10 hours ago
The startling truth about Spotify — it's got a porn problem
A s I understand it, one of the clichés of pornographic plotting is a hapless innocent — a plumber or pizza delivery boy — stumbling unwittingly into a sexual scenario.
Last week this happened to me on my Spotify Premium Family account. It was a weekday morning. I was at my desk, researching potential column subjects as the Sunday Times radio and podcast critic. Scrolling Spotify's podcast charts to check out what was trending, I noticed a couple of high-ranking shows in the fiction podcast category Top Ten that I hadn't heard of.
At No 3 there was Yaya Sama Audios, with some anime-looking cover art and more than 140 episodes uploaded since mid-May. At No 7, something called ivys aud, with fewer episodes and a vintage feel to its artwork — violet roses wrapped in a broadsheet newspaper. I clicked on an episode of the first audio title, one of about half a dozen uploaded just that day, and then gasped to discover, under the cartoon image of a doe-eyed girl, the title ****ed Hard by an Obsessed Big ***k. Its English-accented monologue narrated a rapey seduction, as the large-type AI-written transcript of the pornographic audio rolled up my screen. Episode titles of the other podcast included Seducing Your Hot Married Deprived Neighbor and A Lesson in Slut Theory.
