Up until this point in history, Auto-Tune in the hip hop sector was still in its developmental stages, but it certainly did seem like the new “thing” everyone was doing, and it seemed as if it was not going away soon. That last part did not sit well with listeners, and even some creatives. Lessley Anderson writes, “The use of showy effects usually have [sic] a backlash. And in the case of the Auto-Tune warble, Jay-Z struck back with the 2009 single, D.O.A., or ‘Death of Auto-Tune.’ … That same year, the band Death Cab for Cutie showed up at the Grammys wearing blue ribbons to raise awareness… about ‘rampant Auto-Tune abuse.’” (Anderson). However, both of these protests fell on deaf ears, as Auto-Tune seemed to have already made its way into much of the mainstream, and “Music producers everywhere were installing the software” (Anderson). If anything, all the buzz now surrounding Auto-Tune was a boon for Antares, as, “Jay-Z didn't hurt either. There is such a thing as bad PR, but ‘Death of Auto-Tune’ wasn't it, not when handled correctly. ‘Sometimes things fall into our lap,’ Mr. Alpert said. ‘I made myself very available to people trying to put together a 'Is Jay-Z going to kill Auto-Tune?’ story’” (Ives). This certainly was not the end of negative backlash directed at Auto-Tune, but its spike in relevancy was certainly a significant loss for anti-Auto-Tune thinking.