Joe Rogan, comedian and America's most-listened to podcaster, apologized to Spotify (SPOT) and people offended by his show as backlash against two of his more controversial interviews reached a fever pitch over the weekend.
Rogan took to Instagram Sunday night to publish his mea culpa where he acknowledged that some of his missteps while also committing to continue to bring a wide-range of opinions to his audience of an estimated 11 million listeners per episode.
"I want to thank Spotify for being so supportive during this time and I'm very sorry that this is happening to them and they are taking so much heat for it," Rogan said.
"If I pissed you off I'm sorry and If you enjoy the podcast, thank you," he said near the end of his nearly 10-minute monologue.
Rogan promised to have more diverse guests on to challenge the views of some of his more controversial guests.
"I'm not trying to promote misinformation. I'm not trying to be controversial," Rogan said.
The move came after Neil Young asked Spotify to remove his music from the platform due to Rogan's podcast, which led to a hashtag Twitter campaign and a nearly 12% drop in the company's stock price last week.
Spotify shares were up 10.4% in morning trading Monday.
Spotify's Bet on Rogan
Spotify, the Sweden-based audio streamer, has shifted its strategy in recent years from a music streaming service to more of a mix that primarily features podcasts.
Spotify realized that making money off of just streaming music was a losing battle and in 2019, the company bet big on the industry by acquiring podcast companies Gimlet Media for $230 million and story-based podcast studio Parcast for $56 million. The company then purchased Anchor podcasts for more than $100 million in December 2020.
In the midst of this podcast push, Spotify struck an exclusive licensing deal with Rogan, reportedly worth more than $100 million. It is the still the richest podcast deal ever.
That push has had mixed results as the company still doesn't consistently turn a profit, though annual revenue is expected to top $10 billion for the first time this fiscal year, according to FactSet.
On Monday, analysts at Citgroup upgraded Spotify to buy, saying that Wall Street is not giving enough credit for potential subscriber growth on the platform.
The Source of Controversy
Rogan has been under fire for spreading Covid-19 "misinformation" after having Dr. Peter McCoullough and Dr. Robert Malone as guests on separate episodes of his Joe Rogan Experience podcast last year.
Both physicians have been outspoken critics of everything from the official narrative surrounding how the Covid-19 pandemic started, to the proper medical treatments for the disease, to the efficacy of vaccines.
McCullough, for instance, recently told a Senate panel that it is "academic fraud" to suggest that vaccines reduce hospitalization without reducing infection and spread.
Meanwhile Malone has campaigned against the mandatory vaccination of children as he says the vaccines pose more risk of serious adverse affects that Covid does in children.
"They have an opinion that's different from the mainstream narrative. I wanted to hear what their opinion is," Rogan said Sunday of his podcast alums.
In January, a consortium of 270 persons in the medical field signed an open letter calling on Spotify to "take action against the mass-misinformation events" facilitated on Rogan's podcast.
"Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Joe Rogan has repeatedly spread misleading and false claims on his podcast, provoking distrust in science and medicine," the letter read.
