The Weeknd, performing right here in final 12 months’s Super Bowl halftime present, was Spotify’s most performed artist globally for the majority of January.
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The period of the political-protest artist might not be lifeless, however the ones protesting will have to be larger now than Neil Young if they will spur Spotify to cancel Joe Rogan.
Last week, singer-songwriter Young, who rose to fame within the Nineteen Sixties and ’70s, pulled his music from Spotify, the world’s largest streaming-music service by subscribers, over objections to COVID-19 vaccine misinformation on Rogan’s well-liked podcast. Young’s ultimatum — Spotify “can have Rogan or Young,” he wrote — got here after a whole bunch of medical professions pointed to Rogan as they known as on Spotify to deal with COVID misinformation extra aggressively. Folk icon Joni Mitchell and a smattering of others joined in Young’s boycott within the following days.
But with out a revolt smoldering among the many artists topping its charts in the present day, Spotify is rejecting the position of “content material censor,” as Spotify CEO Daniel Ek framed it in a weblog put up Sunday. And even when chart-toppers communicate up, Spotify might not uproot Rogan. Spotify makes the overwhelming majority of its income from music streaming, nevertheless it’s betting its future on being the world’s No. 1 supply for all audio, together with podcasts — with a reported $100 million staked on Rogan’s present as a Spotify unique.
“We are speaking a few catalog music artist versus a famous person, frontline audio creator,” Mark Mulligan, an analyst at Midia Research, mentioned in a word. “Rogan is one in all Spotify’s greatest audio bets, and audio is Spotify’s greatest strategic wager, so it might take rather a lot — an actual lot — to see Spotify take into account pulling the plug on the controversial podcaster.”
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That “actual lot” might embody protests by in the present day’s musical superstars. The Weeknd, for instance, was essentially the most performed artist on Spotify’s service globally for the majority of January. Bad Bunny, Taylor Swift, BTS and Drake rounded out Spotify’s high 5 within the final week — and so they had been Spotify’s most performed artists worldwide all of final 12 months. Ultimatums from recording artists of their rank might pressure Spotify’s hand. None has weighed in publicly but. (Representatives did not reply to messages searching for remark.)
Spotify is grappling with the dilemma that Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and different web giants have struggled to comprise: tips on how to steadiness freedom of expression with efficient moderation of essentially the most objectionable materials on their platforms. While the likes of Facebook and YouTube should reckon with policing content material at unprecedented scale, Spotify has problem of carving an identification of neutrality after it sank $100 million right into a political lightning rod.
A big a part of Rogan’s attraction to his viewers is courting controversy. Long earlier than bringing on Peter McCullough and Robert Malone to voice opposition to COVID-19 vaccines, Rogan hosted conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and far-right Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes. Comments on his podcasts have additionally been lambasted as transphobic and racist.
On Sunday, Rogan mentioned he had “no laborious emotions in the direction of Neil Young and positively no laborious emotions in the direction of Joni Mitchell.” He defended internet hosting friends like McCullough and Malone. But if he might do something otherwise, he mentioned, he would carry on specialists with counterpoints immediately after “controversial ones.” COVID-19 vaccines, particularly, have been confirmed protected and efficient in opposition to extreme illness, hospitalization and dying.
Protest versus revenue
But even when headliners pull out of Spotify, it hasn’t slowed its momentum for lengthy.
Power couple Jay-Z and Beyonce stonewalled Spotify for years. Beyonce held again her 2013 self-titled LP for one 12 months; 2016’s Lemonade was on strike from Spotify for 3 years. Jay-Z pulled most his solo work off Spotify from April 2017 till the tip of 2019. Their beef with Spotify was centered on the economics of streaming and aggressive benefit, fairly than misinformation, however their absence made headlines all the identical.
Regardless, Spotify greater than doubled its variety of listeners, to 271 million, through the three years Jay-Z boycotted and Beyonce withheld Lemonade and different recordings. Since then, that quantity has continued to develop, surpassing 400 million listeners on the finish of the final 12 months.
Swift additionally famously blackballed the service. Objecting to streaming as an “experiment” that did not pretty compensate creators, she pulled her whole music catalog off Spotify in 2014. Her music returned in 2017. Last 12 months, she was the second most performed artist on Spotify worldwide.
Spotify’s CEO spoke out Sunday about misinformation for the primary time since Young stoked the newest outcry over Rogan, in a weblog put up that by no means referenced Rogan particularly. Spotify will not act as a censor, Ek mentioned then, however it is going to be extra clear. That contains publishing its insurance policies on harmful content material and different guidelines, in addition to including a content material advisory with hyperlinks to an informational hub to any podcast episode that discusses COVID-19.
Ek mentioned Wednesday that it is “too early to know” whether or not the backlash to Rogan would spur cancellations, however “I be ok with the place we’re.”
And until you begin listening to from the likes of Bad Bunny or The Weeknd that the informational hub simply is not adequate, you are positive to maintain listening to from Rogan on Spotify for some time.