Recently, Spotify was being criticised for its top-rated podcast “The Joe Rogan Experience” that aired misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines. The podcast apparently suggested that healthy young people don’t need the COVID-19 vaccine. As a sign of protest against comedian Joe Rogan’s podcast, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, and Nils Lofgren had their music removed from the platform. Reportedly, this has led Spotify to lose $4 billion in market value. Hashtags including #DeleteSpotify and #CancelSpotify also trended on social media.
To reduce the spread of misinformation on the platform, Spotify has announced to add “content advisory” to its podcasts that include discussion about COVID-19. This announcement is recently made by Chief Executive Officer Daniel Ek in a company blog. This news comes after the company recently faced backlash for giving voice to misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines. As per the blog, “This new effort to combat misinformation will roll out to countries around the world in the coming days. To our knowledge, this content advisory is the first of its kind by a major podcast platform.”
There’s been a lot of conversation about information regarding COVID-19 on Spotify. We’ve heard the criticism and we’re implementing changes to help combat misinformation. https://t.co/ic8jfR1RNR
— Daniel Ek (@eldsjal) January 30, 2022
According to Spotify, this content advisory will direct the listeners to the COVID-19 Hub that will provide the right information to the listeners. For the unversed, Spotify’s COVID-19 Hub is “a resource that provides easy access to data-driven facts, up-to-date information as shared by scientists, physicians, academics and public health authorities around the world, as well as links to trusted sources.”
The company has also announced the new “Spotify Platform Rules“, which will work as a guidebook for all creators on the platform including the ones whose work is shared across multiple platforms. Spotify explains that these rules are being localised into different languages to help creators understand how Spotify assesses content.
According to the company blog, “We will also begin testing ways to highlight our Platform Rules in our creator and publisher tools to raise awareness around what’s acceptable and help creators understand their accountability for the content they post on our platform.”
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