I miss the days when jocks wanted to beat up geeks instead of interview them. Alas, here we are.

This Joe Rogan vs. Neil Young thing is a tough one though. Neil Young was my #1 most listened to artist on Spotify last year. Nothing but respect for the brilliant songwriter/losing him is a blow to my playlists.

But I don’t get the end game of the “boycott Spotify” brigade. If Spotify kicks Rogan off the platform now, Rogan gets…

• More listeners: He can put his podcast back up on Apple, Stitcher, YouTube, Overcast, etc.

• More money: He keeps his $100M from Spotify and can now strike a new deal somewhere else for way more.

• More buzz: He cements his role as the bad boy of podcasting and becomes an even bigger anti-cancel culture hero.

The reality is Joe Rogan helps Spotify way more than Spotify helps Joe Rogan. In fact, that $100 million deal was a steal for the Swedes.

So all this Spotify boycott stuff feels mostly like an ego stroke for those who want to…well, I’m not sure what they want. Because if you think Joe Rogan should be heard less, you should want him to remain on Spotify (an investigation found his influence has actually waned since he went behind Spotify’s wall).

Also, everyone who complains about Rogan needs to look up the Streisand effect. If the goal is to reduce misinformation, well…

I listen to Rogan occasionally (mostly when he interviews comedians I know), but, generally speaking, his 3+ hour episodes are too much for me to handle. Still, his Instagram response came off tonally perfect. In the land of the hysterical, the calm man is king. He seemed reasoned, lacked vitriol, and indicated he’ll bring on more mainstream experts to counter the outliers he interviews. He seemed like a normal guy doing his best. Meanwhile, many of Rogan’s online opponents veer toward hyperemotional attacks, out of context dunks, and other distortions.

Vooza @voozahq

This platform incentivizes and promotes lies. We've seemingly all decided dunking on our opponents is more important than telling the truth. I know it's just a photo but this kinda thing is happening on our timelines constantly. It's sad and dangerous.

January 31st 2022

1 Like

So what will Spotify do? I’m not sure the Swedes really care about all this much. Their PR response was humorous; they’re going to raise awareness around what’s acceptable in their publisher tools? OK, cool. But I can’t imagine Joe Rogan lighting a cigar, scrolling through Spotify's Platform Rules, and going, "Oh, so that's what’s acceptable to say. Good to know."

It also feels worth mentioning that, as Matt Taibbi explained recently, the most dangerous misinformation is typically from official sources, not podcasters.

Whether it’s WMDs or the Gulf of Tonkin fiasco or the missile gap or the red scare or the twenty-year occupation of Afghanistan, the worst real-world disasters always turn out to be driven or enabled by official falsehoods. In the case of Afghanistan (and Iraq, and Vietnam before both), the cycle of war disaster was perpetuated by a sweeping, organized, and intricate system of official lying, about everything from the success of missions to the efficacy of weaponry to the political devotion of supposed allies. The only defense against these most dangerous types of deceptions is an absolutely free press.

The raging wildfire of internet "do your research" ain’t new – it all began with the spark of WebMD (see: Vooza’s Cyberchondria episode). People are done with old fashioned information streams. Rogan is a symptom, not the disease. The real root causes here are our lackluster educational system, rage-inducing algorithms, and the decline (death?) of journalism. But I get why it’s easier to go after a musclehead who eats elk than these entrenched, systemic issues. Plus, he’s reaching way more folks than anything on TV these days – with great power…

Anyway, Neil Young is now boosting Amazon Music in a classic “lesser of two evils" scenario. As if there’s a nice megacorporation for us to all support. Apple gonna slave labor, Amazon gonna make employees cry and p*ss in bottles, and Spotify gonna keep sending that goofy #wrapped animation every year. It’s just who we are now.

Let’s stop expecting corporations to be our saviors. They may talk a good game, but there ain’t no such thing as “woke capitalism.”

“Diverse world,” “come together,” “reflecting the diversity of the world around us,” “deeply committed to diversity and inclusion,” “attracting, retaining and promoting diverse talent across our company.”

Want to know where that “woke” homage to “diversity and inclusion” came from? Fox News. Yes, Fox News…This is just what brands do and say because no company is going to go out and argue against inclusivity in its advertising or hiring, even if it’s a place as vile as Fox News…

If a brand changes its logo, that is capitalism, not “wokeness” (and “woke capitalism” just fundamentally does not exist, especially when you’re talking about companies like Mars facing on-again/off-again child slavery lawsuits). If a brand puts out a statement talking about a commitment to “diversity” and “inclusion,” that is capitalism, not “wokeness.” If a brand changes its profile picture into a rainbow for LGBTQ pride month, that is capitalism, not “wokeness.” Companies do these things to make more money, improve their image, and secure some earned media.

I have zero hope CEOs will save us. Instead, let’s REGULATE BIG TECH PLATFORMS the way we do with radio, TV, cable, etc. (Heck, Facebook is running a whole series of ads practically begging to be regulated.) Pass laws that clearly define what is/isn’t their responsibility. Someone who is injured (or related to someone who dies) due to misinformation published on Spotify should be able to sue the platform for damages. This is how it works in other forms of publishing. Laws and courts should decide this, not execs who answer to VCs and shareholders. Neil Young doesn't say, "Arrest that bank robber or I'll stop performing in your town." He doesn’t have to because that’s someone else’s job.

Related: I wrote something about selling out/Neil Young a while back: "Selling out" morphed into "making it."

Quickies

🌀 I’m not a robot. I’m an artist!

🌀 Comedians are always really angry about some dumb sh*t. Just chill man, they’ll figure out dimmer switches or hand dryers or whatever soon.

🌀 I feel like the economy can't be doing too badly if (judging by my targeted ads) 90% of Americans are now gambling nonstop on sports.

🌀 “With your new sound, you don’t fear losing old fans?” Nick Cave replies, “To challenge our fans is to love them, even if it means losing them.” (via JS)

We love and respect our fans, both past and present, but, of course, they are free to come and go as they please. What The Bad Seeds are trying to do is to nurture our listeners, to challenge and confront them, to make records that create some kind of dissonance, and perhaps even disturb them, but hopefully ultimately move them.

Losing fans is the collateral damage that comes from engaging in music from an artistic perspective, rather than a commercial one. Making music specifically to please fans can be patronising and exploitative. Challenging music, by its very nature, alienates some fans whilst inspiring others, but without that dissonance, there is no conversation, there is no risk, there are no tears and there are no smiles, and nobody is moved and nobody is affected!

🌀 Why people latch on to conspiracy theories, according to science. People always say the bigger the lie, the more they believe it. But maybe it's just the more you *repeat* the lie, the more they believe it.

Experts also say that people are more likely to believe misinformation that they are exposed to over and over again—such as allegations of election fraud or claims that COVID-19 is no more dangerous than the flu. “The brain mistakes familiarity for truth,” van der Linden says…

Another psychological factor that can lead to belief in conspiracies is what experts call “collective narcissism,” or a group’s inflated belief in its own significance. Marchlewska’s research suggests that collective narcissists are apt to look for imaginary enemies and adopt conspiracy explanations that blame them.

🌀 Cartoonist conveys the entire message of Don’t Look Up in a single panel cartoon.

The New Yorker @NewYorker

A cartoon by @BrendanLoper. #NewYorkerCartoons

January 27th 2022

1,075 Retweets4,045 Likes

🌀 All my robocalls are now in Spanish which makes me feel like I've reached the next level of "Capitalism: The Video Game."

🌀 Standup comedy shows are where white women go to find out the things they love are super basic.

🌀 Jeff Daniels is so underrated. Love this scene in "Something Wild" where he's dancing to The Feelies. Whole movie is great too (streaming now on Amazon Prime).

🌀 The ‘beautiful mess’ effect: "Showing vulnerability might feel more like weakness from the inside, our findings indicate, that, to others, these acts might look more like courage from the outside.”

🌀 Cool group of copywriting examples from Harry Dry. He’s got a good newsletter too if you’re into that sort of thing.

🌀 490,000 views on TikTok for this one so far. It’s a clip from my last special about the phrase “people of color”:

rubymatt

A post shared by Matt Ruby (@rubymatt)

🌀 Aimee Mann is one of my fave songwriters and she’s been doing a fun media tour where she talks about music she loves – including Neil Young, Elliott Smith, Steely Dan, Sharon Van Etten, and They Might Be Giants.

• Aimee Mann on the Music That Made Her

• KCRW Presents Lockdown Listening: Aimee Mann

• Aimee Mann’s Five Essential Albums

🌀 We're gonna miss movie theaters. They were the one place we could gather, watch a movie trailer, and feel the glee of an entire roomful of people 100% agreeing something is full of crap.

🌀 Sanitation, eh?

🌀 Listening through - listening to every (original studio) album by a particular artist, chronologically.

Lately I’ve assigned myself the project of listening to every album recorded by a band I like…That I only knew fractions of the output of artist who’d given so much to me felt selfish, like not knowing the date of someone I cared about’s birthday…I’ve found that giving over real considered time to an artist’s work has taught me so much–about art, about creative decisions and really just about how we all get up in the morning and have to make that day happen in a way that it mattered. 

Rob Walker adds a suggestion: While you’re at it, make a playlist.

👇👇👇

But wait, there’s more! Up ahead for subscribers: What Orwell, Prince, and the Stones have in common, positive friction, relationshopping, the design legacy of Covid, how to reclaim your mind, the metaverse vs. loneliness, the phrase “low-skilled jobs,” the perfect stock portfolio, Narcos vs. Ballers, how long it takes to be a real New Yorker, and more. Not yet a subscriber? Sign up for more exclusive content in the future and help support the Rubesletter. Thanks...