Then why does the majority of people still listen to the shit that radio force feeds them thinking that its the pinnacle of musical achievement only to forget about their "favorite" artists a few years later?
Because they enjoy it, probably.
Seriously, everyone, I have friends who listen to Top 40 music and I have tried playing them stuff I think is "better" and they honestly just don't like it as much. Different people just have different tastes and I genuinely believe, especially in this day and age when nobody listens to the radio or gets their music from MTV, that people who listen to "Top 40" music - now more than ever - are doing it out of CHOICE and not because they're being spoon-fed music by the Evil Labels. The Internet has rendered everyone a music expert, at least
in potentia.
Like, for example, this girl I know, she's 18 and the only music she likes that I also like are The Millionaires and She Wants Revenge. One day a couple weeks ago we were driving around and I was
determined to play something she liked.
First, I tried some old Tricky - Pre-Millennium Tension - because she likes hip-hop and female vocalists. She thought it was okay but said "Let's listen to something 'more girly'." I don't know what that means, but whatever. I played Regina Spektor. She was "meh" about that too. I played like 20 different things and she wasn't into any of it. When you get down to it, it doesn't matter, either.
People have become so convinced that their taste in music or other art forms somehow defines them that they'll do anything to shore up that definition - usually involving paying money, at least indirectly, to Evil Corporations.
I prefer to listen to music in an ethical vacuum, personally.