Joni Mitchell was one of the first to take action, and writing “Irresponsible people are spreading lies that are costing people their lives” in her official statement. However, it does present a step in the right direction of Spotify siding with artists by removing inappropriate and offensive language from the platform, something many cited as a primary reason for leaving.Īfter Spotify doubled down on their defense of Rogan, Young’s actions have been followed by other prominent artists. 5 All but one of the now-deleted episodes were recorded prior to the Covid-19 pandemic and therefore remain unrelated to the issue of misinformation that sparked this controversy. The two agreed, resulting in the removal of 113 episodes from the platform. After the retaliation by artists on the platform, Spotify CEO Daniel Ek spoke with Rogan. Their deal entails that Rogan maintains creative liberty over his show, but that is not to say that Spotify cannot disapprove of it. With millions of dollars on the line and a contract to uphold, Spotify has to be extremely careful with handling Rogan’s content. With approximately 11 million listeners per episode and three to five episodes per week, The Joe Rogan Experience is likely the “exclusive licensing deal” Spotify credits their significant ad revenue too. This increase has been credited to the fact that “podcast revenue benefited from strong growth across existing Spotify studios and our exclusive licensing deals.” 3 Following Spotify’s recent podcast acquisitions, the company raised their Cost Per Thousand Listeners (CPM) to advertise on Spotify-exclusive shows to upwards of $60. Apart from an increase in users, Spotify cites that their “Ad-Supported Revenue reached a record 15% of total revenues,” marking the first time that ad-revenue has exceeded one billion dollars in a single year for the company. In their 2021 Q4 report, Spotify boasted an 18% increase in Active Monthly Users (AMU), with Premium Subscribers increasing by 16%. With no negative impact on their bottom line so far, Spotify seemingly has no reason to re-evaluate its stance on Rogan’s podcast. Money aside, Spotify also has the numbers to reason that the rising concern over the “infodemic” Rogan perpetuates has never deterred users from the site. From the numbers alone, Spotify clearly would have suffered a much more significant financial loss if they sided with Young, considering podcast ads becoming an essential source of revenue. 2 On the other hand, Neil Young regularly accumulated around six million monthly listeners, not even breaking into the most significant 500 artists on their service. Not to mention Spotify and Rogan’s $100 million deal to have all of his episodes exclusively streamed on their platform. In its first month alone, the show accounted for 4.5% of all Spotify podcast listening or 14.9 million hours. The Joe Rogan Experience has been on Spotify since September of 2020, with over 11 seasons worth of content. With each artist making statements about issues they take with the company, what started as a fight against misinformation quickly became a much larger exposé of Spotify’s ethics and dominance over the streaming industry. In the days that followed, many other artists, including Joni Mitchell, Nils Lofgren, and India.Arie, followed Young’s lead and planned to remove their catalogs from the platform. Not both.” 1 The ultimatum posed to the streaming service became a call to action for artists everywhere. On January 24, Neil Young penned a letter to his label and manager regarding the spread of misinformation regarding Covid-19 perpetuated by America’s number one podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience on Spotify. A guest post by Vincent Williamsof Berklee College of Music: Music Business Journal.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |