SoundCloud

SoundCloud was founded in August 2007 in Berlin, Germany by Swedish sound designer Alexander Ljung and Swedish electronic musician Eric Wahlforss. The two friends created the platform out of frustration with the difficulty of sharing music and audio files with collaborators. Unlike YouTube, which focused on video for the masses, SoundCloud was initially designed as a professional tool for musicians, producers, and audio creators to upload, share, and receive feedback on their work. The platform's distinctive waveform visualisations and ability to comment at specific timestamps in tracks set it apart from other music services. SoundCloud officially launched to the public in October 2008 and quickly gained traction within the music production community, offering both free and premium tiers for users.

SoundCloud's true cultural impact emerged in the early 2010s when it became the launchpad for a new generation of independent artists who bypassed traditional record labels entirely. The platform democratised music distribution, allowing unknown artists to upload tracks directly to millions of listeners. Artists like Chance the Rapper, Post Malone, Lil Uzi Vert, Billie Eilish, and countless others gained their initial followings on SoundCloud, giving rise to the term "SoundCloud rapper" to describe a DIY aesthetic and distribution model. By 2013, SoundCloud had 250 million listeners and was hosting 10 hours of audio uploaded every minute. The platform became essential infrastructure for electronic music, hip hop, podcasts, and experimental audio, fostering vibrant communities around genres like cloud rap, future bass, and lo-fi hip-hop.

However, SoundCloud's path has been turbulent. The company struggled to balance its creator-first ethos with the need for profitability and copyright compliance. Legal pressures from major record labels over unlicensed music led to licensing agreements in 2015-2016 with Universal, Sony, and Warner Music Group, though these deals came with significant revenue-sharing obligations. SoundCloud launched its monetisation program, Premier (later rebranded as the Repost program), allowing creators to earn money from their uploads, but faced criticism that payments were too low. The company went through multiple rounds of funding, layoffs in 2017, and came close to running out of money before securing emergency investment. In 2022, SoundCloud was acquired by its creditors in a complex financial restructuring, and the company has since focused on stabilising its business model with subscription tiers and improved creator payments.

Today, SoundCloud remains a vital platform in the music ecosystem with over 375 million monthly listeners and more than 40 million creators uploading content. While it faces intense competition from Spotify, Apple Music, and other streaming services, SoundCloud maintains its unique position as the platform where emerging artists break through and experimental sounds find audiences. The company continues to innovate with features like fan-powered royalties (which pay artists based on their actual listeners rather than pooled streams) and direct artist-to-fan tools. Co-founder Alexander Ljung stepped down as CEO in 2017, with various executives leading the company since. Despite its financial challenges, SoundCloud's cultural legacy is secure: it fundamentally changed how independent music is discovered and distributed, proving that artists don't need major labels...