Final week, Neil Younger issued an ultimatum to Spotify after rising annoyed with podcast king Joe Rogan spreading COVID misinformation on the platform. “They'll have Rogan or Younger,” he declared. “Not each.”
Spotify selected Rogan; a firestorm ensued. Joni Mitchell and another musicians ditched the service, whereas writer Brené Brown paused her Spotify-exclusive podcast. Meghan Markle and Prince Harry, who've an enormous Spotify deal, voiced “considerations.” The corporate’s inventory has shed billions in worth over the previous week, prompting founder Daniel Ek to reply Sunday by publishing a set of platform guidelines and promising so as to add content material advisories.
However the message was clear: whether or not to defend free speech or safe income, Spotify was standing by Rogan. And somearequestioning whether or not the episode is about to set off a mass exodus of musicians, maybe sufficient to hazard Spotify’s enviable place atop the streaming heap.
It received’t, and right here’s why.
To start, as admirable because it was for Younger to place rules forward of income, he’s risking lower than lots of his friends could be. The “Coronary heart of Gold” singer has by no means actually wanted Spotify, incomes simply 10% of his earnings from the service.
Younger stood to realize even much less from Spotify after promoting half of his music catalog en path to a career-best $78 million in earnings final 12 months (rating him No. 11 on my checklist of the world’s highest-paid musicians). Merck Mercuriadis, the man who purchased Younger’s copyrights, is standing by him. So is Warner Music Group, house to his information.
Most different musicians are nonetheless hurting from the shortage of touring alternatives amid the pandemic — which, mockingly, would virtually definitely be over sooner with out misinformation unfold by the Rogans of the world. For these musicians, it’s exhausting to surrender one of many few remaining sources of earnings. That’s very true for the acts with youthful followings, whom Spotify could be extra stung by dropping. Younger’s viewers of lefty Boomers isn't a key demographic for the streaming enterprise.
Spotify doesn’t want Younger, however it does want Rogan. The corporate reportedly paid greater than $100 million to deliver him aboard; on the time, Rogan claimed he was clocking 190 million downloads a month. He’s the centerpiece of Spotify’s years-long push to turn into the Netflix of audio.
Not like recorded music, which is encumbered by a byzantine morass of agreements amongst singers, songwriters, producers, document labels and copyright holders, podcasts are typically less complicated and extra worthwhile. Normally, massive names get a flat payment and that’s that — no pesky royalties to pay out, no renegotiations. The episodes can dwell on a platform in perpetuity and are fairly common with advertisers, producing $1 billion and counting in U.S. advert income yearly.
Lastly, and maybe most critically, Spotify doesn’t wish to slide down the slippery slope of booting Rogan and his ilk when there are such a lot of others who're equally problematic. Like so many different main platforms (together with Substack, the place I write), the corporate defends its occasion line with a concentrate on defending free speech. However the complexity and value of moderating content material can’t be overstated. To take accountability for content material would reduce deeply into income, most likely driving many platforms out of enterprise.
Musicians face the same slippery slope. Upon leaving Spotify over COVID misinformation considerations, they’d should confront one other actuality: The social networks that drive a lot of their publicity are additionally havens for pandemic misinformation.
Is there a tipping level for Spotify, a crucial mass of artists whose objections would make the corporate severely think about dumping Rogan? Nicely, we is likely to be having a distinct dialog if we have been speaking Drake and Taylor Swift — each of whom boast greater than 50 million month-to-month listeners — as an alternative of Younger and Mitchell, who generate a fraction of the spins.
Maybe much more disruptive could be a complete document label pulling its roster, a transfer that will endanger Spotify’s core proposition of providing a virtually limitless buffet of music to subscribers.
But it surely’s very tough to think about both of these situations unfolding, due to the monetary implications.
By far the most probably end result: Spotify takes successful within the brief time period however retains its perch atop the streaming heap. For Younger, the episode burnishes an already golden legacy of standing up for what’s proper, irrespective of the price.
Sounds proper on model for each.
Zack O’Malley Greenburg, writer of the Jay-Z biography “Empire State of Thoughts” and previously senior editor of media and leisure at Forbes, writes about the enterprise of music on Substack.
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