Earlier this week, Neil Young pulled his music from Spotify after falling out with the platform over its internet hosting of Joe Rogan and COVID misinformation. So now, in fact, rival streamer Apple Music is courting Young and his followers, sending out tweets, playlists, and even push notifications to model itself as “The home of Neil Young.”

It’s all a little bit of theatrical silliness, in fact. Neil Young is a legendary songwriter, sure, however his presence or absence gained’t determine the destiny of this or that streaming platform. He’s no Kanye or Taylor Swift. Instead, Apple is solely indulging within the time-honored company custom of inserting itself right into a related information cycle whereas the going is sweet.

The firm’s not been refined about it both. It even placed a playlist of Young’s music on the entrance of its “browse” part below the heading “We Love Neil.”

Pettiness apart, the spat does spotlight variations between the 2 streamers. As The Verge’s Ashley Carman identified in a chunk unpacking the choice to maintain Rogan over Young, Spotify has put far more inventory in podcasts lately as half a wider plan to diversify its content material. Apple Music, by comparability, tends to presents itself as extra of a pure music promote (not least as a result of Apple has its personal separate podcasts platform).

All the whereas this market triangulation continues, Spotify has truly been shedding a bit of market share in opposition to rivals. Recent knowledge from evaluation company Midia Research confirmed that whereas Spotify was the most well-liked music streaming service by a large margin in 2021, with 31 % of the market in comparison with second place Apple Music’s 15 %, that determine had dipped from a 33 % market share in 2020.

Spotify nonetheless grew when it comes to absolutely the variety of subscribers together with the entire market, however it illustrates that the corporate’s lead is on no account secured without end.