During the highlight performance of the Grammys, the microphones repeatedly went out for seconds on end while rap artists Eminem, Lil Wayne and Drake were on stage. 25 million tuned in to see the performance late Sunday night, and were given censorship. CBS sought to include cutting-edge, top-selling artists, while censoring it to the point of distraction.

"It was a rousing musical performance, but words were edited from the live telecast that didn't meet our broadcast standards," said CBS spokesman Chris Ender. "We have great respect for artists' creative freedom, but there are certain things you can't say, or sing, on television."

Even so, New York magazine's Web site was among those wondering "why were whole lines being cut to avoid one profanity? Why was the music cut out along with the mikes? Did the bleep button keep getting stuck in the on position or something?" Then, helpfully, the Web site posted annotated lyrics to the performance, with bleeped portions highlighted. (It also noted the performers "were doing a pretty good job of censoring themselves, making the silences all the more pointless.")

"Don't have performers on the show if you're going to bleep the hell out of their performance," proposed Paul Levinson, professor of communication and media studies at Fordham University. Levinson argues that the Grammycast did an injustice to the performers music as well as to the audience expecting to hear it.

He pointed back a half-century to when CBS "The Ed Sullivan Show" refused to show Elvis Presley on camera from his gyrating waist down, and when, at Sullivan's command, the Rolling Stones substituted the line "Let's spend the night together" with the seemingly less racy "Let's spend some time together."

"We laugh at Ed Sullivan today," Levinson said. "But that's exactly the same thing CBS was doing Sunday night."