Needless to say, I rate this cynical practice two thumbs down...

In a way, it's the logical, perhaps unavoidable, progression to the journalistic democratization made possible by the Internet. Everyone with a computer or wireless device has a voice, and the mainstream media -- frightened to death at the prospect of losing currency with the youngest, most tech-savvy consumers -- has elevated those voices at almost every opportunity.

You can see it most clearly on cable networks aimed at young viewers. On MTV and Fuse, for example, many programs are set aside that, while filling part of the screen with music videos or other cheaply generated programming, fills the rest with a live crawl of texts and tweets and toots and belches from its multi-tasking audience. Read those missives, though, and you'll wonder why anyone bothers to write them, much less read them.

(Compare that with the reader responses here -- perhaps your own included -- which are gratifyingly incisive and intelligent, and confirm the hope that there remains a place for smart discussion about smart TV shows.)

You can also see it on network promos for new shows that either want to embrace their fan base or have few positive reviews from actual critics at actual newspapers, magazines and professional websites. Instead of quoting raves from critics from major metropolitan newspapers, many shows now feature raves from the likes of couchpotay2 and buttscratch127.

Newspapers haven't helped any by reducing the numbers of critics covering the arts. By thinning the number, and not replacing them, newspapers and magazines are running the danger of deforesting the critical landscape without planting any new growth. And without bona fide critics to sort the wheat from the chaff, who can have faith in what's being recommended -- especially when rave reviews for Amazon and elsewhere are now being sold at $5 or less a pop?

I humbly suggest that you've already found at least one solution: TV WORTH WATCHING.

We've been in business since 2007, and many of the contributors to this site are TV critics whose individual reputations, during their careers on daily newspapers, go back decades. Nationally or regionally (or internationally, including Canada), you knew a lot of their names before you, and they, came to this site:

Ed Bark. P.J. Bednarski. Tom Brinkmoeller. Bill Brioux. Diane Holloway. Noel Holston. Gerald Jordan. Ed Martin. Eric Mink. Alan Pergament. Diane Werts. And myself. You can trust them all, and you can't buy their loyalty or praise for any amount. When Eric Mink raves about a Curt Flood HBO documentary (right), it's not because Eric is being Flooded with under-the-table payments. We watch. We write. And when we respond, it's to the material, not to some pay-per-view, pay-per-superlative arrangement.

Plus, when we relaunch next month, we're proudly adding yet another much-respected, long-standing critical voice: Eric Kohanik of Canada's TV Times. And our other writers include college professors and other established experts in specific fields.

Maybe it's because we're just about to showcase these writers anew, in preparation for the coming fall TV season, that I react with pride to news about bogus "critics" churning out positive reviews. Most reviews on this site will be positive as well -- that's the primary reason for the site, to identify and discuss the medium's best offerings.

But every review, I promise, will be earned -- not earning.