The Swedish streaming audio platform saw the artists Neil Young and Joni Mitchell remove their music to protest against the diffusion of a controversial podcast on the CVIV-19.
Le Monde with AFP
Accused of allowing the free field to misinformation on COVID-19 in its podcasts, the Swedish giant Audio Streaming Spotify has announced measures, Sunday, January 30, to try to respond to the increasing controversy led by the US legend -Canadian of Folk Rock Neil Young.
The CEO and founder of the world number one, Daniel EK, announced in the evening a series of measures, including the introduction of links in all its podcasts evoking CVIV-19, which will guide its users to factual information and scientifically sourced. An effective measure “in the coming days,” he promised.
“On the basis of the returns we have since in recent weeks, it has become clear to me that we had an obligation to do more to provide balance and give access to widely accepted information from medical and scientific communities “,” said the Swedish billionaire in a statement.
Spotify has also made public, Sunday, its rules of use and affirms “testing ways” to further report to podcast creators “which is acceptable”, without however an openly mentioning sanctioning or exclusion mechanism.
“Lies sold against money”
Will these measurements be sufficient to calm the game? Neil Young had initiated the movement against the Swedish group, asking him to stop hosting the controversial but very listened to American animator Joe Rogan, number one of the podcasts on Spotify in 2021. The latter, whose contract signed with the group. Swedish last year is estimated at $ 100 million (€ 90 million) is accused of discouraged vaccination among youth and pushing to the use of unauthorized treatment, ivermectin, against coronavirus. More than 200 American health professionals had recently shot the alarm after he had received a highly appreciated doctor from the Anti-Vaccines, Robert Malone.
Failure to get saving, Neil Young had put his threat to execution this week. At first, Spotify was content to express its “regrets” about the departure of the American-Canadian star, whose gesture was applauded by the boss of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
“Spotify has become a potentially deadly misinformation place on COVID. Lies sold against money,” had accused Neil Young. The controversy continued to grow: Friday, it is another cult singer to millions of subscribers, the Canadian Joni Mitchell, who had announced his withdrawal of the platform.
Movement unsubscribe on social networks
In parallel, on social networks, was born a troubleshooting movement at Spotify. The British Prince Harry and his wife Meghan Markle – who signed with the platform an agreement estimated at $ 25 million – said Sunday that they had expressed “their concerns” to Spotify on the question.
Since its spectacular emergence of Start-up Stockholmoise to the world leader listed in New York, the Swedish flagship has already been regularly criticized by the artists on the amounts they pay for them, even if his role in the Recovery of the musical industry is greeted. By developing hundreds of millions of dollars in podcasts in recent years, the company in Daniel EK, 38, also sees its responsibilities of content hosting extend beyond music.
The new successful niche puts the streaming platforms in the face of new responsibilities on misinformation, like social networks like Facebook. Last year, Daniel EK had tried on a podcast of the Axios (Re: Cape) site that the platform did not have an editorial responsibility for the content. “We also have rappers (…) who do tens of millions of dollars, even more, every year on Spotify. And we do not tell them what they must put in their songs,” he said.