Spotify age cap

Olivia Rodrigo has been a slow burn for me.

I first heard of her when she and Paramore had beef because her song good 4 u sounds an awful lot like Misery Business by Paramore. As a longtime Paramore fan (the early stuff, not the new poppy junk), I wrote Olivia off as a new pop artist riding the coattails of other musicians.

Boy was I wrong.

Since doing a deeper dive after her most recent album came out, I’ve become a bit of a fan. Not only that, I’ve regressed to listening to Taylor Swift from time to time. It reminds me of when I saw her live back in 2011 or 2012. Simpler times.

The lyrics of many Olivia Rodrigo songs are at times juvenile. They deal with a lot of the emotional angst one experiences in youth (I guess sometimes in adulthood too). I do wonder from time to time if I’m too old to be listening to this Gen Z artist.

This got me thinking… what if there was a way for artists on Spotify to set an “age cap” to block older people from listening to their music? No sane artist would do this because it means they miss out on royalties. Additionally, parents everywhere would switch to YouTube to play Baby Shark for the millionth time.

Maybe this is one of my bad/hare-brained 2 am ideas. We won’t know until I post it though…

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