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All of the accusations of sexual misconduct against R. Kelly led music streaming services like Spotify, Apple Music, and Pandora to ban his music in certain playlist on their website. However, this ban has not affected his streams at all. In fact, it slightly increased.
Source: Halle Calhoun / Instagram
Prior to Spotify’s announcement, R. Kelly’s music was streamed across music platforms an average of 6,584,000 times every week, according to Nielsen Music. After the new policies began, streams of Kelly’s music actually increased slightly – 6,676,000 for the week of May 10-16.
The co-founder of women’s advocacy group UltraViolet, Shaunna Thomas, said, “Frankly it’s not important in this context whether people are listening to his music or not, what’s important is that Spotify is holding itself to the standard that they themselves established and they live up to it.”
