I’m confused about the conceptual distinction here. Is the problem that Spotify obviates the need (in the eyes of many at least) of a physical record collection? Or that the subscription model means you don’t “own” your music? If the former, why does physical matter? If the latter, does this mean we should also buy DVDs or not go to public libraries?

Then on the curation side, you can of course curate your own collection on Spotify, building your own library and playlists. The algorithms are more for discovery purposes, and in that role, how are they different from, say, listening to a college radio station to find out about new artists, or reading a review in MRR and checking out the band?

I get that them removing “problematic” artists is a problem, but it sounds like you had these criticisms of Spotify before they began doing that.