The CEO and founder of the world number one, Daniel Ek, announced on Sunday evening January 30 a series of measures, including the introduction of links in all his podcasts evoking the Covid, which will guide his users to factual and scientifically sourced information.
“Based on the feedback we have had over the past few weeks, it has 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,” the Swedish billionaire said in a statement. The measurement should be effective “in the next few days”he promised.
Spotify also made its rules of use public on Sunday, January 30 and affirms “test ways” report more to podcast creators “what is acceptable”without however openly mentioning a sanction or exclusion mechanism.
Enough to calm things down? It was Neil Young who initiated the movement against the Swedish group, asking it to stop hosting the controversial but widely listened to American host Joe Rogan, number one in podcast listening on Spotify last year. The latter, whose contract signed with the Swedish group last year is estimated at 100 million dollars, is accused of having discouraged vaccination among young people and of having pushed for the use of an unauthorized treatment, ivermectin, against the coronavirus.
More than 200 American health professionals had recently sounded the alarm after he had received on his show a doctor much appreciated by anti-vaccines, Robert Malone. Failing to win, Neil Young had put his threat into execution this week. At first, Spotify was content to express its “regret” about the departure of the American-Canadian star, whose gesture was applauded by the boss of the World Health Organization (WHO) Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
Friday, January 28, it was another cult singer with millions of subscribers, the Canadian Joni Mitchell, who announced her withdrawal from the platform. At the same time, on social networks, a movement of unsubscription to Spotify was born. Britain’s Prince Harry and his wife Meghan Markle – who signed an estimated $25 million deal with the platform – said on Sunday they had expressed “their worries” to Spotify on the matter.
Since its spectacular emergence from the rank of Stockholm start-up to that of world leader listed in New York, the Swedish flagship has already been regularly criticized by artists on the amounts it pays them, even if its role in the recovery of the music industry is hailed. By developing with hundreds of millions of dollars in podcasts in recent years, the company of Daniel Ek, 38, also sees its responsibilities as a content host extend beyond music.
The new hit niche puts streaming platforms in the face of new responsibilities on misinformation, like social networks like Facebook. Last year, Daniel Ek judged on an Axios (Re: Cap) podcast that the platform had no editorial responsibility for the content. “We also have rappers (…) who make tens of millions of dollars or more every year on Spotify. And we don’t tell them what to put in their songs”, he argued.
The experts interviewed by AFP recognize that the question of content control is not simple, both from the point of view of editorial freedom and the millions of hours of comments available on a platform. Neil Young, victim when he was a child of a poliomyelitis attack from which he kept the consequences all his life, defended himself from any desire for censorship concerning the Covid-19. “I did it because deep in my heart, I had no other choice,” he wrote.