
The Case for SoundCloud - techthumb
http://www.thembj.org/2016/04/the-case-for-soundcloud/
======
rndmize
As a heavy EDM listener, Soundcloud is an amazing resource. Unfortunately, I
see a variety of problems with the platform.

* The company was founded eight years ago but only added subscriptions to the artist side two years ago (I think?) and to the listener side in the last three months. Ads were added to the listener side a year ago, with no option to subscribe to remove them until the last few months. I basically stopped listening to Monstercat given how pervasive the ads were (every two tracks when skipping after a few seconds? Come on...)

* No way to buy music from them directly. Here's a recent release from Pegboard Nerds: [https://soundcloud.com/monstercat/sets/pegboard-nerds-heartb...](https://soundcloud.com/monstercat/sets/pegboard-nerds-heartbit-remixes) . First five lines on the description: buy on iTunes, Bandcamp, Beatport, watch on Youtube, listen on Spotify. Not being able to sell music and have an online library of purchases seems like a lost opportunity.

* Speaking of libraries, you can like or repost songs. Beware though - if an artist removes a song or makes it private, it'll be gone from your lists. And I mean GONE - there's no record it existed, no track name, no artist, nothing. I only found out because I'm familiar enough with my likes that I noticed songs weren't playing in the right sequence. This is extraordinarily frustrating - at least if I bookmark music on Youtube, the artist and track name are in the bookmark, even if the video gets removed, making it possible to find/purchase elsewhere. Until a day arrives where I don't have to add the title of every track I like to a local text file, there's no way I'd sign up for their listener side subscription.

I've felt like Soundcloud could become a tremendous force in the music scene
if they did things right - a one-stop shop for everything; uploading, sharing,
listening, purchasing, collecting. Doesn't seem like they're pulling it off
though.

~~~
emdd
And their podcast service is so nice, especially integrating with Twitter
cards. But, I don't know how long they can last.

~~~
dublinben
>their podcast service is so nice

As far as I can tell, there are no RSS feeds for SoundCloud pages. This fails
the fundamental definition of what makes content a podcast.

~~~
scott_hardy
A couple friends and I made this (UI still a work in progress) to solve this
exact problem: [https://www.soundcasts.net](https://www.soundcasts.net)

------
minikomi
Serial reposters have killed my soundcloud stream. Even artists I like, I
offen do not like their taste. Discoverability is also a major problem. Lack
of search filters, and arbitrary sorting of results in particular. Hashtag
spamming and fake playlist naming to try and pump up play counts are rife.

Don't get me started on the mobile app..

I'd love to see some kind of subreddit like channels built into the platform
which could encourage discussion and interaction - between artists especially
.. There's so much good random music out there on the platform, but it just
feels lost to the ether sometimes. To be honest, the platform which did this
best while it lasted was MySpace artist pages.

Edit:

There's so much more they could be doing to become a place for artists.
Special curated playlists - pay trendsetters / djs / weirdos to create awesome
playlists out of the current content. Something I can set and listen to, look
forward to updates on. The fact that Youtube is a better radio than Soundcloud
is depressing to me.

Also, something like the RBMA[1] could easily boost the sense of community and
respect for the platform. At the moment it just feels like.. plumbing. No love
whatsoever. The official soundcloud blog[2] is so sterile and detached from
the music they host. If I was them I'd be going _insane_ over Desiigner's
Panda[3] becoming No. 1 on Billboard [4] after having such a meteoric rise
within the platform - feels like Solja Boy - Crank Dat moment for Soundcloud,
yet there's pretty much nothing officially acknowledging it.

[1] [http://www.redbullmusicacademy.com/](http://www.redbullmusicacademy.com/)

[2] [https://blog.soundcloud.com/](https://blog.soundcloud.com/)

[3] [https://soundcloud.com/lifeofdesiigner/desiigner-
panda](https://soundcloud.com/lifeofdesiigner/desiigner-panda)

[4] [http://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/chart-
beat/7341870...](http://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/chart-
beat/7341870/desiigner-panda-billboard-hot-100-number-1)

~~~
_kyran
Agree with reposts killing the stream. I made this as a hacky solution to keep
my using the service:

[https://github.com/kyranb/SoundCloud-Feed-
Cleaner](https://github.com/kyranb/SoundCloud-Feed-Cleaner)

Many friends/other people online have all expressed the same frustration. I've
reached out to Soundcloud but have had no response. If any SC engineers are
lurking here, can you shed any info on why there's no built in toggle or
navigation pane to only show original content and not reposts?

~~~
Kiro
Why not just use the Tracks tab? Isn't that the same thing?

~~~
_kyran
A few reasons:

1\. Tracks only shows on an artists page, not your stream of all artists you
are following. 2\. Tracks wasn't there originally when this extension was
made. It was only added somewhat recently. 3\. Often artists will use the
repost feature to share their own tracks that have been posted to their
label's or another artists account. This is especially true when it comes to
remixes. This extension will still consider these to not be a repost :)

------
tomc1985
I'm so sick of all these businesses starting out humble and bespoke and then
suddenly chasing growth and trying to take over the world.

Soundcloud is a tool for artists to host their music with a minimum amount of
hassle. It's also a tool for fans to discover said artists. But it should be
nothing more than this. There are other competitors that have already taken
over other aspects of the music space, and own it completely -- but nobody
owns artists'-hosting-their-music like Soundcloud.

It was the beginning of the end when they were bought by ABC or whoever-it-is.
I wish there was some way for a business' customers to block acquisitions,
maybe we'd fewer entrepreneurs with reckless exit strategies messing with the
good things in life.

~~~
nemothekid
Soundcloud was launched in 2007, and raised €2.5M in VC cash in 2009.
Soundcloud charged nothing and had no real business model.

Seems like to me they were chasing growth for the beginning. The " _tool for
artists to host their music with a minimum amount of hassle._ " was subsidized
by VC money.

~~~
tomc1985
Art has, for thousands of years, flourished under a system of patronage.
Sometimes patrons really wanted art, sometimes they it was just a selfish
indulgence, but unless they were commissioning something specific the art was
generally left to its own devices. I could see Soundcloud thriving under such
a system.

And how much of this money lost was due to technological vs. human costs? How
is it that a streaming site needs nearly 200 employees anyway?

Soundcloud could be thriving, but then they seem to have put people at the
helm who prioritize spending money above all else.

~~~
kristiandupont
>I could see Soundcloud thriving under such a system.

You could see Soundcloud thriving by spending VC cash as "patronage"? Sure, so
could I! But I doubt that any VC is interested in that.

~~~
tomc1985
Yes, because many believe art to be a higher calling than some stupid new
gadget or cloud service.

While I don't really want patrons or VCs ruling the scene, and would much
rather let the artists reign, artists generally don't have jobs (VCs took 'em)
and so they don't have much money, so they can only do so much to support
themselves. Enter the patron.

~~~
drewstiff
Cool why don't you go ahead and do that instead of expecting someone else to
do it?

It's easy to say "someone else should pay for this without expecting anything
in return but the glory of art". People would rather make more money from
their money than not. If you feel that strongly, go and break the cycle. If
your personal wealth is not enough to make a difference* by doing so then I
don't see how you can go giving out your "solution" which is just getting
someone else to pay and them not have any say in how their money is being
spent.

*Disclaimer: mine is not either

------
humbleMouse
Soundcloud is a terrible mobile app and a slightly better website. I love that
I can access vast troves of undiscovered house music - but you couldn't design
a worse UI if you tried.

Soundcloud is lame now that the ads have come. Listening to a taco bell ad
come on in the middle of my favorite playlist really kils the vibe.

~~~
recursive
I'm kind of surprised to hear that. It's one of my most used and favorite
mobile apps. I'm sure I could make a worse one.

If you want to hear ads, you could subscribe to Soundcloud Go like I do. I
can't stand ads.

------
jimmytidey
New artists often just want people to hear their music, so they can build a
following.

There are millions of people who want to sift through new music to find the
next gem.

How can it be so hard to build a platform where these kinds of demand and
supply meet?

There is a separate, market where established artists want to monetise
mainstream listeners, and I can see that's what iTunes etc provide.

Maybe I'm overestimating the size of the 'sifting' market, because I'm one of
those people?

~~~
executesorder66
Check out [http://libre.fm/](http://libre.fm/)

------
firegrind
It's interesting for me as a long-term Soundcloud user to hear a predominance
of listeners here, when my experience of the site is that it focusses on
producers and performers.

Sure, once in a while someone with a YouTube mindset uploads an album that
they clearly didn't write, or an indie label learning about PR reposts their
own back catalogue, but not that often. Mostly, artists upload tracks they
wrote or are working on, and people repost a curated taste of what they are
inspired by.

That's what I found about six years ago and my community on there have helped
to keep me publishing music occasionally - not just writing bits and pieces
but actually finishing music and hitting upload.

I think I'm fairly central for Soundcloud's target audience. You'll find
download links on my tracks (full quality) and no Beatport, iTunes or Bandcamp
links, because it's something I do for fun, not profit. I've never reached my
upload limit because I'm not exactly prolific - or because the limit is
generous.

The service has value to me, but I simply don't need anything that going pro
offers.

------
kevando
People are very particular about their music. Doesn't it make sense that a
service built for niche genres doesn't have broad appeal? I fucking love
soundcloud and they nailed their product years ago, so I'm really excited to
see what deals they've been cooking up the past year or so.

I bought Soundcloud Go the day it was available.

~~~
dublinben
>service built for niche genres

There is nothing inherent in the structure of SoundCloud that limits its
usefulness to only niche genres. Mainstream genres simply have access to more
established avenues of promotion, like radio and YouTube.

~~~
kevando
Correct. Soundcloud is built for musicians that don't have access to radio and
the like, aka niche genres. That doesn't mean anyone can't use it.

------
dbcooper
I used to love Soundcloud, but with growth and licensing concerns, mixes and
remixes/edits started going missing. Then they deleted the Balearic Social
account.

A lot of the better balearic types are posting at hearthis.at now, but the
website is pretty rough, and their android app is terrible. Mixcloud seems a
better choice.

------
ChristianBundy
I use SoundCloud when I don't have any other options, but I try not to make a
habit of using websites that depend on Adobe Flash.

~~~
dublinben
SoundCloud has offered an HTML5 player for years.

~~~
OvidNaso
How dose one enable it? I only get the "something went wrong" page when
visiting the site and all the help docs only reference an HTML5 embedded
player.

~~~
dublinben
All I had to do to "enable" it was not have Flash installed. Their site has
continued to work properly with no issue.

