[The Hill] Spotify sides with Joe Rogan after Neil Young ultimatum

lol

 

I didn’t get the impression that Young thought he’d be chosen over Rogan by Spotify. He made a statement to make it clear that Spotify can’t stream his music while they are giving Rogan a platform, which to me amounted to a demand that they stop streaming his stuff since their deal with Rogan is way too lucrative. He got what he wanted, and that’s that.

I haven’t listened to Rogan since he left YouTube. What is this misinformation he’s being accused of?

 

https://spotifyopenletter.wordpress.com/2022/01/10/an-open-letter-to-spotify/

An Open Letter to Spotify: A call from the global scientific and medical communities to implement a misinformation policy

On Dec. 31, 2021, the Joe Rogan Experience (JRE), a Spotify-exclusive podcast, uploaded a highly controversial episode featuring guest Dr. Robert Malone (#1757). The episode has been criticized for promoting baseless conspiracy theories and the JRE has a concerning history of broadcasting misinformation, particularly regarding the COVID-19 pandemic. By allowing the propagation of false and societally harmful assertions, Spotify is enabling its hosted media to damage public trust in scientific research and sow doubt in the credibility of data-driven guidance offered by medical professionals. JRE #1757 is not the only transgression to occur on the Spotify platform, but a relevant example of the platform’s failure to mitigate the damage it is causing.

We are a coalition of scientists, medical professionals, professors, and science communicators spanning a wide range of fields such as microbiology, immunology, epidemiology, and neuroscience and we are calling on Spotify to take action against the mass-misinformation events which continue to occur on its platform. With an estimated 11 million listeners per episode, JRE is the world’s largest podcast and has tremendous influence. Though Spotify has a responsibility to mitigate the spread of misinformation on its platform, the company presently has no misinformation policy.

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Joe Rogan has repeatedly spread misleading and false claims on his podcast, provoking distrust in science and medicine. He has discouraged vaccination in young people and children, incorrectly claimed that mRNA vaccines are “gene therapy,” promoted off-label use of ivermectin to treat COVID-19 (contrary to FDA warnings), and spread a number of unsubstantiated conspiracy theories. In episode #1757, Rogan hosted Dr. Robert Malone, who was suspended from Twitter for spreading misinformation about COVID-19. Dr. Malone used the JRE platform to further promote numerous baseless claims, including several falsehoods about COVID-19 vaccines and an unfounded theory that societal leaders have “hypnotized” the public. Many of these statements have already been discredited. Notably, Dr. Malone is one of two recent JRE guests who has compared pandemic policies to the Holocaust. These actions are not only objectionable and offensive, but also medically and culturally dangerous.

The average age of JRE listeners is 24 years old and according to data from Washington State, unvaccinated 12-34 year olds are 12 times more likely to be hospitalized with COVID than those who are fully vaccinated. Dr. Malone’s interview has reached many tens of millions of listeners vulnerable to predatory medical misinformation. Mass-misinformation events of this scale have extraordinarily dangerous ramifications. As scientists, we face backlash and resistance as the public grows to distrust our research and expertise. As educators and science communicators, we are tasked with repairing the public’s damaged understanding of science and medicine. As physicians, we bear the arduous weight of a pandemic that has stretched our medical systems to their limits and only stands to be exacerbated by the anti-vaccination sentiment woven into this and other episodes of Rogan’s podcast.

This is not only a scientific or medical concern; it is a sociological issue of devastating proportions and Spotify is responsible for allowing this activity to thrive on its platform. We, the undersigned doctors, nurses, scientists, and educators thus call on Spotify to immediately establish a clear and public policy to moderate misinformation on its platform.

Signed,

270 medical experts

 

Jealousy that more people listen to Rohan than CNN and Fox together
Legacy media is desperate

 

I'm guessing there might be more to this. Several artists have criticized Spotify's system of paying artist. I fully believe Neil Young is genuine in his belief that Spotify shouldn't be giving a platform for Rogan but he also might feel that Spotify isn't helping his career anyway.

 

only when it comes to killing his friends.

 

The examples cited in the letter don’t seem very egregious, honestly. Saying that young healthy people don’t really need to get vaccinated isn’t misinformation. It’s an opinion — which may be a bad one. Him referring to mRNA as “gene therapy” is a misnomer, but he does immediately follow that with detail that seems more or less accurate (tricking your body into creating spike protein). This academic page on gene therapies actually lists mRNA therapy: https://hsci.harvard.edu/translation/what-are-drugs-4-gene-therapies

As for the guest he had in his show, I can’t assess the specific falsehoods he made on air since the link goes straight to Instagram (weird) which I don’t use.

 

Good for Neil, and I hope other artists follow his lead. But, let's be honest, Neil doesn't need Spotify.

 

This is my favorite description of Spotify from maybe the greatest band of all time:

I am kind of surprised that Spotify has managed to survive though given Amazon prime. I'm guessing podcasts are a big reason why, and the top podcasts streamed everyday are of course Joe Rogan and Ben Shapiro. Meanwhile everyone else not-obsessed with right wing politics enjoys living their life listening to good music and watching Yellowstone at night instead of Hannity and Tucker after listening to Rogan and Shapiro all day.

 

Is it me or are right wingers more prone to getting their information from memes, podcasts, YouTube videos etc while the left is more prone to get their information from reading?
Is this a trend that is just in my head?

These are very broad generalizations. I understand that. But I think there is something to it. Right wingers tend to dispise the "reading heavy" social science fields in college. Leftists are more likely to actually go through that type of education therefore it's more common for a leftist relative to a right winger to have more patience absorbing long form nuanced articles.

 

Statistically speaking liberals are more likely to have gone to college which means they likely are more critical thinkers. Taking Joe Rogan as an expert and mentor on everything from medical science to sexual proclivity is way more likely from people who take things at face value based on quick emotional spikes rather than exercising those memory muscles of processing new information through that critical thinking checklist. Namely motive and credibility of the messenger.

The most obvious example is Alex Jones. A liberal is way more likely to contextualize his conspiracies alongside his segment that comes right after to sell me some herbal testosterone shake. If someone like my crazy Uncle listens to Alex Jones, he gets hung up on that end of the world prophecy linked to Hillary Clinton in the last segment, and that emotional need to scratch that itch will drown out the segment in between where he's selling me snake oil. I've seen it firsthand many times where this amazing compartmentalization of information takes place when you talk about some topic that is driven from the right wing nonsense he consumes. He can just totally swat away really big pieces of the story of the messenger like it doesn't matter.

With Liberals the best example of how we handle this is Bill Clinton. We'll never just wipe away Monica Lewinsky or Paula Jones. We want to discuss him in full context and it's always a conversation where the Emotional side of what Right Wingers want to discuss is all they want to discuss, and it does override his credibility in our minds to give him full due for the good things as well. Had Clinton been a Republican right winger, you know damn well the right would have him on FoxNews every night, and he'd be a superhero to them.

I think liberals enjoy things on Youtube and Podcasts too. There are plenty of quality left leaning podcasts and Youtube channels. I can't tell you why the right is more dedicated to listening and watching their propaganda than the rest of the country is, but my guess is at a very basic level, they are more prone to get hung up on the emotions of the moment and a higher level of critical thinking would trigger your brain to say.... "Holy crap... I need to go spend time with my kid, and then watch Yellowstone with my wife."

Speaking of which... I need to go make a call for work lol.

 

The links in the letter works for me... weird.

Yes, agree that is an opinion. A bad one.

Please re-read that gene therapies link carefully. It said what gene therapy is and what mRNA is. This is not a misnomer. mRNA vaccine is absolutely not modifying your gene or DNA. It's instruction for your cell to create covid spike protein prompting your immune system to response. It does not enter cell's nucleus that houses your DNA genome. These mRNA also die out rapidly and don't hang around. Gene therapy, on the other hand, involves making deliberate changes to cell's DNA that can persist for years if not forever. What makes this so egregious is the guest is an expert in this field so I wouldn't call this misinformation but disinformation.


About mRNA | Moderna, Inc. (modernatx.com)

How does mRNA differ from gene therapy?

Helping the body make its own medicine using mRNA sounds like it might be similar to gene therapy or gene editing. While these treatment approaches seek to treat disease through genetic information, they take fundamentally different approaches. Gene therapy and gene editing alter the original genetic information each cell carries. The goal is to produce a permanent fix to the underlying genetic problem by changing the defective gene. Moderna is taking a different approach to address the underlying cause of MMA and other diseases. mRNA transfers the instructions stored in DNA to make the proteins required in every living cell. Our approach aims to help the body make its own missing or defective protein. Unlike gene editing and gene therapy, mRNA technology does not change the genetic information of the cell, and is intended to be short-acting. It acts like traditional drugs that can be adjusted over time based on the dose and frequency needed. In simple terms, we are working to provide physicians and patients with a “controllable” way to start and manage their therapy over time

 

I thought the quote about mRNA vaccines being a gene therapy came from Rogan, and that perhaps "gene therapy" can be understood in a strict sense where it's actually modifying genes in your cell's DNA, or in a looser sense where it covers things like mRNA therapies that use manipulated genetic material to instruct the cell to do something.

Fact Check-mRNA vaccines are distinct from gene therapy, which alters recipient’s genes | Reuters

“As mRNA is genetic material, mRNA vaccines can be looked at as a genetic-based therapy, but they are classified as vaccines and are not designed to alter your genes,” said Dr Adam Taylor, a virologist and research fellow at the Menzies Health Institute, Queensland, Griffith University.

“Gene therapy, in the classical sense, involves making deliberate changes to a patient’s DNA in order to treat or cure them. mRNA vaccines will not enter a cell’s nucleus that houses your DNA genome. There is zero risk of these vaccines integrating into our own genome or altering our genetic makeup.”
​

This "vaccine" or "gene therapy" thing feels more like a debate over semantics or classification rather than a debate over facts. If Rogan stated that mRNA is modifying people's DNA then it is clearcut misinformation. But arguing, in effect, that it has more in common with gene therapy than what we classically understand as vaccines seems like a legitimate perspective.

 

Hey Spotify, it's either me or Misinformation Fauci. Choose wisely.

 

The intent by Rogan and his guest using the term "gene therapy" was to add to the boogyman narrative of the Covid vaccine. That was the intent.

It's not a different perspective. It's a intentional method to create more fear about the vaccine.

 

A profit driven healthcare system will always result in uninformed skepticism because people even when suffering from the dunning-kruger effect can smell something fishy when healthcare has a strong profit motive. Humans inherently understand the conflict of interest. This leads to people resorting to people who had their heads bashed in for a living to receive healthcare information from.

So my solution to medical misinformation being spread so easily and rapidly is cease the profit motive for healthcare and pharmaceuticals.

Government spending sent men to the moon. It can do medical research also.

When you take out the profit motive you take out people's inherent skepticism regarding the conflict of interest.

That's my non-censorship solution to medical misinformation.

 

More jealousy