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With a boycott you have to be happy with either result. Either you change and we still do business with you or you don’t change and I take my business elsewhere

by awb 5y ago

With a boycott you have to be happy with either result. Either you change and we still do business with you or you don’t change and I take my business elsewhere. Yes, it involves an ultimatum but both results are successful outcomes. The only way you lose is if you are unhappy with the result of your ultimatum and I haven’t heard any indication of that. I think it worked out just fine for both parties. Neil is almost 80 and decades past his prime. I doubt he cares at all about the money, it was always out of principal for him.

imgabe 5y ago
I'm not saying he's unhappy. I'm saying the goal of his actions was to reduce freedom. The principle he is following is that of censorship. He left because Spotify refused to capitulate to his demands for censorship. Yes, he is free to do that if he likes. Yes, he may be happy about it. But I do not find supporting censorship to be a noble or worthy cause.
- awb 5y ago
  Where did he ask for censorship though? https://www.foxbusiness.com/lifestyle/spotify-remove-neil-young-music-songs-threaten-joe-rogan-covid-vaccine https://www.foxbusiness.com/lifestyle/spotify-remove-neil-yo... > Young reportedly posted a letter that read: 'They can have Rogan or Young. Not both' Censorship is saying “You can’t have Rogan, and no one can have Rogan”, but that’s not what he said. He’s just saying he doesn’t want to be associated with Rogan. They agreed to go their separate ways and everyone’s content is still available for purchase by any willing consumers.
  - imgabe 5y ago
    Literally nobody was associating him with Rogan. He's on a platform with millions of artists. Absolutely not one single person in the entire world was thinking "Gee, Neil Young must agree with every single thing that Joe Rogan says, because they're both on Spotify". That is complete nonsense. The only reason to make a threat like this was to attempt to get Rogan dropped from the service. I'm sure at various times Neil Young's music was sold in Wal-Mart or other stores that also sold music or other media by other people he disagreed with. He never felt the need to pressure any of them into dropping other artists for fear that they would be associated because they're both in the same store. Imagine for a second that Neil Young had written something like "There's too many gay artists on Spotify. They need to kick off all these gay artists or I'm gonna pull all my music". He might technically be in his rights to do that and pull his music over that, but I doubt anyone would be on here saying how he's just standing up for his principles and exercising his freedom to choose who he does business with. We'd all be saying that it's a shitty thing to do to try to use your clout to silence people you disagree with. That's what he's doing here. The fact that it didn't work doesn't make it any less shitty of a thing to do. The fact that you might also disagree with the person he's trying to silence also doesn't make it right.
    - awb 5y ago
      > The only reason to make a threat like this was to attempt to get Rogan dropped from the service. Not true. Young was very willing to pull his own catalog, said as much and then did so willingly and without a fuss. And yes, artists have images to uphold. Music is displayed right next to podcasts on the Spotify Home Screen. It’s totally possible for Spotify to recommend you listen to Neil Young and a Rogan podcast. And it’s really only up to Young what he decides is appropriate for his brand. What seems silly to you might be really important to him. As for your other examples, this happens all the time in business where someone pulls out of some event or stops selling goods in a store for moral reasons. It’s within their rights. I have no problem with any business refusing to do business with any other business for any legal reason. That’s just the free market. And no, I wouldn’t berate Young for pulling his products from a store for bogus reasons, I would challenge the reasons themselves, not the act (or threat) of pulling the products.
      - imgabe 5y ago
        > And no, I wouldn’t berate Young for pulling his products from a store for bogus reasons, I would challenge the reasons themselves, not the act (or threat) of pulling the products. And indeed, that is what I've been doing this whole time. I never said he wasn't allowed to pull his music, or that he shouldn't be able to. I've said that his reason for doing so - he wants particular podcasts to be censored - is, as you put it, bogus. That is a shitty thing to want, and it should not be promoted by any means, whether it's pulling your music catalog or anything else.
        awb 5y ago
        This is one of the broadest definitions of censorship I’ve ever heard then. I understand censorship to be the total suppression of content, not a partial restriction of it, or having to view it on one major (similarly priced, similar ease of use) platform instead of another. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/censoring https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/censoring Censorship: > to examine in order to suppress (see SUPPRESS sense 2) or delete anything considered objectionable https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suppress https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suppress Suppress: > to keep (something) secret : to not allow people to know about or see (something) I haven’t seen any evidence or quotes from Young that request keeping Rogan’s content secret. I don’t think it counts as censorship if you say a platform no longer has content that’s available elsewhere. At that point, any content dropped from any platform for any reason would be “censorship” and the word starts to lose it’s original meaning.

by awb 5y ago

imgabe 5y ago

I'm not saying he's unhappy. I'm saying the goal of his actions was to reduce freedom. The principle he is following is that of censorship. He left because Spotify refused to capitulate to his demands for censorship. Yes, he is free to do that if he likes. Yes, he may be happy about it. But I do not find supporting censorship to be a noble or worthy cause.

awb 5y ago
Where did he ask for censorship though? https://www.foxbusiness.com/lifestyle/spotify-remove-neil-young-music-songs-threaten-joe-rogan-covid-vaccine https://www.foxbusiness.com/lifestyle/spotify-remove-neil-yo... > Young reportedly posted a letter that read: 'They can have Rogan or Young. Not both' Censorship is saying “You can’t have Rogan, and no one can have Rogan”, but that’s not what he said. He’s just saying he doesn’t want to be associated with Rogan. They agreed to go their separate ways and everyone’s content is still available for purchase by any willing consumers.
- imgabe 5y ago
  Literally nobody was associating him with Rogan. He's on a platform with millions of artists. Absolutely not one single person in the entire world was thinking "Gee, Neil Young must agree with every single thing that Joe Rogan says, because they're both on Spotify". That is complete nonsense. The only reason to make a threat like this was to attempt to get Rogan dropped from the service. I'm sure at various times Neil Young's music was sold in Wal-Mart or other stores that also sold music or other media by other people he disagreed with. He never felt the need to pressure any of them into dropping other artists for fear that they would be associated because they're both in the same store. Imagine for a second that Neil Young had written something like "There's too many gay artists on Spotify. They need to kick off all these gay artists or I'm gonna pull all my music". He might technically be in his rights to do that and pull his music over that, but I doubt anyone would be on here saying how he's just standing up for his principles and exercising his freedom to choose who he does business with. We'd all be saying that it's a shitty thing to do to try to use your clout to silence people you disagree with. That's what he's doing here. The fact that it didn't work doesn't make it any less shitty of a thing to do. The fact that you might also disagree with the person he's trying to silence also doesn't make it right.
  - awb 5y ago
    > The only reason to make a threat like this was to attempt to get Rogan dropped from the service. Not true. Young was very willing to pull his own catalog, said as much and then did so willingly and without a fuss. And yes, artists have images to uphold. Music is displayed right next to podcasts on the Spotify Home Screen. It’s totally possible for Spotify to recommend you listen to Neil Young and a Rogan podcast. And it’s really only up to Young what he decides is appropriate for his brand. What seems silly to you might be really important to him. As for your other examples, this happens all the time in business where someone pulls out of some event or stops selling goods in a store for moral reasons. It’s within their rights. I have no problem with any business refusing to do business with any other business for any legal reason. That’s just the free market. And no, I wouldn’t berate Young for pulling his products from a store for bogus reasons, I would challenge the reasons themselves, not the act (or threat) of pulling the products.
    - imgabe 5y ago
      > And no, I wouldn’t berate Young for pulling his products from a store for bogus reasons, I would challenge the reasons themselves, not the act (or threat) of pulling the products. And indeed, that is what I've been doing this whole time. I never said he wasn't allowed to pull his music, or that he shouldn't be able to. I've said that his reason for doing so - he wants particular podcasts to be censored - is, as you put it, bogus. That is a shitty thing to want, and it should not be promoted by any means, whether it's pulling your music catalog or anything else.
      - awb 5y ago
        This is one of the broadest definitions of censorship I’ve ever heard then. I understand censorship to be the total suppression of content, not a partial restriction of it, or having to view it on one major (similarly priced, similar ease of use) platform instead of another. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/censoring https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/censoring Censorship: > to examine in order to suppress (see SUPPRESS sense 2) or delete anything considered objectionable https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suppress https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suppress Suppress: > to keep (something) secret : to not allow people to know about or see (something) I haven’t seen any evidence or quotes from Young that request keeping Rogan’s content secret. I don’t think it counts as censorship if you say a platform no longer has content that’s available elsewhere. At that point, any content dropped from any platform for any reason would be “censorship” and the word starts to lose it’s original meaning.