I learned these zeitgeist tidbits by spending about an hour perusing the latest neat thing from Google, the YouTube Trends Map. It's the video equivalent of Twitter's trending topics feature, with the added ability to break down categories by gender, age and geographic location. Want to know what 13-17-year-old girls in the East are watching compared to 55-64-year-old guys in California? The Trends Map will show you.

The world is watching around 6 billion hours of YouTube video every month, which suggests that the insights to be gained from spying on viewer habits should be culturally meaningful. For example, I did not realize quite how gendered love of Spock is. Right now the Audi ad featuring Leonard Nimoy (old Spock) battling it out with Zachary Quinto (new Spock) is the most watched video for men of all ages. But it doesn't even show up in the top five for women of all ages.

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As the Internet chastised Swift for not being able to take a joke, and she seemed more fragile when she admitted in a InStyle U.K. interview that  she's afraid of  "being awful and intolerable. Alone. Laying in a marble bathtub by myself, like sad, with a glass of wine just complaining that my life ended up alone because I pushed everyone away because I thought I was too good to hang out with anybody."

But any sympathy extended towards Swift was short-lived when it was discovered that she her much-adorned fan mail is in a Nashville dumpster; now the punchline that is Swift's love life is too good for even the characteristically dry game show Jeopardy to pass up.

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Nashville resident Kylee Francescan was throwing out some old newspapers when she discovered the letters in a dumpster outside a local elementary school. "I didn't know if they were stolen [or] discarded, so I threw them in a box," Francescan told Nashville's News 2 Investigates. "And I'm like, ‘Somebody needs to let Taylor know.'"

The letters, which I like to imagine were sealed with a combination of watermelon lip gloss, mall perfume, and a Lisa Frank panda sticker, were addressed to Taylor Swift International, a P.O. box in a strip mall a few miles outside of Nashville. News 2 reporter Andy Cordan delivered the letters to the address, where he was told that a representative from Swift's staff drops by to pick up fan mail.

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After the comedian and co-host Amy Poehler joked about the country singer's dating history at the Golden Globes, Swift used a common quote in Vanity Fair: "There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help other women."

When a member of paparazzi asked Fey, "Do you think Taylor Swift overreacted with the joke?," the "30 Rock" actress used a well-known obscene expression; she then laughed derisively and walked away, using the expression once more. Fey's frustration may stem in part from the fact that she has already responded, saying, "I did not see that one coming. It was a joke. It was a lighthearted joke. And it’s a shame that she didn’t take it in the crazy-aunt spirit in which it was intended." In the past week, the actress, who's gone from a low-rated but beloved NBC series to carrying romantic comedies like "Admission," also noted how horrified she was that photos of her swimming on vacation were captured by paparazzi."

"My nightmare came true and I was photographed in my bathing suit in Florida. Thankfully, I was mostly submerged," she said.

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Swift referenced a Madeleine Albright quote by way of Katie Couric: ‘There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help other women," referring, in part, to Fey and Poehler, who joked that the serial dater and confessional singer should "stay away from Michael J. Fox’s son.”

Poehler apologized to Swift for the misunderstanding yesterday, saying, "Aw, I feel bad if she was upset. I am a feminist, and she is a young and talented girl. That being said, I do agree I am going to hell. But for other reasons. Mostly boring tax stuff."

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The comment even prompted Michael J. Fox to criticize her, saying, "What a way to build a career" (though he and Swift have since reconciled). But Swift still has issues with Poehler and Fey, it seems. The singer this month indirectly fired back at the comedians in Vanity Fair, dismissing Poehler and Fey as mean girls:

“'You know, Katie Couric is one of my favorite people,' Taylor Swift tells Vanity Fair contributing editor Nancy Jo Sales on the subject of mean girls in general and in response to an incident at this year’s Golden Globes, where Amy Poehler and Tina Fey mocked her highly scrutinized love life. 'Because she said to me she had heard a quote that she loved, that said, 'There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help other women.’"

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The genius "wahs" added to Taylor Swift's "I Knew You Were Trouble" have owned the web for days -- but have you seen the goats add the background "woah-ohs" to "Livin' on a Prayer" yet?

Bon Jovi's "Livin' on a Prayer" (Goat edition)

Taylor Swift's "I Knew You Were Trouble" (Goat edition)

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Most Improved Live Singer: Rihanna gave a surprisingly compelling take on her ballad "Stay" and was creditable in the Bob Marley tribute. That said, her disaffected pre-show red carpet interview -- and her walking off-camera after losing an award to mentor Jay-Z -- indicated that 2013 may be the year she opts out of releasing her annual album.

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Lonely Boy - The Black Keys

Stronger (What Doesn't Kill You) - Kelly Clarkson

We Are Young - Fun. featuring Janelle Monáe

WINNER: Somebody That I Used to Know - Gotye Featuring Kimbra

Thinkin Bout You - Frank Ocean

We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together - Taylor Swift

ALBUM OF THE YEAR

El Camino - The Black Keys

Some Nights - Fun.

WINNER: Babel - Mumford & Sons

Channel Orange - Frank Ocean

Blunderbuss - Jack White

SONG OF THE YEAR

The A Team - Ed Sheeran, songwriter (Ed Sheeran)

Adorn - Miguel Pimentel, songwriter (Miguel)

Call Me Maybe - Tavish Crowe, Carly Rae Jepsen & Josh Ramsay, songwriters (Carly Rae Jepsen)

Stronger (What Doesn't Kill You) - Jörgen Elofsson, David Gamson, Greg Kurstin & Ali Tamposi, songwriters (Kelly Clarkson)

WINNER: We Are Young - Jack Antonoff, Jeff Bhasker, Andrew Dost & Nate Ruess, songwriters (Fun. featuring Janelle Monáe)

BEST NEW ARTIST

Alabama Shakes

WINNER: Fun.

Hunter Hayes

The Lumineers

Frank Ocean

BEST POP SOLO PERFORMANCE

WINNER: Set Fire To The Rain [live] - Adele

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The music I chose was the music of Taylor Swift. So I wrote about disliking the music of Taylor Swift over at the Rumpus, where I have been writing music criticism since 2009. In this case, it should be said, the majority of my column (a miscellany of brief thoughts I have had about various musical phenomena since last summer) was the usual hortatory stuff: shout-outs about a Los Lobos show I saw last summer; about the new Young Fresh Fellows album (great! buy it!); about the breakup of the band called the Books; a brief attempt to connect Owen Ashworth (of Casiotone for the Painfully Alone) to Raymond Carver and so on.

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But it’s hard to believe that the pop singer, who is preparing for the Super Bowl halftime show, hadn't already heard it all. After all, an entire corner of the Internet believes her daughter is the Antichrist.

Beyoncé and her husband, Jay-Z, are just two of the popular music stars whose ties to the so-called Illuminati have come in for Zapruder-level scrutiny online, on sites like Vigilant Citizen, Media Exposed, and, yes, Beyonce-Illuminati.com.

The fear of the entity known as the Illuminati is neither unique — Bey and Jay join Lady Gaga, Rihanna, Ke$ha, Kanye West, and practically every prominent banker and politician on Earth is under conspiracy theorists' microscope — nor novel. The original Bavarian Illuminati, a short-lived Enlightenment group devoted to overthrowing the local government, would likely have been forgotten, said "Occult America" author Mitch Horowitz, had Scottish physicist John Robison not speciously alleged in 1797 that the group had infiltrated the Freemasons and instigated the French Revolution.

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It's that last part that may have the record industry a bit concerned. Adele's success (her album sold over 1 million more than Taylor Swift's "Red" in 2012, though it had several more months on shelves) is among the only inspiring stories that music labels can tell themselves about the album, a form that may have outlived its usefulness in a post-CD world. After an uptick in 2011, album sales were down in 2012 as they had been for years before; CD sales continue to flat-line, though they make up the majority of album purchases.

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Country singer Hunter Hayes sang the nominees for Pop Vocal Album:
Kelly Clarkson, "Stronger"
Florence + the Machine, "Ceremonials"
fun., "Some Nights"
Maroon 5, "Overexposed"
P!nk, "The Truth About Love"

Grammy winner Sheryl Crowe and country singer Chris Young announced Record of the Year:
The Black Keys, "Lonely Boy"
Kelly Clarkson, "Stronger"
fun. ft. Janelle Monae, "We Are Young"
Gotye ft. Kimbra, "Somebody That I Used to Know"
Frank Ocean, "Thinkin Bout You"
Taylor Swift, "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together"

It was around this time, 30 minutes into the performance, that Bieber fans started collectively sweating, scared that the artist wouldn't win a coveted nomination (#BieberForGrammy and #JustinDeservesAGrammy were both trending in the U.S.):

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Like many great pop songwriters who break through freakishly young (Swift signed her publishing deal at 14 and released her first album two years later), Swift’s lyrical style is so direct it can be misunderstood as facile. She is an artist who, without irony, titles her songs “Love Story” and “Innocent.” You’ll find wit and sass and even sarcasm in Swift’s lyrics but never cynicism or hopelessness, and for those who’ve actually experienced life after 22, that can be difficult to stomach. Then there’s the fact that a very short list of largely female solo artists (Adele, Lady Gaga, Rihanna) currently prop up what remains of the traditional music industry. It’s bad business to bite one of the few hands that still feeds you.

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That Swift defies the current economic model of selling music is not a surprise since she is a star made for this post-recession era of staycations, “Downton Abbey” and Prius sports wagons. Like any pop singer, she mirrors her time, and lucky for her, she didn’t emerge during the economic prosperity of the post-9/11 era when McMansions lined Heartland cornfields, weapons of terror were to be found in the desert and Arnold Schwarzenegger stumped for Hummer. As is known to any market research analyst, we aren’t rewinding to those halcyon days and our current “new normal” means downsized sales expectations in almost every market sector, especially cars, real estate, tourism. Which means the raised metric for pop longevity is demure thoughtfulness, not tacky opulence.

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Nothing much happens in the video, but its muted color palette, patient pace, and most of all that looming threat make it unusually effective. With its piercing guitar theme and the subdued production courtesy of T Bone Burnett, the song reflects that mood, even as it gives so much time over to lyric-less passages. Swift may be better casting than even Jennifer Lawrence, who plays the heroine Katniss Everdeen in the film adaptation of Suzanne Collins’ young-adult novel. The 22-year-old singer-songwriter is arguably the most successful musician of the moment, and her two songs — “Safe and Sound” and “Eyes Open” — will ensure that the “Hunger Games” soundtrack will sell very well.

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In all seriousness, it cannot be easy to be governor of Texas and run for president at the same time.

That is the entirety of the post. (Commenter "motherofthetroops": "K-Lo, I say this in Christian love: what Perry is to debaters, you are to Corner commentators." People who preface things with "I say this in Christian love" are people who are about to say something awful to you, usually.)

This morning, she published a longer reaction to last night's debate, informed by a night of careful consideration. "These candidates aren’t half bad," she declares. "I do wish Santorum would have his moment," she sighs, wistfully, imagining herself chastely holding hands with the former senator on a lovely spring day as they block the entrance of a Planned Parenthood clinic.

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Still though, is Justin Bieber country music? His award came in the form of Collaborative Video of the Year for his song 'That Should Be Me," featuring Rascal Flatts. Does it fit the specifications required of country music? Hard to say.

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Sorry, kids, Taylor Swift has not "been there," as is clearly evidenced in her own fantastical bully scenario, which involves a guy dressed like Snidely Whiplash tying her to the train tracks. That is some damsel in distress imagery, which really doesn't scream "It gets better," so much as "I am the definition of heterosexual norms." (Not to mention the somewhat offensive cutaway to the kid in purple when Taylor sings, "And you, picking on the weaker man." Are gay kids inherently weak?)

From what Taylor shows us in the video, she is so far from ever having been bullied that she immediately equates it with some fairy-tale vision of evil.

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