Spotify CEO addresses hateful conduct policy after R. Kelly, XXXTentacion controversy
Spotify CEO Daniel Ek said in a Q&A Wednesday at Code Conference in California that the introduction of Spotify’s hateful conduct policy was “too ambiguous and open to interpretation,” Pitchfork reported.
Spotify rolled out the new policy earlier this month, and XXXTentacion and R. Kelly were the first to have their music removed from the platform’s curated playlists and promotional materials based on breaches of the policy. R. Kelly was found in violation of its policy after reports that he had been running sex cults involving young girls. Xxxtentacion’s music was removed based on domestic abuse allegations.
The removal of the rappers’ music from promotional content sparked controversy among people in the music industry who felt that Spotify was exercising censorship and singling out certain artists instead of others. Meanwhile, women’s rights group Ultraviolet urged Spotify to go a step farther and pull other artists who are known or alleged abusers—including Chris Brown, Red Hot Chilli Peppers, and Eminem.
Ek admitted Wednesday that the streaming service’s new policy wasn’t presented in a clear way in the first place.
“We rolled this out wrong and could have done a much better job,” Ek said, according to Variety. “The whole goal with this was to make sure that we didn’t have hate speech. It was never about punishing one individual artist or even naming one individual artist.”
The policy states that “Spotify is a platform for artistic expression, exploration, and inspiration. We believe in openness, diversity, tolerance and respect, and we want to promote those values through music and the creative arts.” Furthermore, the policy says hate content is never permitted on the platform and calls for its removal upon identification.
Although neither R. Kelly nor XXXTentacion were banned completely from the platform, only from playlists and promotions curated and supported by Spotify, Bloomberg reported that Spotify will restore XXXtentacion’s music to the playlists due to public criticisms.
H/T Pitchfork
The post Spotify CEO addresses hateful conduct policy after R. Kelly, XXXTentacion controversy appeared first on The Daily Dot.
