SoundCloud

Submission 39,357

About

SoundCloud is an audio-sharing platform with social networking features based in Berlin, Germany.

History

In August 2007, Swedish sound designer Alex Ljung and Swedish artist Eric Wahlforss began working on SoundCloud as a platform for recording artists to share music. In an interview with the technology magazine Wired,^[2] Ljung revealed that the site was initially made out of frustration for not having a proper platform to collaborate on music. The site SoundCloud.com^[5] was launched in October 2008. In April 2009, SoundCloud received €2.5 million in Series A funding from Doughty Hanson Technology Ventures.^[1] In January 2011, SoundCloud raised $10 million in Series B funding from Union Square Ventures and Index Ventures.^[3] On January 23rd, 2012, SoundCloud announced that had reached more than 10 million users and posted a story wheel on their official blog^[4] to mark the occasion (shown below).

Financial Troubles

Souncloud has had a history of being unable to monetize their product. The company posted major losses of $52 million and $44 million in 2015 and 2016, respectively. In the summer of 2017, Souncloud laid off 40% of its staff. On July 12th, 2017, Techcrunch^[8] posted a bombshell report that stated co-founders Alex Ljung and Eric Wahlross admitted to their employees that the layoffs would only keep Soundcloud afloat until Q4, just 80 days away from the time the article was posted. On the 14th, Chance the Rapper tweeted that he had just called Ljung and that Soundcloud was here to stay.^[9] Ljung echoed the sentiment in a blog post that day.^[10] On August 11th, Ljung took to the Soundcloud blog^[11] again to announce that The Raine Group and Temasek had invested in Soundcloud. He also announced that he would no longer be the company's CEO and would take on the role of Chairman. There has been no further update on Chance the Rapper's supposed involvement on the platform.

Features

SoundCloud users can upload audio files to share on their public feeds, with each given a distinctive URL. Audio tracks are automatically visualized as waveforms and users can leave comments at specific parts on a track's timeline. Registered users are allowed to upload up to 120 minutes of audio to their profile for free and can pay a subscription fee to upload additional content.

Highlights

Actual Cannibal Shia LaBeouf

Actual Cannibal Shia LaBeouf is a comedy song portraying the actor Shia LaBeouf as a homicidal cannibal. The song inspired several photoshopped images and animated GIFs of LeBeouf after it was uploaded to SoundCloud in March 2012.

Comcast Customer Service Fiasco

Comcast Customer Service Fiasco refers to the online backlash surrounding a recorded telephone conversation in which tech blogger Ryan Block repeatedly tries to request a Comcast customer service representative to cancel his cable service subscription over the course of an 18 minute-long call. The recording instantly went viral after Block uploaded a portion of the conversation to SoundCloud in July 2014, which ultimately prompted the American cable company to issue a personal apology.

Airhorn Remixes

Air Horn Remixes are audio tracks and music videos that feature samples of the loud, high-pitched sound produced by the portable pneumatic instrument. It is most commonly featured as an ironic-comedic device in montage parodies and other mashup tracks by remix artists.

Traffic

On July 17th, 2013, USA Today^[7] reported that SoundCloud^[7] had reached 40 million registered users and 200 million unique listeners worldwide. As of July 2014, the site has a global rank of 206 and a United States rank of 126 on the traffic analytics site Alexa,^[6]