Breaking News

Joni Mitchell removes music from Spotify in protest of Joe Rogan's podcast

Joni Mitchell removes music from Spotify in protest of Joe Rogan's podcast




Joni Mitchell has decided to remove all of her music from Spotify, joining Neil Young in protesting Rogan's podcast, Joe Young says, about COVID-19 vaccines (via The Wall Street Journal) spreads false information about

"I have decided to remove all my music from Spotify," the Canadian singer-songwriter writes in a post on her website. “Irresponsible people are spreading lies which are costing lives. I stand with Neil Young and the global scientific and medical communities on this issue."

Mitchell also includes a link to an open letter to Spotify, which was signed by dozens of medical and scientific professionals in mid-January. It urges the forum to establish a misinformation policy to address the "misleading and false claims" promoted by the Rogan Experience, such as Rogan's suggestion that healthy youth should not get vaccinated against COVID-19.

Earlier this week, Young gave Spotify an ultimatum: Keep his music or Rogan's podcast. Spotify sided with Rogan, and in line with Young's wishes, the platform pulled all of his music. Young later said he "felt better" after deleting his music, and then criticized Spotify for failing to offer lossless audio, an option that both Amazon and Apple Music offer. Apple is also using Young's departure from Spotify as an opportunity to take several digs at its rival, even going so far as to label Apple Music as "the home of Neil Young". .

In 2020, Spotify made the Joe Rogan Experience an exclusive to the platform, and it has since come under fire for Rogan's potentially misleading comments about COVID-19 and its vaccines. As it stands, it appears that Spotify's content policies prevent the platform from doing anything about Rogan's podcasts. In internal guidelines seen by The Verge, its policies allow podcasters to state that COVID-19 vaccines can cause death, but not that they are "designed" to cause death. Screenshots from an internal message seen by The Verge show that Spotify has reviewed several controversial episodes of The Joe Rogan Experience, and none "meet the threshold for removal."

The Verge reached out to Spotify with a request for comment, but did not immediately hear back.

1 comment: