5 ms·

I don't disagree with you, but legally purchasing the intellectual property rights to a work, and the proceeding to hide it from the public is still censorship

by branon 5y ago

I don't disagree with you, but legally purchasing the intellectual property rights to a work, and the proceeding to hide it from the public is still censorship in my book. It might not be quite as wrong or bad as, say, state-sponsored blanket censorship, but I think we should call it what it is. A work was available and now it's not. The only reason being that an entity decided that it should be removed from view. Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information[0]. Here, information has been suppressed, thus, censored. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship

spac 5y ago
How do you call the opposite phenomenon in which a company is forced to continue engaging in money-losing activities because of interests external to the company (in this case, the interest in not making Joe Rogan episodes unavailable)?
- kolbe 5y ago
  I find it hard to believe this is a net gain to Spotify in the long run. It may well have been legal, but Rogan signed on as exclusive to Spotify with the understanding that they would be a platform for him and allow him to further extend his brand and reach his followers. Spotify is still in the early stages of their plan to curate and improve advertising in the podcast space, and their plan is to sign exclusives, forcing listeners onto their platform where the free tier can now have targeted ads as opposed to traditional podcasting with traditional media style ads. Now anyone who receives an offer like this from Spotify will have to consider the possibility of having their brand censored. This will either drive up the cost to Spotify or simply make content providers refuse all together. So, unless Spotify has decided to quit this business plan, I don’t think this is a good long-term solution. I do think what happened is Spotify saw its DAUs and subscribers dipping, and after the bloodbath in $FB stock last week, got freaked out and abandoned a long-term business plan to prevent a dip in users this quarter.
- christophilus 5y ago
  I’m not sure what you’d call that. But standing up to an angry mob is called “spine”— something Spotify seems to lack. The only JR podcast I listened to was the Bernie Sanders one; I have no dog in this fight. But I do dislike it when a bunch of angry folks silence someone. I saw it all the time as a kid when Newt and the evangelical right were in power. Today, the same abhorrent behavior is coming from the other side of the aisle. It’s all the same to me; moralizing do-gooders who can’t just leave other folks alone.
- computerfriend 5y ago
  Its called "compelled speech".
- SpicyLemonZest 5y ago
  I don’t think anyone here is arguing they should be forced to keep these episodes up. I just think that they should voluntarily want to do so, and that it’s bad we have a cultural climate where letting people hear contrarian political views is a financial risk in the first place.
vanusa 5y ago
I don't disagree with you, Uh, plainly you do. The commenter's main point was that what the broadcaster did was not censorship (and whoever calls it that "need a reality check"). You're saying it "still is in my book". What much more different can the two of you be on this issue? Part of the reason for the disconnect here probably lies in the fact that the definition given in the WP is overly broad and vague. The way the term is usually used, it strongly suggests some outside party, typically an authoritative body like a government, intervening to say "you cannot publish this". Basically, there needs to be some element of outside coercion for the term "censorship", or even "self-censorship" to apply. And no -- the weight of public opinion does not constitute "coercion" in this context. That's why when a company wakes up and realizes "gee, it turns out publishing endless amounts inflammatory crap that does not contribute to discourse and with essentially no artistic value is actually not so good for our overall image and business model" -- that's not what the term "censorship" was is really meant for.
- branon 5y ago
  My disagreement is purely semantic in nature. I disagree that we can't or shouldn't use the word "censorship" to describe Spotify's actions. The other parts of the parent comment; free market, free will, all parties within their rights, etc, that I'm all fine with. I just think we need to be able to say hey, this is censorship, and it's not necessarily wrong because of XYZ reasons and it's fine and above-board. Spotify's got the rights to the show and nobody can or should be able to compel them to broadcast something they don't want to. However, pointing to a nebulous category of "proper censorship" (which sounds like pretty much exactly the same thing, just perpetrated by a state actor instead of a private corp) as a way to invalidate the use of the word "censorship" in this context seems dishonest. Not to mention that it strikes me as odd to refer to some instances of censorship as "proper" compared to others. Let's go along with the "proper censorship" narrative and put on the tinfoil hat for a moment. It would be easy for a sufficiently motivated state actor to create or compel a private company to acquire the rights to works that they want censored, and then simply use the private entity as a front to carry out the censorship on the government's behalf. I'm not implying that's happening here, but we need to recognize that mostly anything is possible. If I'm entirely unable to access a work today that was freely available yesterday, it has been censored. The devil's in the details, but the semantics and results here are very clear.
runarberg 5y ago
I think this is nuanced. I can see your point if an artist is forced sell their art through an unfavorable marketplace. However in this case that probably doesn’t apply. Joe Rogan has a big enough of a platform on his own that he can probably get by just fine without selling the rights to his show at all. The fact that he did despite that makes this slightly less nuanced.

by branon 5y ago

spac 5y ago

How do you call the opposite phenomenon in which a company is forced to continue engaging in money-losing activities because of interests external to the company (in this case, the interest in not making Joe Rogan episodes unavailable)?

kolbe 5y ago
I find it hard to believe this is a net gain to Spotify in the long run. It may well have been legal, but Rogan signed on as exclusive to Spotify with the understanding that they would be a platform for him and allow him to further extend his brand and reach his followers. Spotify is still in the early stages of their plan to curate and improve advertising in the podcast space, and their plan is to sign exclusives, forcing listeners onto their platform where the free tier can now have targeted ads as opposed to traditional podcasting with traditional media style ads. Now anyone who receives an offer like this from Spotify will have to consider the possibility of having their brand censored. This will either drive up the cost to Spotify or simply make content providers refuse all together. So, unless Spotify has decided to quit this business plan, I don’t think this is a good long-term solution. I do think what happened is Spotify saw its DAUs and subscribers dipping, and after the bloodbath in $FB stock last week, got freaked out and abandoned a long-term business plan to prevent a dip in users this quarter.
christophilus 5y ago
I’m not sure what you’d call that. But standing up to an angry mob is called “spine”— something Spotify seems to lack. The only JR podcast I listened to was the Bernie Sanders one; I have no dog in this fight. But I do dislike it when a bunch of angry folks silence someone. I saw it all the time as a kid when Newt and the evangelical right were in power. Today, the same abhorrent behavior is coming from the other side of the aisle. It’s all the same to me; moralizing do-gooders who can’t just leave other folks alone.
computerfriend 5y ago
Its called "compelled speech".
SpicyLemonZest 5y ago
I don’t think anyone here is arguing they should be forced to keep these episodes up. I just think that they should voluntarily want to do so, and that it’s bad we have a cultural climate where letting people hear contrarian political views is a financial risk in the first place.

vanusa 5y ago

I don't disagree with you, Uh, plainly you do. The commenter's main point was that what the broadcaster did was not censorship (and whoever calls it that "need a reality check"). You're saying it "still is in my book". What much more different can the two of you be on this issue? Part of the reason for the disconnect here probably lies in the fact that the definition given in the WP is overly broad and vague. The way the term is usually used, it strongly suggests some outside party, typically an authoritative body like a government, intervening to say "you cannot publish this". Basically, there needs to be some element of outside coercion for the term "censorship", or even "self-censorship" to apply. And no -- the weight of public opinion does not constitute "coercion" in this context. That's why when a company wakes up and realizes "gee, it turns out publishing endless amounts inflammatory crap that does not contribute to discourse and with essentially no artistic value is actually not so good for our overall image and business model" -- that's not what the term "censorship" was is really meant for.

branon 5y ago
My disagreement is purely semantic in nature. I disagree that we can't or shouldn't use the word "censorship" to describe Spotify's actions. The other parts of the parent comment; free market, free will, all parties within their rights, etc, that I'm all fine with. I just think we need to be able to say hey, this is censorship, and it's not necessarily wrong because of XYZ reasons and it's fine and above-board. Spotify's got the rights to the show and nobody can or should be able to compel them to broadcast something they don't want to. However, pointing to a nebulous category of "proper censorship" (which sounds like pretty much exactly the same thing, just perpetrated by a state actor instead of a private corp) as a way to invalidate the use of the word "censorship" in this context seems dishonest. Not to mention that it strikes me as odd to refer to some instances of censorship as "proper" compared to others. Let's go along with the "proper censorship" narrative and put on the tinfoil hat for a moment. It would be easy for a sufficiently motivated state actor to create or compel a private company to acquire the rights to works that they want censored, and then simply use the private entity as a front to carry out the censorship on the government's behalf. I'm not implying that's happening here, but we need to recognize that mostly anything is possible. If I'm entirely unable to access a work today that was freely available yesterday, it has been censored. The devil's in the details, but the semantics and results here are very clear.

runarberg 5y ago

I think this is nuanced. I can see your point if an artist is forced sell their art through an unfavorable marketplace. However in this case that probably doesn’t apply. Joe Rogan has a big enough of a platform on his own that he can probably get by just fine without selling the rights to his show at all. The fact that he did despite that makes this slightly less nuanced.