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It’s completely wild to me that anything other than what you’ve said here would be a common view. Spotify is totally free to bankroll Joe Rogan. Others are equ

It’s completely wild to me that anything other than what you’ve said here would be a common view. Spotify is totally free to bankroll Joe Rogan. Others are equally free to feel that this is a bad decision, to criticise it, and to withdraw support in the form of subscriptions or platform participation because they don’t want to contribute to it. Support for freedom of speech does not come with a requirement to support or share a platform with any particular example of speech. Spotify can make a decision about what has more value to them in the long term. Subscribers and content producers can decide if funding and promoting Rogan is a dealbreaker for them. Thats’s all this comes down to - a business decision. Personally the real crime here is that this has become an issue at all - thanks to Spotify’s frankly desperate attempt to become something other than a music streaming service. I have at no point been interested in Spotify providing podcasts; it’s already an active anti-feature for me, so “now we give some of your subscription to this asshole!!” isn't going to do much than tip me further in the direction of moving to another service.

kdtsh 5y ago
This is exactly the way I feel. The best way I heard this described just today was by Anthony Fantano on his Twitch stream, where he said that a music streaming service just shouldn’t be in the news this much. That is spot on in my opinion - too much controversy for nothing. I have never listened to podcasts on Spotify and never will, I use the podcasts app for this and it works quite well for me. I would have been very happy for Spotify to be a music streaming service with a killer app and better support for artists (hell I’d even pay another $5 a month for this, I tried Tidal as I think they pay artists well but I found their app to just not be as good as Spotify’s). As it stands, Joe Rogan makes millions of dollars from his deal with Spotify, while most artists I listen to will probably make pocket money - certainly not nearly enough to make a living, especially during a pandemic when touring is so difficult. Ultimately I think Joe Rogan isn’t going anywhere unless he sees the writing on the wall and decides to take his millions and build his own platform. Frankly, it means nothing to me - I think it would be great if he stopped bringing on guests who routinely lie about the pandemic, but I don’t listen to his podcast so I just don’t care enough to get up in arms about it. But I absolutely reject the idea that this is censorship and I call it out when I can - deplatforming isn’t censorship, and he isn’t even being deplatformed.
- telxosser 5y ago
  The music industry has exactly been this controversial and a battle ground over difficult free speech issues in my lifetime. Frank Zappa vs Tiper Gore for instance.
  - kdtsh 5y ago
    This however is a business dispute. Zappa vs Gore, as well as the rest of the sick legacy of PMRC, was absolutely an issue of government overreach and real censorship. If this particular case should ever require a senate hearing then I’ll be shocked. (Luckily for those of us growing up around this time, the ‘Parental Advisory’ sticker basically became a label of good taste - if it’s got that sticker, it might ge worth listening to.)
zajio1am 5y ago
> Spotify is totally free to bankroll Joe Rogan. Others are equally free to feel that this is a bad decision, to criticise it, and to withdraw support in the form of subscriptions or platform participation because they don’t want to contribute to it. Support for freedom of speech does not come with a requirement to support or share a platform with any particular example of speech. People understand distrinction between 'using your freedom to pursue your happiness' and 'using your freedom in order to punish someone'. Some action can be both 'exercising your liberty to free association' and 'using economic power to oppress others'.

kdtsh 5y ago

This is exactly the way I feel. The best way I heard this described just today was by Anthony Fantano on his Twitch stream, where he said that a music streaming service just shouldn’t be in the news this much. That is spot on in my opinion - too much controversy for nothing. I have never listened to podcasts on Spotify and never will, I use the podcasts app for this and it works quite well for me. I would have been very happy for Spotify to be a music streaming service with a killer app and better support for artists (hell I’d even pay another $5 a month for this, I tried Tidal as I think they pay artists well but I found their app to just not be as good as Spotify’s). As it stands, Joe Rogan makes millions of dollars from his deal with Spotify, while most artists I listen to will probably make pocket money - certainly not nearly enough to make a living, especially during a pandemic when touring is so difficult. Ultimately I think Joe Rogan isn’t going anywhere unless he sees the writing on the wall and decides to take his millions and build his own platform. Frankly, it means nothing to me - I think it would be great if he stopped bringing on guests who routinely lie about the pandemic, but I don’t listen to his podcast so I just don’t care enough to get up in arms about it. But I absolutely reject the idea that this is censorship and I call it out when I can - deplatforming isn’t censorship, and he isn’t even being deplatformed.

telxosser 5y ago
The music industry has exactly been this controversial and a battle ground over difficult free speech issues in my lifetime. Frank Zappa vs Tiper Gore for instance.
- kdtsh 5y ago
  This however is a business dispute. Zappa vs Gore, as well as the rest of the sick legacy of PMRC, was absolutely an issue of government overreach and real censorship. If this particular case should ever require a senate hearing then I’ll be shocked. (Luckily for those of us growing up around this time, the ‘Parental Advisory’ sticker basically became a label of good taste - if it’s got that sticker, it might ge worth listening to.)

zajio1am 5y ago

> Spotify is totally free to bankroll Joe Rogan. Others are equally free to feel that this is a bad decision, to criticise it, and to withdraw support in the form of subscriptions or platform participation because they don’t want to contribute to it. Support for freedom of speech does not come with a requirement to support or share a platform with any particular example of speech. People understand distrinction between 'using your freedom to pursue your happiness' and 'using your freedom in order to punish someone'. Some action can be both 'exercising your liberty to free association' and 'using economic power to oppress others'.