In 2001, Joe Rogan began hosting the hit cable show \u00ab\u00a0Fear Factor\u00a0\u00bb alongside contestants eating cockroaches and confronting their arachnophobia.
\nTwenty-one years later, Rogan \u2026<\/b>
\nIn 2001, Joe Rogan began hosting the hit cable show \u00ab\u00a0Fear Factor\u00a0\u00bb alongside contestants eating cockroaches and confronting their arachnophobia. Twenty-one years later, Rogan is at the center of controversy over the false information on his wildly popular podcast \u00ab\u00a0The Joe Rogan Experience.\u00a0\u00bb The podcast’s exclusive home on Spotify has drawn the music streaming platform into a years-long struggle to balance freedom of speech and content moderation on the internet. In the process, the comedian and former reality show host has emerged as a central figure in the cultural and political clash. Spotify paid a reported $100 million for the rights to \u00ab\u00a0The Joe Rogan Experience\u00a0\u00bb in May 2020, a move that put it up against Apple and Google in the podcasting race. Rogan, whose show was already immensely popular, quickly became an even more controversial figure \u2014 and presented Spotify with one of its first major moderation challenges. Rogan has lauded the horse drug ivermectin \u2014 which is disproven as an effective medicine against the disease \u2014 as a COVID-19 cure, said Americans were \u00ab\u00a0hypnotized\u00a0\u00bb into wearing masks, and has advised young, healthy people that they don’t need to get vaccinated against COVID-19 (while claiming to be pro-vaccine.) In response to criticism, he said on his podcast: \u00ab\u00a0I’m not a doctor \u2014 I’m a fucking moron. I’m not a respected source of information.\u00a0\u00bb Respected or not, an estimated 11 million listeners tune in to each of his episodes on Spotify, and his show was the site’s most popular podcast of 2021 globally. Supporters of his show laud him for what they say is his openness and willingness to discuss controversial topics. His critics \u2014 which now include Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, Neil Young, and hordes of scientists \u2014 lambast him for giving a megaphone to guests that spout misleading comments about the COVID-19 pandemic, sexual harassment, conspiracies, and other topics without providing fact-checks or rebuttal. Songwriter Neil Young gave Spotify an ultimatum last week: stand up to misinformation and stop airing Rogan’s show or take his music down. \u00ab\u00a0I am doing this because Spotify is spreading fake information about vaccines \u2013 potentially causing death to those who believe the disinformation being spread by them,\u00a0\u00bb Young wrote. \u00ab\u00a0They can have Rogan or Young. Not both.\u00a0\u00bb CEO Daniel Ek and his company, which has always stood behind Rogan \u2014 much to some employees chagrin \u2014 sided with the podcaster. The Verge reported Friday that a Spotify exec concluded Rogan’s material \u00ab\u00a0didn’t meet the threshold for removal.\u00a0\u00bb Young’s music is no longer discoverable on Spotify \u2014 he tweeted to his followers last week that they can find his discography on Amazon Music. Fellow artists Joni Mitchell and Nils Lofgren are following suit. Other musicians, some of whom don’t have the right to remove their music because of recording label deals, are changing their profile pictures to read \u00ab\u00a0Delete Spotify.\u00a0\u00bb For Rogan’s part, he responded Sunday by apologizing and promising to make his show more balanced. In a video message, he said he would \u00ab\u00a0try harder to get people with differing opinions\u00a0\u00bb on his show and would \u00ab\u00a0do my best to make sure I have researched these topics, the controversial ones in particular, and have all the pertinent facts at hand before I discuss them.\u00a0\u00bb Going forward, Spotify said Sunday that it believes in welcoming a diverse array of voices and perspectives, which means \u00ab\u00a0some content on our platform may not be to each individual’s liking or is content that Spotify endorses.\u00a0\u00bb It did, however, advise creators to avoid promoting false and deceptive medical information that could cause offline harm. \u00ab\u00a0Breaking the rules may result in the violative content being removed from Spotify,\u00a0\u00bb it said. \u00ab\u00a0Repeated or egregious violations may result in accounts being suspended and\/or terminated.\u00a0\u00bb The fallout has reignited the conversation about the delineation of platform versus publisher: does the streaming company merely license and air musicians’ work? Or is it tasked with moderating podcasts to which it holds exclusive rights? It’s a debate that has also ensnarled sites from Facebook and Twitter, to Youtube and Reddit and more. \u00ab\u00a0Spotify is leaning directly into the comparisons to Facebook and YouTube; it lets them run the ‘content moderation is an impossible challenge’ playbook instead of the ‘we bought and distribute this media property’ playbook,\u00a0\u00bb Nilay Patel, the editor of The Verge, said on Twitter recently. \u00ab\u00a0This is like HBO responding to criticisms about drug use on Euphoria by saying content moderation at scale is a difficult problem.\u00a0\u00bb Keep reading<\/p>\n