Its not just the playlisting getting the artists hot, its the labels getting these artists on these playlists, similar to how they got their artists on the radio back in the day,
Best example I can think of here is G-Unit and how Interscope created several multi-platinum artists with their influence on the industry, and then when 50 went on Hot97 and dissed Jimmy Iovine, they pulled the plug and all of them regressed from going gold first week to 100k first week, and eventually back to underground artists. They went from being on every XXL cover to zero promotion, to eventually being dropped.
G-Unit can still make money cause they cultivated a real fanbase like Russ, especially 50 and to a lesser extent Game, but you cant deny that if they played the industry game with Interscope they would be much bigger today. Similar to how Russ would be much bigger today if he had playlisting support. The fact that they can still make money off their real fans by touring and dropping independent albums isnt a rebuttal for how they got blackballed by the industry.
The machine is the industry. Getting blackballed is the industry telling you that you cant work here and to go do your own thing to make money.
Of course you arent entitled to a job, but that is a completely separate discussion. What we're discussing is how the industry can take that job away from you at their discretion (aka blackballing). And dudes like Ebro are one of those gatekeepers that decides who gets to be in the industry and who doesnt.
You are pointing out important things artists should do to mitigate the impact of being blackballed - like building a real fanbase so you dont need the industry at the end of the day. But the reality is theres different types of fans. Most fans are casual fans that consume music through playlists, similar to how people mostly consumed music through the radio or clubs. It takes a real fan to go out and type out their favorite artist name in the search bar or go out and buy an album. Different artists have a different % of casual fans and different % of real fans, depending on how much work they put into building their fanbase. Dudes like Spitta or LaRussell probably got 90% real fans, while someone like RHQ is mostly casual fans cause all hes really known for his a few hits.