Spotify slapped for ‘fuck you’ email

Music streaming firm Spotify has been slammed by the ad watchdog after it sent a foul-mouthed email campaign to promote its service, which included the phrase “Have you heard this song by Lily Allen? Give it a try. Fuck You”.
The Advertising Standards Authority launched an inquiry following a complaint that the use of a profanity in the ad was likely to cause serious or widespread offence, and asked Spotify to justify itself.
However, the music company reacted with incredulity, claiming it did not intend to cause offence to its users or to the wider public; rather it was simply promoting the song, entitled “Fuck You”, to people who it believed would like Lilly Allen.
It said the song, which was named by the artist, not Spotify, was not chosen to shock consumers or to drive traffic to their website by being controversial.  The firm said users under 18 years of age had to have the consent of a parent or guardian to join and those under 13 years were not allowed to sign up at all.
Spotify added that around 36 million recommendations were sent to users by email every month and over the years a significant proportion of its users would have had the same song recommended to them.  But they had not received any other complaints and believed the ad was not likely to cause serious or widespread offence.
But while the ASA considered Spotify users would understand the use of “Fuck You” to be the title of a song, it ruled recipients of emails from a general online music service would not expect them to include swearing.
Concluding the ad was likely to cause serious offence to some recipients, it banned it from running again and warned Spotify to ensure future advertising contained nothing that was likely to cause serious or widespread offence.