Earlier this week, Neil Young forced Spotify to pick his catalog or Joe Rogan’s conspiracy-peddling podcast. The streamer made a quick and very predictable choice.
Take a quick scan of your trending tab on Twitter. “Deleted Spotify” and “Bye Spotify” should be somewhere in the mix. And not by chance. The streamer has doubled-down on its resident elk-meat-weed-and-supplement-fueled podcasting superstar, Joe Rogan, with the swift removal of Neil Young‘s catalog from their platform. It wasn’t a random eviction. In fact, the folk-rock legend demanded it.

In a since-deleted note to his management team and label (Reprise Records via Warner Music) posted to his website, Young cited an open letter to Spotify from hundreds of doctors, scientists, and medical professionals who called on the streamer to either enact a protocol for COVID-19 and vaccine conspiracies being openly peddled by Rogan on his podcast or simply be clear about what those protocols actually are. “I am doing this because Spotify is spreading fake information about vaccines — potentially causing death to those who believe the disinformation being spread by them,” Young wrote in his original post. In response to the ultimatum posed by Young, Spotify made a quick and predictable choice to back Rogan, the pillar of their massive investment into podcasting in recent years.

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