Spotify loses more than $2 billion in market value after musicians remove their songs as protest to Joe Rogan's controversial vaccine claim

More musicians have decided to follow Neil Young’s move to remove his songs from Spotify as a form of protest to the controversial claim about vaccines which he expressed on his podcast exclusive to the platform. The musicians include Joni Mitchell, Graham Nash, Nils Lofgren and India Arie. 

It all started when Joe Rogan, the man behind Spotify’s most popular podcast of 2021 “The Joe Rogan Experience”, stated on a podcast that he believes “for the most part it’s safe to get vaccinated”, mentioning that his parents are vaccinated. 

However, he added: “But if you’re like 21 years old, and you say to me, ‘Should I get vaccinated?’ I’ll go no.” 

Rock legend Neil Young, who is known as a strong advocate for vaccines, decided to immediately take action and have his songs removed from Spotify. 

Young wrote that, “Spotify has recently become a very damaging force via its public 

misinformation and lies about COVID”, citing an open letter from doctors and health professionals issued earlier this month demanding Spotify to crack down on COVID-19-related falsehoods. 

As a result, as reported by Variety, Spotify’s market capitalisation fell about $2.1 billion over a three-day span and its shares fell 6%. 

“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,” he wrote. “They can have Rogan or Young. Not both.”

Spotify ended up favouring Rogan and pulled all Young’s music. Joni Mitchell followed Young’s decision, saying that, “Irresponsible people are spreading lies that are costing people their lives. I stand in solidarity with Neil Young and the global scientific and medical communities on this issue.” Young and Mitchell have about 10 million monthly listeners on Spotify combined. 

As a response, Spotify announced the publication of the platform’s internal content moderation policies as well as a new labelling system for COVID-19-related content. However, it did not specifically mention Rogan or his show.

“This advisory will direct listeners to our dedicated COVID-19 Hub, 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,” Spotify CEO Daniel Ek said in an official statement.