

Moderating audio - on demand on Spotify or live on Greenroom - is hard, especially at scale. That's also what Twitter, Facebook, Reddit and others did in response to misinformation and disinformation about the pandemic. Spotify did make a few changes in response to the uproar: It published its content guidelines for the first time, and said it's working on adding a "content advisory" to every podcast that includes discussion of COVID-19 that will direct people to accurate information about the subject.And he said that "it is important to me that we don't take on the position of being content censor," which is a line straight out of the Mark Zuckerberg canon.

He intimated that Spotify doesn't agree with what Rogan said, without ever explicitly saying so.

Since then, Rogan has continued to do what he always did, which is relatively frequently veer into deeply problematic content and misinformation, particularly when it comes to COVID-19. Here's a quick catch-up on the Rogan controversy: Spotify paid $100 million to make Rogan's podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience, a Spotify exclusive. And yesterday, after days of trying to ignore the issue, Spotify finally had to say something. If you're going to pay Joe Rogan to make podcasts for your platform, you're eventually going to have to answer for what happens on those podcasts.
