AUSTIN, TX - Following comments on Russia's invasion of Ukraine, where multi-millionaire podcaster Joe Rogan blamed Ukrainian defence for "causing World War III", the podcast phenom clarified that he was not echoing Kremlin propaganda, but is in fact truly this fucking braindead.
Podcasts are literally destroying the fabric of our society.
Kill the internet. We simply aren’t responsible enough for it.
We’re letting too many stupids with microphones warp our brains.
That’s a weird take, that podcasts are the issue and not monopolies, big tech, lack of privacy regulation, etc.
Podcasts are one of the few interoperable, democratic things left out there. Anybody can put one up, they use an open technology, RSS, for distribution, they’re not monetized by default, etc.
The real issue is that the Internet has an advertising duopoly made from two companies that harvest vast amounts of personal data. They promote controversial stuff like Joe Rogan because it keeps people engaged (read “angry”) and engaged people spend more time on their various sites which means more ad dollars flow in.
Spotify, which has a cozy relationship with the music industry cartel, signed Rogan to an enormous deal. So, again, not really podcasting that’s the issue here, it’s the music/entertainment cartel using him as a means of driving engagement with their platform.