The business profile of the female MC vanished with each passing year, apparently due to the budget constraints of the label. Seeing an image of a perfectly done-up female with a mic in her hand served to draw attention to them, and I understand that purpose in the fight against the double standard, even in hip-hop - not many people want to see a female wearing a doo-rag and dirt under her nails. The documentary says this "keeping up with the Joneses" approach prevented labels from signing any more female artists, probably letting their existing artists finish their contracts or buying them out of their deals. Is that a conspiracy, you ask? No, it's just the label's way of cutting their losses, especially if all that they were paying for didn't translate into sales. What isn't mentioned in the program is the rise of digital music, dropping the bottom out of the music business as a whole, as well as that already weakened niche as the public was getting used to not paying for music, further damaging their livelihoods.
