Week 1: Spotify, Joe Rogan, and Social Responsibility

In reading about socially conscious businesses this week, it seemed appropriate that Spotify and accusations of negligence in their moderation of content, or lack thereof, would crop up. It strikes me as interesting that a company that spends so much time personalizing its service and trying to create that deep, long-lasting connection with its customer base would not publicly take responsibility for their largest content creator. Joe Rogan is notorious for both the amount of misinformation he spreads and the reach that his misinformation has, and in the NYT article linked, Neil Young notes that "Spotify has a responsibility to mitigate the spread of misinformation on its platform." 

Spotify seems to be trying to have their cake and eat it to, their CEO stating that they are not looking to moderate what their creators say whilst their statement earlier in the article stated they had removed over 20,000 podcast episodes related to COVID-19. It's not a good look for the company, showing clear favoritism for their largest creator and a disregard for the safety of the public, as Joe Rogan is spreading falsehoods and encouraging dangerous behavior that by no stretch of the imagination has already put many people in danger, already putting Spotify in a position of not working with their customers' best interests in mind. 

But is it in their best interest to continue letting Joe Rogan run free? Perhaps - he is their largest content creator, and companies are not often willing to spend $100 million that isn't a sure bet. However, the backlash against Joe Rogan is beginning to more directly link back to Spotify, and could lead to losing a significant portion of their customer base and engagement. Not only do they have a responsibility to the public to stem the tide of misinformation, they have a responsibility to themselves to retain the customer base they have cultivated an almost personable relationship with. 

For the past seven or so years, the Spotify Wrapped has been a wonderful day of free advertising for Spotify as hundreds, if not thousands, of people gleefully share their personalized review and link back to Spotify. Discover Weekly playlists are discussed often among Spotify users, and many Spotify customers have no interest in leaving these personalized services behind. I myself have used Spotify's services for nearly ten years. The scrutiny Spotify is facing for this callous disregard for the damage Joe Rogan is doing could be enough to sway the minds and habits of the die-hard Spotify customers and Spotify will have to ask itself: is losing these customers worth it for their top content creator? Will Joe Rogan be enough to replace those customers? Are they willing to take that gamble?