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Joni Mitchell joins Neil Young in protest against Spotify
- t0bia_s 5y agoI never heard any podcast from Rogan, but now I'm curious when there are more and more ultimatums from other artist. Great advertisement, btw.
- olivierestsage 5y agoI'll resist[0] the impulse to make fun of these artists as having an inflated sense of their own importance, and simply join others in noting that this kind of behavior shouldn't be tolerated. It sets a horrible precedent, no matter what one thinks about Joe Rogan. Edit: Too late now to save myself from downvote land, but I just spoke poorly. I meant it shouldn't be tolerated in the form of Spotify acquiescing to the demands. Obviously the artists can do whatever they want. [0] Kind of
- least 5y agoWhy shouldn’t this behavior be tolerated? This is the response that they uniquely can make to protest for what they believe in. I do not condone censorship and I’m more concerned about the surgeon general suggesting that Spotify should censor Joe Rogan but these actions are also falling in the lines of free expression, which should be protected.
- eej71 5y agoHe certainly has a right to do that. No doubt I wonder if Mr. Young will apply the same moral stringency to the rest of his distributors. I also wonder if his fans are aware of his own unscientific misinformation campaigns in regards to GMO foods. I think most wonder - where does it end? What heterodox positions are tolerated and which ones aren’t? Especially in the context of something like a broad based music distributor.
- plufz 5y agoIsn’t this just life/humanity? No one is ever gonna have a 100% scientific correct moral applied equally to all of their life. He is gonna protest some stuff and not other stuff. I’m not really afraid of a slippery slope here. I think the bigger problem is people not taking a real stand in what they believe.
- eej71 5y agoFor me there is a cultural question of - what kind of heterodox should be considered normal as part of a broad based distribution service. For example, there are a number of artists who seem to glorify killing police. Should we consider it normal that big time artist XYZ would feel the need to remove their music from the service? Yes, it would be their right (I don't think anyone disputes that)... but... is that a good cultural trend? To my eyes, this looks more like tribalistic posturing than some sort of principled stand for something.
- least 5y agoIt's hard to call it a cultural trend when it's a couple famous people removing their library of music from one music service. I don't think it's unethical for a musician to stop working with a distributor if the terms of that stop being acceptable, that's wholly reasonable. But to try and answer your question; no, I think it's kind of silly. Someone like Neil Young can only do this sort of thing once and trying to use it to deplatform another entertainer doesn't seem to be the most useful (removing Joe Rogan's podcast or whatever won't make a dent in the cause he supposedly is fighting for) and also not particularly effective unless there is a cataclysm of high profile musicians removing their music from Spotify.
- subpixel 5y agoNeil Young has, as far as I’m aware, made a point of arguing against GMO policy, not science. He’s anti-corporate, greed and an environmentalist, and Monsanto and glysophate are credible threats to farmers and the environment, respectively. I know less about the plight of farmers being forced to use GM seed, but I am intimately familiar with the decimation of insect life in the last decade.
- lowdose 5y agoJoe Rogan has been right a lot, he can’t be right about everything. I think this is an ego problem of an icon turned to insignificance, irritated he doesn’t get an invite to the biggest show of the world.
- assttoasstmgr 5y agoIt literally mirrors the plot to "Caddyshack": A couple of old, out of touch rich people throwing a tantrum because they have to share a club with a loud gregarious buffoon that's wildly popular with others.
- tomjakubowski 5y agoIn that analogy, who is the gopher?
- jhorogueon 5y agoJamie
- unfocussed_mike 5y ago"Out of touch"? They are both survivors of childhood polio, making a very timely point about vaccinations. [downvoted for this? really?]
- torstenvl 5y agoAre they childhood survivors of authoritarian governments that turned into oligarchies? Maybe if they had been, they wouldn't be so convinced that rich and famous people should get to decide what ideas other people are exposed to.
- unfocussed_mike 5y agoIn what way are they deciding that? They are simply deciding that they don't want to share a platform with Joe Rogan. Neil Young made it clear it's an either/or; Spotify went with "or". Their prerogative on both sides.
- unfocussed_mike 5y ago> Are they childhood survivors of authoritarian governments that turned into oligarchies? Yep. They are both Canadian.
- tomjakubowski 5y agoTo me it's no different than pulling your art from a gallery which is selling the paintings of John Wayne Gacy next to your work - except that music recordings are reproducible, so you can sell the same thing on multiple platforms. (Artists in physical media can still distribute their work across many galleries - or "platforms")
- unfocussed_mike 5y agoYou mean in the interests of free speech, artists who you think have an inflated sense of their own importance should necessarily sacrifice their freedom of speech for someone who is parroting dangerous untruths? Pulling their music from Spotify is speech. Why can they _not_ do it? What makes what they are doing a "horrible precedent"?
- olivierestsage 5y agoI didn't actually mention free speech in my comment, which (although I do passionately believe in it!) I don't consider the main issue here. If a precedent is set for artists being rewarded for demanding that other artists be removed from platforms, where will it end? How will the line be drawn? How much content will the people listening on these platforms be deprived of simply because of rivalries and the like? It doesn't seem like it's in the interest of listeners or customers to behave this way.
- unfocussed_mike 5y agoIn what sense are Mitchell and Young being _rewarded_? They're going to lose some money, right? And they've certainly lost a few Joe Rogan fans. Both of them simply asserted their right not to share a platform with someone they believe is doing significant harm. They owe him and their (Spotify's) customers nothing in particular. It'll either work out for them and they'll get what they want, or it won't.
- ipaddr 5y agoHe makes 600,000 a month from his own streaming service. Some protests are commercials.
- olivierestsage 5y agoThey would be rewarded if Spotify dropped Joe Rogan to appease them.
- xioren00 5y agoYes let them exercise their free speech so they can collectively silence others; You're on to something. And speaking of parroting, I'll agree that much of what joe and by proxy his guests say is dangerous. Where we disagree is whether or not these things are "untrue" and to whom they are dangerous towards.
- spaceisballer 5y agoLol. People can’t take a stance? I think it’s well within their right to pull their music for what they believe in.
- eej71 5y agoOf course he can take a stance. And by the same token the rest of us are free to criticize it.
- shadowgovt 5y agoAs they are free to criticize Spotify by putting their money where opinions are and taking their content elsewhere. Free speech all the way around.
- throwawaysea 5y agoWithin their legal rights? Sure. But they are advocating for others to be silenced in the same breath, not just silently pulling their content. In other words, they are using power (financial power, celebrity influence) to silence others. That is incompatible with the ideas underlying a classically liberal free society.
- zapataband1 5y agoSorry Neil Young isn't the all powerful boogeyman that you think he is. He isn't censoring joe rogan because he doesn't have that power.
- dazilcher 5y ago> Neil Young [...] joe rogan Interesting capitalization choice. Intentional?
- zapataband1 5y ago
- ykevinator2 5y agoJoe Rogan is an artist too, we have 3 entertainers, they are here to entertain us. I suspect you are more educated than the 3 of them combined, don't fall into to trap of picking which kardashian is best.
- porcoda 5y agoThis is why I still buy music I like - either physical media, or DRM-free files I can archive away. It's more expensive and labor intensive to manage, but at least I don't have to worry about my music ever vanishing for one reason or another. Things like Spotify are useful for discovering new stuff, but I sort of like knowing that stuff I like will always be available for me to enjoy regardless of what's going on amongst artists, labels, service providers, etc.
- bklaasen 5y agoLikewise. Nextcloud Music and Subtracks. Glorious.
- coffeefirst 5y agoSame. Plus this way I’m paying the artists (directly, wherever possible).
- manquer 5y agoAre there good tools which let you manage a catalogue? Either SaaS or self+hosted ? It is hassle to manage your own files on all your devices.I would rather i had app like Spotify but streaming files owned by me.
- guerrilla 5y agoPersonally I'd use Banshee (or iTunes if you prefer) and a NAS, but a lot of people are using Nextcloud which has plugins for this kind of thing.
- manquer 5y agoBanshee looks interesting! thanks for sharing. I was hoping for a streaming server(and clients) I suppose!, which maybe also fetches podcasts and also maybe does audiobooks and perhaps manage buying from stores which supports DRM free content downloads.
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- bruceb 5y agoFor Neil Young this actually might work out well financially. He gets more media exposure than he has had in 20, 30 years? I won't be surprised if his album sale 5x this year and his streams 10x. Whatever money he loses from not being on spotify will be made up on other services. He was the first so will be remembered for a while. Probably get invited to some events more readily. Not a comment on the Rogen or the moral aspect of this move, just the money.
- rootusrootus 5y ago> For Neil Young this actually might work out well financially. He is 76 years old and worth $200M. I don't think he cares much about money at this point.
- harry8 5y ago> I don't think he cares much about money at this point. I think that is probably right in terms of stuff you can spend. What he probably does care about is relevance and a sense of importance. If you look at anyone with that kind of money, they've got more than they can spend, more than their family and grandchildren can meaningfully spend and yet frequently they don't stop working at their business. One rich guy in Australia a few decades ago made that point and said he considered money from his deals as a substitute for applause. I strongly doubt Neil Young would be willing to take up a public position that involved a real sacrifice on his part, where he was rejected by the orthodoxy of his tribe. He's had plenty of opportunity to take a strong position and hasn't until this one which will probably lose him very, very few admirers. I could be wrong about that and he could prove me so too.
- kennywinker 5y agoI switched to Tidal last year. Spotify is notoriously one of the worst streaming services in terms of what it pays artists, and then there was this: https://themusicessentials.com/news/daniel-ek-e100-million-investment/ https://themusicessentials.com/news/daniel-ek-e100-million-i... (spotify ceo investing in AI weapons company). While Tidal’s app is a little rough around the edges, and their auto-playlist stuff isn’t quite as smart, it has a solid catalogue and i’m pretty happy with it.
- woodruffw 5y agoThank you for sharing that article. It's convinced me to cancel my subscription as well.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- shepherdjerred 5y agoIs it worth getting Tidal if I primarily listen with AirPods? I've heard that Bluetooth decreases audio quality, so that would negate any benefit of the lossless music Tidal provides.
- kondro 5y agoYou don't need to buy the lossless plan.
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- kosyblysk666 5y ago
- tomcat27 5y agoJoe Rogan is a very good listener and his show is popular for a good reason and that's not political. Silencing this way is just cancel culture.
- woodruffw 5y agoWho, precisely, is "canceling" (much less "silencing") who in this scenario? As I recall, the Supreme Court has consistently recognized the freedom of association as a core component of free speech. And that seems to be what's happening.
- torstenvl 5y agoPerhaps you didn't know, but Neil Young tried to get Spotify to deplatform Joe Rogan (i.e., to cancel his Spotify distribution deal), and used his repertoire as an ultimatum. EDIT: I'm being downvoted to oblivion for stating an objective fact. This is unbecoming of HN. I'm out.
- thisisnotatest1 5y ago
- sbelskie 5y agoIs that not speech?
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- woodruffw 5y agoThe linguistic choice of "deplatform[ing]" is such a funny one: in any other era, we'd call withholding one's business a "boycott." But the history of the word "boycott" in the US has a distinctly anti-racial hue, and people who yammer about deplatforming seem to take extreme pains to avoid any comparison between today's boycotts and those good old lunch counters.
- throwawaymanbot 5y ago
- monkeybutton 5y agoI hate Spotify's recommendation algorithm for podcasts, if you can even call it that. Why does it think I want to listen to Joe Rogan and Jordan f-ing Peterson. Or any of the podcasts about drugs. I've never listened to any podcasts using their app, so is it based on the music I listen to, or do they recommend that crap to everyone? Jordan Peterson! Do they think he's what the average person likes? It's twisted! Worse is they've been showing the same few recommendations to me for years now. What makes them think today is the day I'm going to magically decide to start streaming them?
- vnchr 5y ago
- kybernetikos 5y agoDon't it always seem to go, that you don't know what you got till it's gone?
- manquer 5y agoI always get saddened when I read an obituary post on HN of some great people I only got to know because they recently passed away
- School-Cotton 5y agoSpotify subscribers can still enjoy Joe Dassin’s excellent French cover Le grand parking :)
- gonehome 5y agoBased on the recent Stratechery Neil Young advocates against GMOs which is the “anti-science” position on that issue. I think independent of my views on Rogan personally this kind of ultimatum to silence someone is just wrong. The free speech position is the principled one. Spotify wouldn’t be in this position if they weren’t trying to aggregate podcast ownership and ruin the open ecosystem anyway. Still, if I were Spotify the move is to take the free speech position and tell these other people to fuck off (imo).
- mulmen 5y agoYoung and Mitchell pulling their music is literally freedom of speech (free expression). Neil Young can do whatever he wants with his content (speech), just like Rogan. This is competition in the free marketplace of ideas. You're absolutely entitled to your opinion on these actions and you're free to support Spotify or Young or Mitchell or any combination of the three. But there is no "freedom of speech" side here.
- throwawayboise 5y agoYes there is. Young and Mitchell should argue their position on its merits, not throw a hissy fit and take their toys and go home.
- mulmen 5y agoThey are arguing their position on its merits. This case is being tried in the court of public opinion.
- throwawaysea 5y agoI view it as a freedom of speech issue because one side is advocating for another side to be silenced. These musicians aren’t just pulling their content - they’re trying to use power to shut someone else down. To me that is clearly a freedom of speech issue.
- gonehome 5y agoYeah, for clarity Young and Mitchell are totally within their right to pull their music as an exercise of their speech and I’m fine with that. What I find distasteful is the framing of “Rogan or me” as a way to pressure Spotify to pull Rogan from the platform. Sure Spotify could do that, but they shouldn’t.
- fortran77 5y agoI like Joni Mitchell and Neil Young. However, if I didn't, I simply wouldn't listen to them. Which is exactly what I do with Joe Rogan. I tried his show, it wasn't for me. It's interesting that Joni Mitchell also promotes controversial and unrecognized medical information, such as "Morgellons Disease" See: https://www.billboard.com/music/music-news/morgellons-disease-joni-mitchell-rare-condition-6517156/ https://www.billboard.com/music/music-news/morgellons-diseas... > The 71-year-old singer first discussed her battle with Morgellons in a 2010 interview with the Los Angeles Times, telling them she had “this weird, incurable disease that seems like it’s from outer space.” Her vivid description left many fans concerned: “Fibers in a variety of colors protrude out of my skin like mushrooms after a rainstorm: they cannot be forensically identified as animal, vegetable or mineral.” and https://www.mayoclinic.org/morgellons-disease/art-20044996#:~:text=Morgellons%20disease%20is%20an%20uncommon,on%20or%20stinging%20their%20skin https://www.mayoclinic.org/morgellons-disease/art-20044996#:.... From the Mayo Clinic: > Some doctors recognize the condition as a delusional infestation and treat it with cognitive behavioral therapy, antidepressants, antipsychotic drugs and counseling. Others think the symptoms are related to an infectious process in skin cells. Further study is needed. And Neil Young isn't without controversial opinions that go "against science" on issues ranging from GMOs (he's against them), to the benefits of super-high-resolution digital audio files (he's for them).
- unfocussed_mike 5y agoJust a side note to say that absolutely everyone who claims to suffer from Morgellons Disease, as she at one point did claim, is struggling with significant mental illness and should probably be treated with some kindness on that point. It's not news that Joni Mitchell has had significant mental health challenges in her life. It doesn't make her wrong about the benefits of vaccination. It's not really comparable with Neil Young's GMO position (which I concede is partly unscientific).
- fortran77 5y agoAgreed. How do we know that Joe Rogan doesn't also have significant mental illness?
- Blackstrat 5y agoIt’s hilarious to me to watch the counter-culture heroes of my youth turn into establishment apologists. I suspect it’s the “anything for attention” syndrome.
- CRConrad 5y agoNo, it's the "the counter culture grew up and became the establishment" syndrome. That's how one can seem to have switched camps without changing one's values at all.
- guerrilla 5y agoApparently both are childhood polio survivors.
- Blackstrat 5y agoPerhaps but there is no parallel between the polio and the COVID vaccine. The former reduced the incidence of polio by more than 99% while the latter, well it does not.
- kennywinker 5y agoNo parallel because one is a bit less effective than the other? That’s a weird take
- Blackstrat 5y agoA bit? That’s an understatement of epic proportions
- kennywinker 5y agoAnd exactly how big does the gap need to be before they stop being comparable? We can compare 99% effective vaccines and 98% effective vaccines, surely? so a 1% spread is ok... but a 10% spread and now we're in "no parallel" territory?
- anderber 5y agoMy biggest issue is that Spotify is prioritizing podcasts over music, and I'm not paying them for podcasts. I decided to switch to Tidal as they pay artists a much more fair share and focus on the music.
- kzrdude 5y agoI'm just annoyed that Spotify is showing a podcast UI in the app, even though I'm not interested. Spotify is trying to corner podcasts which is a thriving, free, relatively decentralized ecosystem. (I cancelled my spotify when the 2021 rewind showed how little I use it)
- alar44 5y ago"If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him." Joni and Neil can do whatever they want and I respect that. What bothers me are all of the virtue signalers following them and getting rid of Spotify (or claiming to). You will not be able to consume anything if you actually care about these standards. Everyone is shitty and people are wrong all the time. Good luck finding a blameless company to buy all your stuff from. Not to mention all of the musicians who have no doubt done bad things and made poor choices. If you don't like Joe Rogan, don't listen to him. I don't see why people feel the need to fucking ban Spotify.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- ipaddr 5y agoIn fairness the amount of money these artists are making from spotify and they are retired makes it really easy to drop spotify. Surprised they agreed to join in the first place.
- gnabgib 5y agoSeveral versions of this post already: Joni Mitchell Joining Neil Young in Protest over Spotify (apnews), 11pts, 8 comments[0], 8 hours ago Joni Mitchell joins Neil Young's Spotify protest over anti-vax content (theguardian), 7pts, 5 comments[1], 8 hours ago Joni Mitchell says she will follow Neil Young by removing her music from Spotify (cnn), 46pts, 72 comments[2], 10 hours ago Joni Mitchell wants songs off Spotify in Covid row (bbc) 3pts, 0 comments[3], 18 hours ago Joni Mitchell Says She’s Removing Her Music from Spotify(pitchfork) 1pt, 0 comments[4], 19 hours ago Joni Mitchell pulling music from Spotify in solidarity with Neil Young (thedenverchannel?), 42pts, 84 comments[b], 21 hours ago [0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30128604 [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30128437 [2]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30127232 [3]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30124600 [4]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30124292 [b]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30123710
- CRConrad 5y agoPlease don't indent your footnotes to turn them into "code" font. That makes the links unclickable.
- sp332 5y agoHow to Break up with Spotify, by Violet Blue https://www.patreon.com/posts/how-to-break-up-61760779 https://www.patreon.com/posts/how-to-break-up-61760779 This article explains how to remove your linked apps and devices from Spotify, and transfer your library to a different service.
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- Txoko 5y ago[flagged]
- sacrosancty 5y agoAn ironic detail about the positions they're staking is that one of the pieces of misinformation that Rogan was accused of spreading was speculating about whether covid escaped from a lab where it has been enhanced. Subsequently, the WHO endorsed investigating that possibility. What if it's found to be true? Are they also opposed to talking about true information before it gets approved by their preferred authorities? That's a repressive and anti-science attitude.
- ykevinator2 5y agoYes, we should all be opposed to true information before it gets approved by prefered authorities. This is how religion starts.
- ykevinator2 5y agoBy the way, as scientifically illiterate as Joe Rogan is, Neil young and Joanie Mitchell are not very hard working and really won the lottery, but at least they're not encouraging the disenfranchised to avoid vaccines against disease.
- jimmydddd 5y ago
- CRConrad 5y agoDid the lyrics advocate doing that?
- andy17231 5y agoI wonder if Rogan propagates vaccine misinformation, who prevents government healthcare officials to come to the show and tell his multimillion audience what exactly is wrong?
- kennywinker 5y agoI suppose this is rhetorical, but to answer anyway - joe rogan prevents that. He’s in charge of who he has on as guests. But even if he did, I suspect his ideology is such that scientific knowledge is de-valued over anti-establishment takes, and so nobody would listen to that healthcare expert. Because it’s not like his listeners haven’t heard that vaccines are effective - they just believe him as a source more than they believe any expert
- sixstringninja 5y agoHe has Sanjay Gupta on, a well known doctor that supports vaccination. Even Gupta couldn’t make a firm argument that everyone must get vaxxed, even with the fact checking in real time
- kennywinker 5y agoDid you just move the goalpost? All you need to make a firm argument for is that “getting vaxxed is safe, protects you, and protects others” not “everyone must get vaxxed” - nobody can make that argument - there are too many people unable to get the vaccine for valid medical reasons.
- imartin2k 5y agoSoon Spotify will start to consider doing away with music altogether. It’s kind of funny that mainstream artists withdrawing their music actually improves Spotify’s financial situation (even though ofc what they need are lost of users who pay the monthly fee, but who mostly listen to podcasts - with a reduced music offering, it’s harder for Spotify to justify the current monthly subscription prices).