As the controversy raged, many Spotify employees felt management was responding too slowly, two current employees said. It has also raised the alarm with Spotify’s board of directors, where some members have been disappointed by the company’s hesitant response, according to a person familiar with the events who wished to remain anonymous due to confidentiality agreements.
Signs of a Cultural Divide
Managing the crisis in the United States was perhaps even more complicated because Spotify’s headquarters are nearly 4,000 miles away, in Sweden, where Mr Ek, a publicity-shy executive who grew up in a suburb of Stockholm, and many of the engineers of the company and longest-serving employees are located.
Free speech is a deeply rooted belief in Sweden. Many employees there — and in the United States — were upset when Spotify removed music by R. Kelly and XXXTentacion from playlists in 2018 for content or behavior it deemed offensive, a decision the company quickly reversed.
Mr Ek has made it clear that he is hesitant to take on the role of censor. “It’s not our job to dictate the discourse these creators want in their shows,” he told employees earlier this month in a speech first reported by The Verge, adding that “if we just wanted content make things that we all like and agree with, we’re going to have to eliminate religion, and politics, and comedy, and health, and environment, and education, the list goes on and on and on.
And as a business matter, censoring Mr. Rogan could alienate his legion of fans and set a slippery precedent with other podcasters, according to Mark Mulligan, an industry analyst at Midia Research.
“That could jeopardize their future podcast strategy,” said Mr. Mulligan.
In a recent memo to employees, Mr. Ek that “voting cancellation is a slippery slope,” but acknowledged that some episodes of Mr. Rogan was removed from the platform. He wrote that Mr Rogan had decided to remove them after meetings with Spotify executives and “his own considerations”.
Katherine Rosman and Ben Sisario message from New York, Mike Isaac reported from Oakland, California, and Adam Satariano message from London. Additional reporting contributed by: Nicole Sperling in Los Angeles and Marc Tracy and Jessica Cheung in New York City.
