Harry and Megan dubbed "fucking grifters" by Spotify exec and podcaster

[Qbish]

No great surprise there... Would love to hear his story about Zooming Prince Harry, I can only imagine his frustration with the whining ninny!

Leading Spotify figure lashes out at Prince Harry and Meghan Markle after end of podcast deal | The Independent

Nope.

WSJ quoted the Spotify and Archewell statements, they never mentioned money or contractual breaches.
Then they said 'those in the know' (ie. sources), so Spotify never said any such thing.

Invictus was a great initiative for Harry in his role as prince but attempting to turn that into content for a global audience is hopeless optimism

It's an interesting point, but I do hope this at least works out for Harry since it's clearly one of the more worthwhile things he's done - at least when he's not spoiling it by dragging the attention back to himself

Speaking of sour grapes, wasn't Jeremy someone reportedly 'in serious pursuit' of Archewell and they took their business somewhere else

And so the attempts to discredit him start - how very predictable
In any case, given how things have turned out I'd have thought he'd be relieved to have dodged a bullet rather than sour, even if that's how he felt originally

Apparently it’s from the POV of competing veterans. I’m sure it will do well, Netflix is great at churning out that sort of content. If they want it to do well enough to justify the megabucks though, Harry will have had to slag off his family in it at least a little bit (like he could go on about the army being an escape from his horrible palatial home or whatever).

I think at best the Invictus documentary will be received in a similar way to Rising Phoenix (which Harry was interviewed for). I thought that was excellent by the way. Rising Phoenix however was about the Para Olympics and so had much more global appeal and the para olympics is now becoming as mainstream and popular with global audiences as the Olympics (which is only a good thing).

Rising Phoenix was shot beautifully and very sensitively - a lot will depend upon production quality and who the producer/directors are. The key part will be that it is not about 'Harry' but about the participants and their stories.

@MarcelProust Spotify are not likely to say anything publicly - I imagine there were mutual confidentiality provisions preventing either party from saying too much about how it ended. 'Sources' indicated that the full pay out wasn't made.

I thinks it’s harsh to say Meghan has no talent. I think it’s true to say she has some talent across a range of subjects - acting, modelling, writing etc, but she isn’t exceptional at any of them. Unfortunately her high profile means people expect more.

As pps have said, they have plenty of money to live on without working, just not at the Montecito pace.

And Netflix probably do have concerns that Invictus is not really an original idea. Given that Harry was part of Rising Phoenix - he probably naturally thought 'Oh, I could do something like this about Invictus'. It gave him a blue print to follow that he knows is successful.

I thought it was a pretty mean thing to say. She doesn’t have much experience at writing/producing/podcasting/interviewing but for the amount paid the product was expected to be really high quality. It was lack of experience not talent. Archewell should have started small and then built up to the big stuff.

Agreed, @tigger2022

For me, they have done a lot of stupid shit, and some really unpleasant shit, distasteful shit, but selling invictus for commercial gain and hard cash is the lowest, it really is.

I thought Zimmer’s comments were mean also. The way people go after women; like comments about Kate not having had a career. Meghan was doing quite well when she met Harry. She got married and had two children and dealt with twin international moves and a pandemic since then. Perhaps give her an actual chance.

I am not going to assume their mindset today matches what it was when they first laid out these plans. Hopefully they have experienced some growth through this process.

@AliceOlive agree, people love to see women fail

Oh and I think Taylor Swift was rude if she really had her staff reply to a handwritten note from Meghan. The timing of sharing that info is really quite cruel.

I’ll be changing my home address now that I’ve written that.

The criticism seems to be two fold - lack of credible ideas and lack of hard work. You have to deliver at least one of those. You either have to be an ideas person that inspires others or a hard worker that pulls in creative talent around you. You need to know your strengths and play to them. H&M lets the adoring crowds at their wedding etc go to their heads. They felt special and believed their own PR. Their failure to deliver will have caused real damage to the bottom lines of Spotify and potentially Netflix so it’s not a surprise the knives are out. Others careers will have been damaged too. If you choose to be a content creator signing massive deals to fund a A list lifestyle then you are going to be either wildly praised if it goes well or suffer derision if it doesn’t. They could have lived an amazing life with the 30 odd million he has and they could have done a lot of good. Instead they wanted to be stars.

The expectations are ridiculous.

Meghan actually does have experience in writing and interviewing. She was interviewing producers and other celebs on The Tig. I believe she was also creating her own content.

Af for not affording Montecito? Wasn't that houses bought for 14M and has a 9M mortgage? Reportedly. Considering that they are part of some ethical investment company, I imagine they will get on just fine. You can't tell me everyone in Montecito has way over 120M and growing.
To top it, harry has 2 Silicon Valley 'jobs' and investments.

Yeah no, I think they are fine.

I doubt it was Taylor who released that info. But I simply don’t agree Tay,or owed Meghan some form of personal response. She doesn’t know Meghan from Adam , and likely gets thousands of interview requests. It is absolutely fine for her to not deal with these issues personally. And she certainly doesn’t need to sit and write a hand written note just because Meghan did. Good lord

@Wheresthebeach Spotify and Netflix will be held accountable for the bad decisions they made. But it’s not even remotely limited to their deals with Meghan and Harry.

The contracts will have been tied to deliverables, though. Both are public companies. They cannot just hand out cash to whomever.

Hang on, overall harry has had the worst attacks. She’s had years of chances, literally. They didn’t leave yesterday. And being female doesn’t give her a get out of jail card. She didn’t exactly hold back on the royals.took millions to sell stories on them, she can’t then expect oh she’s had babies and moved so no one should say it like it is.

I don't think Taylor was rude. Why would she be considered rude - because Meghan is a Duchess and she should have respected rank? Because Meghan is a celebrity and celebrity's should be treated differently to mere mortals?

If Taylor doesn't know Meghan and is not a friend then this is just another commercial request. If I wrote to Taylor I would not expect a personal reply, why should this be any different?

I thought there was some talk - how reliable I don't know - about proceeds being given back to Invictus?

Somehow that seems less likely now, but in any case (and as with any of the RF) I'd want to see receipts before joining the applause

it Is neither confirmed or how much, either way though they still get commercial gain.

Oh?
What did Taylor's rep say about this please. I cannot see any link that it happened or what Taylor's reasons are - she is a busy woman after all, so I can see a schedule clash.

But, please do link.

I think Harry has been donating part of the fees for all these deals to Invictus (but the vast chunk goes to Archewell and therefore them)

Source is WSJ