344 Free Speech and Podcasting

Elsie didn’t wanna, but the She Podcasts community asked (more than once!) Here’s a different side of the Spotify, Joe Rogan thing focusing on how it impacts YOU, your listeners, sprinkled with a side of free speech. Shownotes in this case are Elsie’s notes and links (Episode recorded 1pm ET 1/31) And no, you have not heard this side of the convo, as it’s about you.

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EPISODE LENGTH 52:22

• Sponsor Ad! Thank you Link Tree!
• Q about Riverside.FM vs Streamyard
• Quickie free speech lesson

Elsie’s JRE/Neil Young redux (if we must)

⭐️ I’m not a fan of JRE, and never have been. I personally would love to not speak his name on this podcast at all. There are plenty of others that can do that. I also DON’T LISTEN TO HIS PODCAST. I listened one time and I found that I very much enjoyed it. —— also at the time of this recording JRE did respond and I think he did very well.

⭐️ I’m not a Spotify subscriber —- I only listen to Call Her Daddy

Let’s talk about it from the independent podcaster + the listener perspective with a heavy bias to Android users, outside of the U.S. and new podcast listeners.

• There are many folks that have their largest audiences from Spotify.
• There are also many people that do not listen to podcasts outside of Spotify - especially those that are outside of the U.S.
• As we know (and it’s been covered SOOOOOOO MUCH) Spotify has gained a lot of ground in podcast listenership. It’s not about cutting into Apple Podcasts piece of the pie - Spotify has made the pie BIGGER.
• The pressure that these podcasters feel is real —- what should the “everyday podcaster” do? Particularly for shows that are serving often excluded communities?
• For many podcasters, they’ve been able to get into podcasting by starting with Anchor (however I might feel about it) and it’s given opportunities to people get into podcasting without having to right out of the gate pay for hosting —- Anchor is owned by Spotify. Should they move hosting platforms?

Not everyone can afford to quit Spotify

I have questions…

1. How many of their 172 million subscribers will delete their accounts?
2. How many of their 381 million monthly listeners will stop listening?
3. What is a breaking point for Spotify?

20k podcast episodes have already been removed from Spotify during the pandemic that mention COVID–19

• They were and continue to be very aggressive when it came to any COVID content on the platform (please reach out to the more prominent podcast platform SUPPORT TEAMS so that they can give you the scoop.)
• I believe we had a past episode

When you become a media company, you are held responsible for the content on your platform

• You are distributing
• You are creating
• You are promoting

There was a quote from the Washington Journal on the topic

“It’s a tech company looking to maximize profits”

Why does this matter to YOU?

PODCASTING IS A RESPONSIBILITY. What you say in your show - you are responsible for.

What I’m most concerned about is about podcasting.

Whatever happens with JRE and Spotify, it will set a precedent in podcasting - and it could fundamentally change the medium in ways that we were not prepared for - and possibly not for the better.

I’m especially concerned about WHO and HOW will content monitoring happen? HOW WILL THEY KNOW THE CONTEXT OF THE CONTENT?

LINKS!

• Join The Super Squad

• 302–240–3425 “yes”

• Riverside.FM

• Streamyard

• Spotify’s Rogan problem: a special edition

• Podcasts were meant to revive Spotify. Now it’s on the culture war frontline

• Spotify still tops other music services, but its market share declined

• Neil Young, Joe Rogan and Spotify’s Balancing Act

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