Spotify founder and current CEO Daniel Ek has published an open letter in response to the criticism of the platform, waged by artists such as Neil Young and Joni Mitchell following Young’s request to have him music. The rub came from Young’s dissatisfaction over podcast host Joe Rogan’s show which has spread misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic and the platform’s apathy towwards its best paid ($100 MM USD) content provider. Ek’s letter does hint at changes to their content policy, it does seem that no content removal is forthcoming. Many other artsits are rumored to be considering pulling their music off the platform, while a wave of fans on social media are bragging about quitting the popular service. It was widely reported at the market close last week that Spotify has hemmoraged losses of up to 25% of its value in 2022 so far, between an estimated 2-4 Billion dollars. Rogan has appologized for the rift to Spotify and says he is a Neil Young fan.
Here is Ek’s open letter with sources.
“You’ve had a lot of questions over the last few days about our platform policies and the lines we have drawn between what is acceptable and what is not. We have had rules in place for many years but admittedly, we haven’t been transparent around the policies that guide our content more broadly. This, in turn, led to questions around their application to serious issues including COVID-19.
Based on the feedback over the last several weeks, it’s become clear to me that we have an obligation to do more to provide balance and access to widely-accepted information from the medical and scientific communities guiding us through this unprecedented time. These issues are incredibly complex. We’ve heard you – especially those from the medical and scientific communities – and are taking the following steps:
Today we are publishing our long-standing Platform Rules. These policies were developed by our internal team in concert with a number of outside experts and are updated regularly to reflect the changing safety landscape. These are rules of the road to guide all of our creators—from those we work with exclusively to those whose work is shared across multiple platforms. You can now find them on our newsroom, and they’ll live permanently on the main Spotify website. They are being localized into various languages to help our users understand how Spotify assesses all content on our platform.
We are working to add a content advisory to any podcast episode that includes a discussion about COVID-19. This advisory will direct listeners to our dedicated COVID-19 Hub, a resource that provides easy access to data-driven facts, up-to-date information as shared by scientists, physicians, academics and public health authorities around the world, as well as links to trusted sources. This new effort to combat misinformation will roll out to countries around the world in the coming days. To our knowledge, this content advisory is the first of its kind by a major podcast platform.
We will also begin testing ways to highlight our Platform Rules in our creator and publisher tools to raise awareness around what’s acceptable and help creators understand their accountability for the content they post on our platform. This is in addition to the terms that creators and publishers agree to governing their use of our services.”
https://open.spotify.com/genre/corona_news_podcasts-page