Atlantic Records Addresses Bot Allegations, Artificial Engagement

Marc Griffin
·2 min read

Atlantic Records is addressing the claim they’re allegedly using bots across its artists’ YouTube videos to inflate their views. On Saturday (Nov. 26), No Jumper found that videos by Don Toliver, Roddy Ricch, and Lil Uzi Vert were all plagued by bots as artificial accounts filled up the comment section with AI-generated engagement.

Don Toliver’s “Do It Right” caught the most heat in the controversy, with comments looking suspiciously bogus using strange speech patterns, grammatical errors, and nonsensical remarks. The alarming optics prompted his team to release a statement denying any use of manufactured views and fan support.

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“Just like other artists and their teams who have been attacked with botting reports, we are both deeply upset and concerned,” a rep for Toliver expressed in a statement to TMZ. “To be absolutely clear, neither Don or anyone on his team has had any involvement here.”

“While we conduct our own investigation into the allegations, we urge Atlantic Records to do the same — to protect the integrity of not only their roster of artists but their reporting metrics. We look forward to sharing more as we obtain more information.”

Atlantic Records followed up with their own statement, addressing Toliver’s team and the accusations at hand, declaring they have not been creating fraudulent support for their roster of talent. “Atlantic Records has never used bots for any of our artists,” the storied label said.

Elsewhere, Atlantic Records and the estate of their deceased founder, Ahmet Ertegun, are being sued for sexual misconduct.

Rolling Stone reports that Jan Roeg, a talent scout working with the record label between the ’80s and mid-2000s, claims that Ertegun sexually assaulted and harassed her, with the record company failing to handle the situation appropriately. 

“Atlantic utterly failed to engage in training or implementation of any policies or standards that would inform employees of the company’s disapproval of and how to report such conduct,” the lawsuit states, “much less anything that would dissuade employees from engaging in sexual misconduct on their premises or while on business trips and dealing with business partners for the Label.”

“As Ms. Roeg shows in her Complaint,” Wigdor LLP partner Lawrence M. Pearson began his statement. “The ‘sex, drugs, and Rock n’ Roll’ culture in the music industry at companies like Atlantic Records was taken as license by powerful men like Ahmet Ertegun to engage in sexual assault and other abuse of women.”

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