For months, Joe Rogan fans were left wondering what happened to a number of earlier shows that went missing following the Spotify transition. Now, we have the answer.
The answer to the riddle came from Joe Rogan himself, who has now confirmed that Spotify simply refused to transfer a number of his earlier shows as a condition of their $100 million exclusive partnership. And Joe Rogan happily agreed to it.
During the transition of Rogan’s podcast episodes onto the Spotify platform in 2020, fans quickly noticed that multiple past episodes were glaringly omitted. Those included interviews with controversial figures like Milo Yiannopoulos, Gavin McInnes, and Alex Jones (who was separately banned by Spotify).
Additionally, Rogan issued a rare public apology and correction over his claim that left-wing anarchists had set fires in Oregon, a point that was made during an interview with Douglas Murray. The information was wrong, though Rogan’s mea culpa was highly unusual and believed to be the result of pressure from activist Spotify staffers.
In a recent podcast discussion with comedian Fahim Anwar, Joe Rogan stated that Spotify is now completely hands off when it comes to his podcast — though that wasn’t the case during the early days of the deal. But despite his frequent declarations regarding free speech, Rogan seemed more than happy to delete his earlier shows to seal the deal.
Ironically, the topic of Spotify came up in the context of corporate censorship, specifically Netflix’s censorship of an episode of Hasan Minhaj’s Patriot Act following pressure from the Saudi Arabian government. “When I saw that Hasan’s show was pulled because of the criticism of Saudi Arabia, I was like, ‘what? Netflix?’
“It made me think like, man, I don’t know if that’s the place. I don’t know if that’s the place anymore, because I feel like there’s too much corporate involvement, there’s too much influence on content.”
“Anytime anything gets big enough, you’re gonna get s—t like that,” Anwar responded. “There’s gonna be strings attached.”
“Yeah, that’s the criticism of me being on Spotify,” Rogan quipped while letting out a laugh.
Which raised the question of whether Spotify is actively censoring or controlling Rogan’s editorial freedom.
“They don’t give a f—k man. They haven’t given me a hard time at all,” Rogan stated, before spilling the beans on the censorship bit. “There were a few episodes they didn’t want on their platform, and I was like ‘okay, I don’t care’. But other than that, in terms of what I do in the future, the big test was having Alex Jones on.”
So that answers that question, though Rogan insisted that there won’t be further corporate oversight moving forward. “A lot of people are like, ‘they’re telling Joe Rogan what he can and can’t do’. They’re not — they’re not.”
Separately, Rogan also confirmed that activist Spotify employees had accused him of transphobia and protested his arrival on the platform.
“That’s one of the things that happened with Spotify with some of their staff, where they thought I was transphobic, or thought I was a bad person — I saw one of their staff say that I was a ‘shock jock’,” Rogan relayed. “I’m not even remotely that.”
Earlier, Rogan addressed a wave of protests against him by activist Spotify employees, particularly over an episode questioning whether pre-teen and teenage girls should be permitted to have gender-transitioning medications or operations. The episode, with guest Abigail Shrier, was never removed, though Spotify employees reportedly threatened to walk out while demanding further show removals and direct editorial oversight over Rogan’s future episodes.
Ironically for the Spotify protesters, it looks like that standoff prompted Rogan to organize an interview with Alex Jones, despite a platform-wide ban on the far-right commentator and conspiracy theorist. That show remains live on Spotify’s platform — while the earlier interview remains banned — which suggests that Spotify shifted to a hands-off approach after the initial clashes.
Rogan slams Netflix for censorship.
Immediately admits to censoring his own podcast for money.
Everybody’s got a price. Especially Joe Rogan.
Well, he had Alex Jones on, but every 3 seconds he interrupted him to do a live fact check, (which 99% came back true). He sold out. But let’s face it, we all would for 100 million dollars.
Are any of you surprised? The left censors people. That’s what they ddo. Expect them.
Zzzz. Left this, left that. You’re a mess with your baseless accusations.
Ignore these turds. They just want attention by making absurd claims.
You are literally commenting under an article about left wing censorship, and your comment is claiming there is no evidence of left wing censorship. Adorable.
Rogan is a tool. Has always been a tool. Will always be a tool.
Just like the hosts of the “Late Night” shows.
Rogan was pulling $30 million per year before Spotify.
Does Rogan still have these banned episodes on YOUTUBE or his website – OR has he wiped them completely?
I saw them, they were entertaining, but I didn’t think Rogan himself agreed with them – he was just an interested interviewer.
They’re on bitchute
There was an episode with Joey Diaz where Joey speculates on Trumps mafia ties during the 80’s in New York and I can’t find it anywhere now.
I just watched it on Spotify
Rogan is a fraud. He loves to point fingers and raise the red flag to get a spotlight and increase viewership through supposed controversy. What a joke.
Joe acts like he’s being persecuted. He’s simply peddling the losing ends of arguments that have already occurred countless times. Perpetuating a culture war while simultaneously trying to frame himself as a victim.
That’s a lot of generalizations. Without specific examples, you’re accusations are false and worthless.
That’s bias bias. Just because somebody makes a poor argument doesn’t automatically make it false.
Wrong. Accusations without examples are just that. They are not false, necessarily. Go do your own research, bitch.
If by “old ends of arguments that have failed countless times” you mean idiot Twitterati leftism then, yeah, you’re right.
He is the opposite of a fraud. His whole philosophy is to push what he likes and not care about critics. You must be talking about somebody else.
Nope. I was talking about him. He’s a con. You’ve never met the guy, obviously. He’s a lot different that he presents. A lot.
I know him personally. He’s a stand up guy with integrity. All his business relationships are sound and he’s known for doing what he says and following through. He’s pursuing several real estate deals here in Austin and has closed several and the agent is a lifetime friend of mine as well. He’s a really kind and generous person and everyone who knows him personally, agrees.
100%.
If all JR cared about is viewership/listenership, he wouldn’t even have people like Alex Jones on. He would have Lefties that keep him well within the “safe zone” and THEN try to talk about supposedly controversial topics with those people.
But Joe has on people that others like Jimmy Kimmel, Steven Colbert, Chelsea Handler, Oprah etc., etc. wouldn’t DARE have on. This PROVES that Joe doesn’t give a & $*@%!-&’* WHAT the others think of him or his show. He just wants to have a reality good show talking about the current issues with current personalities of the times we are living in. All the others want to do is bash certain public figures every day/night of the week and that gets to be SO tiresome.
And Joe is just your average, down-to-Earth guy that I can just sit down and listen to. He asks interesting questions and draws a lot of interesting stories and information out of his guests. THAT is the difference between him and the other mindless drones on late-night TV. I just don’t watch any of that drivel anymore. I REALLY miss Johnny Carson.
“If all JR cared about is viewership/listenership, he wouldn’t even have people like Alex Jones on.”
One of the episodes with Jones has 26 million views on YouTube. The Jones episodes are among Rogan’s most popular.
This “article” is so completely biased. Removing episodes from before the acquisition isn’t censorship. It’s not great, but to compare it to state sponsored pressure from the saudi government? lol learn to write
“Censor” means to erase or remove information that you want hidden or disagree with. Which is exactly what Spotify did.
Stop lying. Or if you’re not lying and you truly believe that than go back to school or do a goddamn Google search.
Yeah, um, this isn’t the first time he’s opened up about this.
What a load bs journalism this is.
Rogan is a BS human
You misspelled June and put Rogan
Your wit is also missing.
His corrections were, “sorry, the anarchists started “wild fires” and not “forest fires.” My mistake.” Its not like he was way off. He was just wrong about what they burned which is really besides the point.
(((Joe rogan)))
KARMA will be a big ol’ bitch when these whining, crying snowflakes get a big fat dose of censorship!! What goes around ALWAYS comes back around to bite you in your ass pussies!
The fact you used the term snowflakes makes your entire comment worthless. Grow up.
It’s almost like he’s a self interested grifter…