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Joe Rogan’s problems with Spotify are piling up. Up to 42 full episodes of the popular podcast The Joe Rogan Experience have been deleted from the Swedish-American platform.
The Joe Rogan Experience is one of the most highly rated podcasts in the world. Hosted by Joe Rogan, a stand-up comedian, TV host, actor and UFC mixed martial arts commentator, the podcast began streaming on YouTube in 2009, and by 2015 reached numbers in the millions of viewers per episode.
On each show, Joe Rogan chats for two to three hours with one or more guests, who are usually relevant personalities or experts in their field. The range of topics covered is very broad and eclectic, including science, technology, sports, business and politics.
One of the keys to the success and popularity of the program has been the diverse cast of guests, many of them with alternative positions and theories, outside the mainstream or officialism, which has brought him problems with censorship and has earned him to be branded as a conspiracy theorist.
In 2020, Joe Rogan signed a $100 million deal with the Spotify platform, in which he would not only begin to exclusively broadcast his new episodes, but also import all his previous programs.
Joe Rogan not only left YouTube for Spotify, but also left his Los Angeles residence to move to Texas. According to Joe Rogan, his decision was not so much due to the tax advantages of Texas, but rather because he wanted to leave a city he felt was overcrowded, as well as to escape the radical progressive environment in California, which he felt was compromising his freedom of speech.
The contract with Spotify stipulated that the platform would retain the right to delete programs it deemed unsuitable, which Joe Rogan agreed to in his million-dollar deal.
Now, as reported by Digital Music News, Spotify has made use of this clause and deleted up to 42 episodes of The Joe Rogan Experience.
Among the deleted programs are those of guests with anti-left or pro-Republican ideas, such as Gavin McInnes, Alex Jones, Milo Yiannopoulos, Owen Benjamin, and Eddie Bravo.
The programs of comedian Chris D’Elia, who has been accused of trying to seduce underage girls- or those of the creator of the Bulletproof Diet, Dave Asprey, have also been deleted because some consider his high-fat diet to be unscientific.
These are not Joe Rogan’s first problems with Spotify
Shortly after his signing, Joe Rogan had to face a boycott attempt by a large number of employees of the Swedish-American company.
Apparently, the employees of Spotify’s New York branch demanded to have editorial control over the content of The Joe Rogan Experience episodes, demanding to be able to cut segments or delete entire programs that they considered offensive, as well as to be able to put warnings, corrections or fact-checking of the opinions expressed by Joe Rogan and his guests.
This group of employees threatened to go on strike or leave the company en bloc if they were not guaranteed to be able to censor content they considered offensive, especially transphobic content.
To date it is not known what has become of these claims by employees, but the fact that Spotify has deleted these 42 programs from the podcast suggests that the company may be giving in to some of these requests.
We will have to closely follow the development of Joe Rogan’s problems with Spotify, as it is one of the most influential opinion and outreach programs on the planet.
Ignacio Manuel García Medina, Business Management teacher. Artist and lecturer specialized in Popular Culture for various platforms. Presenter of the program "Pop Libertario" for the Juan de Mariana Institute. Lives in the Canary Islands, Spain // Ignacio M. García Medina es profesor de Gestión de Empresas. Es miembro del Instituto Juan de Mariana y conferenciante especializado en Cultura Popular e ideas de la Libertad.
Social Networks: @ignaciomgm
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