“We have an opportunity to mold behaviours [sic] and make new things that never have been seen.”
Those are the words of Alexander Ljung and Eric Wahlforss, SoundCloud’s co-founders, in a 2011 video feature hosted by adidas on YouTube. The remainder of the three-minute clip includes thoughts like, “There were so many broken things on the web that you could improve and make ten times better. And make new stuff. In some way that’s where it started.” Basically, it’s your run-of-the-mill entrepreneurial change-the-world-isms, but it’s happening in a world that actually matters to so many of us: music. But some eight years since starting SoundCloud, when they “realized [they] had to fix” the Internet, the Berlin-by-way-of-Stockholm businessmen have seemingly hit a wall.
That wall is one made evident by the following comment on the adidas clip, which hadn’t received user feedback since 2013: “Hurry up and fix soundcloud then! ;)”. It’s a brief, potent message aimed squarely at Ljung and Wahlforss, two guys so adamant about repairing a broken system that they apparently didn’t realize they can become part of the problem of stifling creativity in the music industry.
Over the past month or so, a growing number of producers and DJs have voiced their displeasure with SoundCloud after receiving takedown notices on remixes, edits, mashups, mixes, etc. often without any warning. Universal Music Group has been cited as one of the major shit-starters in this whole debacle, apparently shutting down accounts and deleting tracks it feels infringes on its copyrights. Mixmag reported that SoundCloud told one user that Universal removed his songs and “that SoundCloud had no control over it.” When the producer wanted to know why this happened, he was told that “they (Universal) don't tell us (SoundCloud)” which part of your upload was infringing.”
Article by Andrew Martin
Source: Noisey Vice
Registered
Article by Andrew Martin
Source: Noisey Vice
Registered
