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Spotify signs ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’ to an exclusive multi-year deal

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Re: Spotify signs ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’ to an exclusive multi-year deal

#221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

YouTube: You can pay your own hosting fees. Namecheap: Your users can find you at your IP address. AWS: You can run your own server hardware. Intel: You can build your own CPU. Electric Co.: You can generate your own electricity. VISA: You can take payments in cash. Hospital: You can use your own butterfly strips and an ibuprofen.

I mean, these are all true. Lots of people chose to avoid particular hosting platforms, components, utility providers and healthcare providers. Do you feel like Jones didn't have his proverbial "day in court"? He's had many, of course, and lost most of them. A basic google search tells me you can buy many books written by Alex Jones on his infowars shop. Even if he was kicked off the DNS system he would be able to ho…

I don't know if he got his "day in court", and I'm not sure he deserved one since these platforms can do what they want on an individual basis.

What is dangerous is a handful of platforms dominating communication and then conspiring to censor the same person all at the same time, which is exactly what happened with Alex Jones.

Though it seems reasonable to tell an undesirable to "find your own X", it's also a sentiment that can be taken too far and could be dangerous when taken to its logical extreme. I don't think most reasonable people believe that platforms shouldn't prevent someone from shouting "fire" in a crowded room, metaphorically speaking, but it shouldn't necessarily follow that the same can be said for anything that people may not like.

I listen to Alex Jones occasionally. I don't listen to him because I believe what he says. I just think he's hilarious and I consider him to be a comedian. I can't say that anything that he says is dangerous, as ill informed or misleading some of it is. (maybe his stance on vaccines) Not everything that Alex Jones says is wrong. He is also often wrong.

That said, depending on where the Overton window lies and the climate of politics, I don't like "find your own X" because it signifies a disdain towards dissidence, and we're not far off from saying "If you disagree with the WHO, go find your own platform." That's scary, but a lot of prominent figures in the media lump in skeptics of the WHO with the likes of Alex Jones, conservatives(i.e. heretics), and anti-vaxxers. When someone says "find your own platform", that is a complete dismissal towards someone and their ideas. Coordinated efforts to expunge people from the public square isn't something to be pleased with, even when Alex Jones is the target.

Once we're told to find our own platforms, and that becomes the norm, there's nothing to stop that precedence from propagating to "find your own website" or "find your own payment processor". When these companies are all in cahoots and basically agree about everything, there's absolutely no guarantee that a company's privilege to ban users stops with people like Alex Jones. You might just do or say the wrong thing with good intention.

There's a reason why we stopped excommunicating people who have committed no crime, and coordinated efforts to censor people is effectively modern day exile. If someone is to be expunged from the public square, the argument should be "they did (insert bad thing)", not simply "they can go elsewhere". Most people who think Alex Jones deserved to be banned don't seem particularly well informed about Alex Jones, other than that he's crazy and that he'd eat his neighbors.

Re: Spotify signs ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’ to an exclusive multi-year deal

#222
post #24
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spotify is free with ads though. So it's more like Joe isn't running his own ad program, but instead letting Spotify run the ads, or provide premium ad-free tier.

Sure, I'd love to have a model where if you don't pay a premium fee, you get the ads as part of the episode. However if you do pay, those ads go away. Although it does question who would pay to put ads in the first place if you can skip them. And people that will pay to skip are ones you want to target. I hope there is a model that can work that makes ads worse off than alternatives as they are cancer.

Spotify runs intentionally annoying and frequent ads for itself, saying they'll go away if you pay them. I pay, it's very cheap for how much I use it.

Re: Spotify signs ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’ to an exclusive multi-year deal

#223
post #170

I agree with JRE leaving YouTube over the censorship but I disagree with him moving exclusively to spotify for following reasons: 1. Spotify was the one who conspired with Facebook, Apple and Google to ban Alex Jones and others. So if Joe is moving off of YouTube because he doesn't like the censorship, he's not getting anything better with Spotify. 2. Currently, Spotify doesn't have video (except album cover clips wh…

Regarding point 1, the article has been updated to reflect that Spotify is holding Rogan to their content policy. This content policy prohibits "Hate Content" [1]. By any mainstream definition that would include Alex Jones and potentially other guests. Some people would even say that applies to Rogan himself for his comments about transgender people. Unless Rogan makes changes to his show or his booking, it is only a…

Most people agree with Rogan that transgender women who have only recently started on female hormones should not hide that status from biologically female opponents in mixed martial arts. It isn't feminist for women's bodies to be brutalized by men's bodies.

Re: Spotify signs ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’ to an exclusive multi-year deal

#224
post #212
post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He can't actually be leaving over censorship because if he was there is no way phrases like "exclusive multi-year" would be thrown around. Once burned twice shy. There might have been some tea-leaf reading involved that YouTube isn't a supportive platform these days but this move is probably linked to obscene amounts of money changing hands.

You have to keep in mind that Joe is a comedian first and foremost. Comedians have had the rug pulled out from under them with COVID-19. He's doing what's right for his family at the moment. I fully expect this to come up in one of his next episodes and since he's up front about this stuff it'll probably be summed up as "Sorry you fucks, a man's gotta eat!"

Rogan makes tens of millions a year with the podcast ad revenue alone. I’ll make an educated guess his family is eating fine.

Re: Spotify signs ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’ to an exclusive multi-year deal

#225
post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Spotify was the one who conspired with Facebook, Apple and Google to ban Alex Jones and others Alex Jones has a right to free speech, but if he's going to claim Sandy Hook was a hoax causing grieving parents to be harassed, nobody owes it to him to give him a platform. He can pay his own hosting fees.

YouTube: You can pay your own hosting fees. Namecheap: Your users can find you at your IP address. AWS: You can run your own server hardware. Intel: You can build your own CPU. Electric Co.: You can generate your own electricity. VISA: You can take payments in cash. Hospital: You can use your own butterfly strips and an ibuprofen.

You forgot Government: You can defend (what you consider to be) your rights/ideas/property with physical force.

Re: Spotify signs ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’ to an exclusive multi-year deal

#226
post #25
post #9

This makes me incredibly sad: not that we are losing Rogan's show, but that Adtech is finally absorbing the last type of media that was truly Free.

Adtech would actually make it free. Arguably this is more like cable / Netflix than adtech

You have to pay for cable / Netflix. Spotify is free (with ads).

Re: Spotify signs ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’ to an exclusive multi-year deal

#227
post #9

This makes me incredibly sad: not that we are losing Rogan's show, but that Adtech is finally absorbing the last type of media that was truly Free.

I'm not sure why you think Youtube is "truly free". They run an enormous amount of advertising. Rogan's show has always been ad supported. Possibly you use an ad-blocker, like I do, and don't see them.

The Joe Rogan Experience is currently available on many different platforms, not just YouTube.

This, however, is an exclusive deal with Spotify, so you will only be able to get it from Spotify going forward. Hence less free.

Re: Spotify signs ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’ to an exclusive multi-year deal

#228
post #212
post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He can't actually be leaving over censorship because if he was there is no way phrases like "exclusive multi-year" would be thrown around. Once burned twice shy. There might have been some tea-leaf reading involved that YouTube isn't a supportive platform these days but this move is probably linked to obscene amounts of money changing hands.

You have to keep in mind that Joe is a comedian first and foremost. Comedians have had the rug pulled out from under them with COVID-19. He's doing what's right for his family at the moment. I fully expect this to come up in one of his next episodes and since he's up front about this stuff it'll probably be summed up as "Sorry you fucks, a man's gotta eat!"

I'm fairly sure he makes a lot more money from having the most popular 'pod in the world than doing a couple of comedy gigs here and there.

Re: Spotify signs ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’ to an exclusive multi-year deal

#229
post #226
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Adtech would actually make it free. Arguably this is more like cable / Netflix than adtech

You have to pay for cable / Netflix. Spotify is free (with ads).

I pay for Spotify and don't get ads, so its not really adtech for me.

Re: Spotify signs ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’ to an exclusive multi-year deal

#230
post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Spotify was the one who conspired with Facebook, Apple and Google to ban Alex Jones and others Alex Jones has a right to free speech, but if he's going to claim Sandy Hook was a hoax causing grieving parents to be harassed, nobody owes it to him to give him a platform. He can pay his own hosting fees.

The “Right to Free Speech” just means the government can’t impede. Nobody is required to give him a platform, though.

What is a government but a corporation that owns land and has a military? Why would you bar the government from impinging on free speech, but give nearly unbounded power to corporations to expand and snuff out free speech? If Google owned nearly everything, should we not be upset when they negate our rights?
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