... I didn't start this; I got the idea from Marillion... downloads don't need packaging, distribution, shops). When we were No1 Publisher in the UK for three quarters recently, people would ask me, John and Carole if we were proud of our little group of companies... we were too busy even to answer, trying to find the NEXT Abba (and banking the royalty cheques).

Most of the knockers were working for the bigger, huge publishers (employing hundreds but not at No1 - only we three worked for our companies) just as most of the trolls, haters and knockers online these days are not very busy in successful careers. They have a lot of time on their hands so, yes, use them, get them to spread the word and create interest by shouting and screaming and arguing. If, as mentioned in another thread, dozens of people want to spend energy discussing whether or not I won an award years ago, good luck to them. It's all traffic and will push hundreds towards the new films, books and music. God bless them.

www.kingofhits.co.uk/index.php?option=co...64&g2_itemId=420

as any US publicist would tell you.."there is no such thing as bad.....etc etc"

I bumped into a top publisher and his wife over Christmas and we had dinner. She revealed he'd told her many times; if he was to go independent the first catalogue he'd try to buy would be ours. I smiled (as did he) and said "sadly not for sale". It's my pension fund. Anyway I like keeping ownership of my songs - my babies.