Neil Young Cost Spotify Around $2 Billion

Spotify‘s market value has dropped by more than $2 billion over a three-day span this week since Neil Young demanded the removal of his catalog from the streaming platform in protest to Joe Rogan’s misinformation-spreading podcast.

Last week, Young wrote an open letter to his manager and record label criticizing Rogan and Spotify. The letter has been removed, but on it he wrote:

“I want you to let Spotify know immediately TODAY that I want all my music off their platform… They can have Rogan or Young. Not both.”

Two days after, Spotify then took down nearly all of Young’s music on their streaming platform.

Spotify’s spokesperson told in a statement:

“We want all the world’s music and audio content to be available to Spotify users. With that comes great responsibility in balancing both safety for listeners and freedom for creators. We have detailed content policies in place and we’ve removed over 20,000 podcast episodes related to COVID since the start of the pandemic. We regret Neil’s decision to remove his music from Spotify, but hope to welcome him back soon.”

Young clarified that the point of his protest was not to censor the podcast host. He wrote in a follow-up letter posted to his website on Friday:

“I support free speech. I have never been in favor of censorship. Private companies have the right to choose what they profit from, just as I can choose not to have my music support a platform that disseminates harmful information. I am happy and proud to stand in solidarity with the front line health care worker who risk their lives every day to help others.”

The singer added that his music is still available to stream on Amazon, Apple Music and Qobuz, he said:

“As an unexpected bonus, I sound better everywhere else.”