Joe Rogan Comes to Spotify
By HUBERT KING ‘21
Last week, comedian, actor, martial artist, and television host Joe Rogan, of The Joe Rogan Experience, announced that he had reached an agreement with Spotify for exclusive rights to his podcast. The podcast will remain on YouTube until December 2020, when it will transition to Spotify. In order to preserve the video aspect of the podcast, Spotify will implement a “vod-cast” format. Though an exact value cannot be confirmed, it is estimated that Rogan will net approximately $100 million through this deal. According to The New York Times, Spotify added $1.7 billion to its market cap within 30 minutes of the deal’s announcement. Aware of the dire economic straits that COVID-19 has set upon millions of Americans, Rogan avoided discussing particulars after news of the deal broke, stating that discussing the deal any further “feels gross, especially right now, when people can’t work.”
The Joe Rogan Experience first aired on December 24, 2009, starring Rogan with his employee and friend Brian Redban. Inspired by the open discussion format of Live from the Compound, Rogan’s show steadily amassed an enormous fanbase. According to rollingstone.com, the podcast had 16 million downloads per month in October 2015, and by April 2019, had over 190 million downloads per month.
Rogan’s podcast frequently features notable political figures and journalists, including Edward Snowden, Dan Crenshaw, Cenk Uygur, and Ben Shapiro. In 2019, then-presidential candidates Andrew Yang and Tulsi Gabbard benefited from significant surges in popularity and fundraising after appearing on the show, inspiring the New York Times to characterize Rogan as an “unlikely political influencer.” However, Rogan keeps his own biases off the air, providing a platform for civil discourse ripe with intellectual parity. Though he briefly expressed support for Bernie Sanders in early 2020, Rogan has hosted some of the most ardent right-wing activists on his show, including Alex Jones and Milo Yiannopoulos. Beyond politics, Rogan champions an annual “Sober October” challenge to his viewers, helping fans curb their addictions while bringing awareness to substance abuse. Finally, in June 2019, Rogan discussed the possibility of extraterrestrial life with conspiracy theorist Bob Lazar. The episode was widely credited with providing the impetus for the satirical Facebook event in which millions of Americans signed a petition to raid Area 51 in hope of finding aliens.
In addition to the diversity of thought that appears on The Joe Rogan Experience, viewers enjoy the simplicity of the show’s format. Though this simplicity is not exclusive to Rogan’s podcast, it allows you to listen to a broad array of topics in a casual manner. As our country begins the process of reopening, expect Rogan’s podcast–and Spotify, for that matter–to continue to thrive. In this time of crisis, after all, comfort comes in the form of familiarity.