I'd imagine that location plays in to it a little bit as well. Before all those sites popped up, were mixtapes travelling like that? Out here in Cali, I can't see people listening to 50 tapes like that. Or any tapes that's heavy in New York or in that area.
Cali is a perfect example. For all I know when I say mixtape they might say Mac Dre before 50 even cross their minds. Texas you probably get SUC and them boys.
Dudes were all about their region before the internet blew mixtapes up. That's why in DC and VA we were on gogo and southern ****, we really did not care about NY musically beyond bigger names until later on when we could really download the tracks vs having to go buy bootlegs from the barbershop of **** we ain't care about in the first place.