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SoundCloud's Collapse

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Re: SoundCloud's Collapse

#241

Post by bogomipz »

cookiecaper wrote: post #219
bogomipz wrote: post #155

>"In November 2014, SoundCloud closed a deal with Warner Music Group, giving the label an undisclosed cut of revenue from ads, a 3%–5% stake in the company and protection against past copyright infringement from the label." This sounds like terms dictated by the Mob. It's quite telling that the deal also conferred ownership on a content holder in order to be able to license and pay handsomely for their content. This…

>This sounds like terms dictated by the Mob. The simple fact is that copyright protections are far too strong. The copyright cartel doesn't need a shady network of 400 pound men to enforce their schemes; they just use the U.S. Attorney's office instead. How many bright technical entrepreneurs have been crushed by rent-seekers milking the royalties out of a 40-year-old track? Copyright has completely lost the plot. We…

>"How many bright technical entrepreneurs have been crushed by rent-seekers milking the royalties out of a 40-year-old track?"

Anything after Jan 1st of 1978 is now capped at 35 years, so these are becoming less and less See:

http://www.songwriteruniverse.com/gosainkaplanrecapture123.h...

>"Copyright has completely lost the plot."

Well the copyright of the of recording is there to protect the record label's investment. They aren't going to finance a record and it's promotion if someone else can come along and also release the same recording and collect money for it. That was always the plot.

That being said artists don't have to sign contracts with record labels if they don't want. With technology and the internet it is possible today more than at any point in history to successfully release and promote your music without a record label. I thought this was the great promise of platforms like Soundcloud. If an artist decides they need the marketing muscle of a record label they can license their recordings to a record label and retain the recording copyright. I really believe this is the future: See:

https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2009/jan/29/reco...

Re: SoundCloud's Collapse

#242

Post by sillysaurus3 »

codegladiator wrote: post #213
sillysaurus3 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, I'm using http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html That's like calling a newly established barber shop a startup. It's not. The GP is working on a podcast hosting company. The market for people who want to host podcasts is miniscule. Large enough to sustain a company, sure. But that's not a startup.

So by that logic, a startup which which provides barber to your doorstep to trim your hair is not a startup ? Also, what about start-ups selling fruits/vegetables ?

Read the essay.

Re: SoundCloud's Collapse

#243

Post by pmarreck »

sgentle wrote: post #47

Never do a music industry startup unless you have a billion dollars, can raise a billion dollars, or plan to be acquired by a company with a billion dollars to spare. That's the table stakes for going toe-to-toe with the big three. They'll bleed you to death with licensing fees, deputise you into their copyright enforcement police, upload their songs to your platform on one hand while suing you with the other, and al…

Can't someone start a brand new music business model from scratch?

Re: SoundCloud's Collapse

#244

Post by Dylan16807 »

bogomipz wrote: post #241
cookiecaper wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This sounds like terms dictated by the Mob. The simple fact is that copyright protections are far too strong. The copyright cartel doesn't need a shady network of 400 pound men to enforce their schemes; they just use the U.S. Attorney's office instead. How many bright technical entrepreneurs have been crushed by rent-seekers milking the royalties out of a 40-year-old track? Copyright has completely lost the plot. We…

>"How many bright technical entrepreneurs have been crushed by rent-seekers milking the royalties out of a 40-year-old track?" Anything after Jan 1st of 1978 is now capped at 35 years, so these are becoming less and less See: http://www.songwriteruniverse.com/gosainkaplanrecapture123.h... >"Copyright has completely lost the plot." Well the copyright of the of recording is there to protect the record label's investmen…

That helps a little bit but it's not automatic and even when that's done the music is still under maximum copyright for another century.

Re: SoundCloud's Collapse

#245

Post by meowface »

pmarreck wrote: post #243
sgentle wrote: post #47

Never do a music industry startup unless you have a billion dollars, can raise a billion dollars, or plan to be acquired by a company with a billion dollars to spare. That's the table stakes for going toe-to-toe with the big three. They'll bleed you to death with licensing fees, deputise you into their copyright enforcement police, upload their songs to your platform on one hand while suing you with the other, and al…

Can't someone start a brand new music business model from scratch?

I can't really imagine how. Content needs to be licensed if you want to profit off of it legally, and I'm not sure how you can disrupt licensing unless you already have many billions of dollars to throw around.

Re: SoundCloud's Collapse

#246

Post by meowface »

peterlk wrote: post #223
bogomipz wrote: post #155

>"In November 2014, SoundCloud closed a deal with Warner Music Group, giving the label an undisclosed cut of revenue from ads, a 3%–5% stake in the company and protection against past copyright infringement from the label." This sounds like terms dictated by the Mob. It's quite telling that the deal also conferred ownership on a content holder in order to be able to license and pay handsomely for their content. This…

Yep, I remember this. I used to use SoundCloud for everything. I built a following, a reputation, and then SoundCloud tried to commit suicide. They signed this stupid deal, they removed groups, and they tried to shove Soundcloud Go down everyone's throats. I think all 3 oysf those things are related, despite PR claiming (vaguely) otherwise. I've been paying SoundCloud for years. They had a business model. I use(d) So…

>I use(d) SoundCloud because everything on SoundCloud sounded different than everywhere else.

Because they have the lowest bit rate MP3s out of all the big streaming platforms?

Re: SoundCloud's Collapse

#247

Post by res0nat0r »

lukaslalinsky wrote: post #139
thinbeige wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Again you're not understanding what I'm saying. How many times do you want to repeat this? > SoundCloud did not start off with DJ mixes or copyrighted material. The CEO and CTO were themselves very much into EDM. SC positioned itself repetoire-wise as a DJ platform from very early on, most tracks, traffic, the first surge were EDM-based the first years. And 99% was copyrighted material stitched together. I don't kn…

It was a platform for producers, not DJs.

But the underlying issue is that those DJ tracks many times technically did need permission from copyright holders to be posted. Unfortunately dealing with this w/o a ton of money is just a failing exercise.

Soundcloud is still good to get DJ mixes from DJ's I like, but I can seeing it go away just due to all of the costs that would accompany trying to ensure they have the right to share everything that is posted by users.

Re: SoundCloud's Collapse

#248

Post by sillysaurus3 »

dkersten wrote: post #220
sillysaurus3 wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If podcast hosting is used as a stepping stone into a more general market, that could work. But the GP indicated they were small and moved slowly, so they can't really leverage that. It doesn't matter whether it originated in the valley. It's not like calling an elevator a lift. A startup is a technical term with a precise meaning. You can call your bar a startup if you want, but that doesn't make it true.

> A startup is a technical term with a precise meaning. My point is that it's really not. The term existed before the valley-definition and it exists outside of the valley-definition. Yes, Paul Graham and others popularised that definition (and I personally think it's a good definition and usually use t as that), but it has existed and continues to exist with other meanings, so it's far from a "precise technical term…

If a rose by any other name smells just as sweet, then a business by any other name stays just as small.

If a business is small and stays small, then at best it's a failed startup. If it's designed to stay small, then it's not a startup at all.

You can argue any other point, but you can't avoid the growth criteria. And if you have that, either you grow quickly or your competitor will put you out of business.

My point is that a podcast hosting company has no growth potential. The target market is too small. A startup could use podcast hosting as a stepping stone toward a bigger market, but in absence of that, it's a business like any other. And there's no shame in admitting that.

But it's really strange to insist it's a startup when it's not. Imagine insisting that a desktop computer is a chair just because you can sit on it.

Re: SoundCloud's Collapse

#249

Post by meowface »

jameskegel wrote: post #172
k-mcgrady wrote: post #17

SoundCloud could have been a nice business if they hadn't got greedy. From the beginning (or close to it) there have been various paid accounts for artists which a lot of people used. SoundCloud was the best place to discover new music from unsigned artists. There were unsigned artists with tracks on it that blew up and eventually got picked up by major labels. But: - SoundCloud neglected the platform. - Then they di…

It is funny you mention Bandcamp as your flagship example considering how much 1993 duct tape is holding it together. You cannot compare the UI and tech of the two; Bandcamp has neglected the same Courier New interface since they were a startup. SoundCloud engineering is worlds ahead. They were one of the biggest proponents and pioneers of containerized microservice architecture. They took a lot of beatings so that w…

I have no idea how Bandcamp is built behind the scenes, but from a user-facing perspective, their UI and UX seem way better than Soundcloud's.

>Frankly I've never read an inspiring development article from Bandcamp a engineering team.

I don't know the actual user numbers, but I'm guessing this is because Soundcloud has had to scale a lot more than Bandcamp has and not necessarily because Bandcamp's engineering team is worse.

But, hey, maybe Soundcloud did have a top-class engineering team. Doesn't really change my opinion of it, since I've always considered it the worst and least user-friendly out of all the streaming platforms (mid-song user comments I can't disable; next song autoplay that I can barely find the playlist for, with seemingly no relation to what I was just listening to; horrible sound quality; hideous and distracting color scheme that distracts from the music, much unlike BC).

That may be entirely the fault of the management and not the engineers, but still.

Re: SoundCloud's Collapse

#250

Post by thirdsun »

Kenji wrote: post #84
sgentle wrote: post #47

Never do a music industry startup unless you have a billion dollars, can raise a billion dollars, or plan to be acquired by a company with a billion dollars to spare. That's the table stakes for going toe-to-toe with the big three. They'll bleed you to death with licensing fees, deputise you into their copyright enforcement police, upload their songs to your platform on one hand while suing you with the other, and al…

Seems to work for Bandcamp though (which I love by the way).

The difference is that Bandcamp doesn‘t need to make deals with major labels. Instead they have smaller and larger labels as well as independent artists coming to them.

I really don‘t understand why Soundcloud tried to get into general, mainstream music streaming. Keeping their niche as paid host for DJs, radio shows, independent artists and small labels should have been their main focus. As a paid service for listeners (in contrast to artists) it simply can‘t compete with Spotify, Apple and others.

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