anleja

I got this directly from the magazine.
"...Rolling Stone polled a blue-ribbon body of rock & roll stars and authorities and asked them to pick their top 50 albums in order of preference. The 273 voters spanned every decade and genre of popular music, from the 1950s to the present, including Beck, U2 guitarist the Edge, Ray Manzarek and John Densmore of the Doors, Fats Domino, Jackson Browne, Art Garfunkel, Flea and John Frusciante of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Britney Spears, Metallica's James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich, Missy Elliott and folk patriarch Pete Seeger. Among the top behind-the-scenec figures: David Geffen, Warner Music Group chairman and CEO Roger Ames, produced Rick Rubin and seminal session musicians Hal Blaine (the Beach Boys, Phil Spector) and James Burton (Elvis Presley, Rick Nelson)..."

"The ballots were scored by the accounting firm of Ernst & Young and overseen by the Rolling Stone editors. We assigned 100 points for each first-place vote, 50 points for each second-place vote, 33-1/3 points for each third-place vote, and so on, down to 2 points for each fiftieth-place vote. We then ranked albums appearing on at least five ballots."

I remember the first time Rolling Stone used the internet for polling "regular" people about their favorite musicians, and Backstreet Boys won artist of the year.