International Journal of Multidisciplinary Research and Development
89
International Journal of Multidisciplinary Research and Development
Online ISSN: 2349-4182, Print ISSN: 2349-5979; Impact Factor: RJIF 5.72
Received: 19-10-2019; Accepted: 21-11-2019
www.allsubjectjournal.com
Volume 6; Issue 12; December 2019; Page No. 89-93
A comparative study of Soundcloud and Mixcloud
Dr. Geetali Tilak
Professor, Department of Journalism and Mass Communication Tilak Maharashtra Vidyapeeth, Pune, Maharashtra, India
Abstract
Automated communication on social media has seen augmented attention. Podcasts and streaming music from various DJs and
radio announcers are demonstrating itself to be quite the dawn in terms of the popularity of the music industry. This
contemporary research paper is mainly focused on dualistic superlative online audio distribution and podcast streaming
platforms which are known as Soundcloud and Mixcloud. In this paper researcher will emphasis on comparison between
Sound cloud and Mix cloud. Further, researcher has provided discernment on pros and cons of audio distribution and podcast
streaming platforms grounded on number of variables. Similarly, the present research paper will deliver highlights on analysis
of deliberated online audio streaming services through various former services and platforms such as You tube and Beat port.
To accomplish the expected outcomes of the study researcher has designed structured questionnaire and collected data from
respondents. Further, collected data is used for data analysis. The outcomes from the analysis done by researcher are shared in
the paper.
Keywords: Audio Streaming, Data Analysis, Mixcloud, Online Streaming Service, Soundcloud
1. Introduction
In today’s progressive, innovative and hi-tech era plenty of
online streaming platforms are available to the artists. With
the commencement of an Internet several companies
emanated with copious platforms to give artists and listeners
acquaintance to multiple genres and types of music.
Soundcloud and Mixcloud are the most extensively used
and favoured online audio streaming platforms. There are
many other services also like Youtube, Beatport, Gaana,
Saavn, etc.
An online music store is an online business which deals
with audio files selling over the Internet. Conversely, online
music stores usuallydeal with partial streaming previews of
songs, sometimes few songs are available for full length
listening. Online music stores typically show a picture of the
album art or of the performer or band for each song. Some
online music stores also sell recorded speech files, such as
podcasts and video files of movies. Now a day there is
increase in amount of new services which enable musicians
to sell their music directly to fans without third party
involvement. These type of services habitually use e-
commerce-enabled web widgets that entrench into
numerous web pages.
In the early 2010s, online music stores—especially
iTunes—experienced a marked increase in sales. The iTunes
platform has been the main reason for this shift, as it
originally sold every song in its library for 99 cents.
Furthermore, with the arising popularity of Cyber Monday,
online music stores have further gained ground over other
music distribution sources
It has been observed that consumer spending is shifted away
from the purchase of compact discs (CDs) in favour of
purchasing albums from online music stores, or more
commonly, purchasing individual songs. Factually, albums
would be sold five times the cost of a single, but iTunes was
selling every song for a tenth of the price of an album.
Nevertheless, in order to increase album sales, iTunes
instituted "Complete My Album," which offered a
discounted price on the full album, if a consumer has
already purchased one or more songs.
The main aim of this research paper is:
To compare between pros and cons of online audio
streaming platforms i.e. Sound loud and Mix cloud.
To find out reason behind popularity behind Sound
cloud and Mixcloud in terms of mixes and singles.
To discover the view of artists and listeners with data
analysis.
What is sound cloud and Mixcloud ???
Soundcloud is the largest music and audio platform which
allows populaces to discover and enjoy the utmost
assortment of music from the supreme diverse creator
community on earth.It was launched in the year 2008.
Soundcloud is well-known for the aforementioned exclusive
content and features which the ability to share music and
connect directly with artists. It also featured with unearth
breakthrough tracks, raw demos, podcasts and many more.
It’s all possible due to the open platform which has an
ability not only to directly connect the creators and their
fans across the globe but also creator can receive feedback
from SoundCloud community.
Mixcloud is a British online music streaming service was
founded as a start-up company over and done with the lean
start up process in 2008 by Nikhil Shah and Nico Perez,
who met at the University of Cambridge. Mixcloud allows
to listening and distribution of radio shows, DJ mixes and
podcasts, which are crowd sourced by its registered users.
The prominent users include Wired, Harvard Business
School, TED Talks, and Barack Obama. As of 2012,
Mixcloud was reported to have over 3 million active users
and over 500 thousand registered Facebook application
users. In October 2017, Mixcloud signed direct licensing
agreement with Warner Music.
International Journal of Multidisciplinary Research and Development
90
Mixcloud also provides an API which users can search,
upload, and embed its content. Users may also share
podcasts and mixes via Facebook, Twitter, and Google.
Mobile apps are available for both Android and iOS. In
December 2018, Mixcloud announced a new form of
subscription called "fan-to-creator". This modernization is
an endeavour by the company to find a new ways of
funding. Mixcloud restricts its users from downloading
audio content from its website for licensing reasons.
Mixcloud also requires its users to attribute their audio
uploads with correct Artist and Song metadata in order to
preserve intellectual property rights.
Mixcloud has constantly been a smart choice for DJs who
want to stream their DJ sets to the world. It is 100% legal, to
start with. It is also one of the much trustworthy names in
the industry so the chances of disappearing in one day are
moderately squat.
When comparing Sound cloudvs Mixcloud, the Slant
community recommends Sound Cloud for most people. In
the question "What are the best music streaming services?"
SoundCloud is ranked 4th while Mixcloud is ranked 16th.
The most important reason people chose SoundCloudis :
You can subscribe to artists to be notified the instant they
upload a new song or give an update.
Pros and Cons of Soundcloud and Mixcloud
Soundcloud Pros
Subscribe to artists: You can subscribe to artists to be
notified. The moment they upload a new song or give an
update will be received by subscriber.
Follow people: You can trail people with similar
discriminations or that frequently find new music. When
they preferred a songSoundcloud will notify you also for the
same..
Recommendations: Links related music, based on what
you're listening to, can be found in the sidebar.
Explore tab has new music constantly: Explore tab hasa
constant stream of new music. This tab on Soundcloud
shows trending music that can be filtered based on
genre/tag.
Free to use: Sound cloud is free. You don't even have to log
in or sign up for an account if you don't want to. It also
provide paid option for the peoples who want to upload
large quantities of audio, but it's free to download as much
and as often as you like.
Pre-releases: One can get new release earliest on Sound
cloud as it has ability to show it before appear anywhere
else.
Creative Commons filter: Soundcloud allows for finding
music that is licensed under Creative Commons.
Sound cloud Cons
Can't do an advanced search: Advanced search option is
very poor on Sound cloud. Example: Creative commons
music with the tag #trap. It could be useful to search for
music you like that is under Creative Commons.
Interface is full of bugs: The Sound cloud website has tons
of problems, including issues with notifications, favourites,
and uploading sounds.
Audio ads in some uploaded content: Some content on
Sound cloud includes audio ads, particularly sponsored
podcasts.
Mixcloud Pros and Cons
Mixcloud Pros
Wide & varied content: There is anenormous and
mottledassortment of content across many styles, genres &
vintages all effortlessly found via tags and particularly
effective recommendations.
Totally Free: Peoples are free to listen and upload as much
as they like.
Sound Quality: Music sounds crisp and punchy when
streaming/playback specially when using quality
headphones/speakers.
Friendly Interface: Mixcloud is user friendly due to its
features.It's easy to use the simple and attractive platform,
unlike the Archive.org.
Mixcloud Cons
Ads even in paid Pro account: Free and Pro Accounts put
ads in your content. If you don't want ads, you have to pay
6.99 USD/mo. for the Premium account.
Engagement tools just for paid accounts: If you want to
grow and monitor your audience in the platform, you'll need
to sign the Pro account, which costs $15/month or
$135/year.
Data charges by surprise: Surprise data charges can be
applied. SO people need to watch out for those data charges
if they are interchanging.
Some common differences between Mixcloud and
Soundcloud:
Table 1: Comparison between Soundcloud and Mixcloud
SoundCloud
MixCloud
Souncloud is for any type of
sound file. E.g. a snippet, a full
track, or a 3h DJ set.
Mixcloud is for DJ sets /
Radio shows. Not for
single tracks.
Very tiny free plan as limit is
based on hours
Mixcloud has no such
limits.
It has a very effective/annoying
sound file introspection system.
It doesn’t have any such
system.
It is more than Mixcloud.
Less popular as compared
to Soundcloud.
Don’t provide Track list.
Provide Track list
Source: Designed by researcher
Research methodology
Research Methodology is the systematic, theoretical
analysis of the methods applied to a field of research. In this
paper the theoretical and philosophical assumptions
underlying the research methodology were reviewed. In this
paper to do the comparative study of Soundcloud and
Mixcloud researcher has designed the questionnaire.
Researcher has designed google form to collect the data
from the respondents. The questions are mainly comprised
of Sound and Online Audio Streaming Services such as
Mixcloud, Beauport, Soundcloud, YouTube, etc. Researcher
has used Likert Scaling method to study the responses
received from questionnaire. Hence, to obtain the answer
and calculate the average Mean, Median and Modes has
helped.
The calculation of mean is helped to find out average
answer which will provide the information about hypothesis
is being proved. The details for the same are as shown in
below table:
International Journal of Multidisciplinary Research and Development
91
Table 2: Average wise result
Average Value
Result
1 To 1.67
Will represent Null Hypothesis
1.68 To 2.34
Will represent Non-Directional Hypothesis.
2.35 To 3
Will represent Directional Hypothesis
Source: Designed by researcher
Each partition have 0, 67 difference in between and where
ever mean will fall in the above range that is concluded in
the paper. For example if my mean will be 1.3 then my null
hypothesis will be proved or if 2.7 wilt be my mean then my
directional hypothesis will be proved like that whatever will
be the mean and in whichever range its falling in, that will
be my hypothesis for this research.
Statement of the problem
For this paper researcher has focused on comparison of
Soundcloud and Mixcloud.
In this research, researcher has focused on study about how
influential the two platforms namely, Soundcloud and
Mixcloud are for consumers and artists. Throughout the
industry, there is a resounding question among artists i.e.
which is the preeminent platform to showcase their mixes
and tracks, at the same time procurement maximum
response and activity for their uploads while being cost
effective.
Objective of research
The objective of the research is as below
To study various aspects of an artist uploads grounded
on various parameters.
To conduct unbiased study of people who listen to and
make mixes and music online using online audio
streaming platform.
To perform data analysis on collected data.
Research Scope
The scope of the study is to revise and compare the
SounCloud and MixCloud aspects. The aspects considered
to this research are various aspects of an artist upload
grounded on various parameters. Like Copyright Claims/
Strikedowns, Type of upload, Duration of upload, Services
provided by company. User Interface of the app/website,
Ease of use, Fee of the subscription.
In addition to it to help industry artists and the common man
comprehend what tools are superlative for individuals out of
the massive number of options of publishing various audio
streaming services such as Youtube, Soundcloud, Mixcloud,
Beat port etc.
To find out what’s the superlative platform for a specific
person on the basis of the type of content wants to upload to
showcase their mixes and tracks, at the same time obtaining
maximum response and activity for their uploads while
being cost effective.
Below mentioned are some of the major scopes of the
current research
This research will comfort industry professionals to
make right choice to elect the right platform which will
help to grow a better profile of them.
It will also guide the artists to comprehend the utmost
favoured platforms used by the listeners.
The listener will also get an insight of the choices made
by artists and make them aware about where it would
find what kind of music more.
Sample selected for the study will help artists and
listeners to make the choice of the audio platform as per
their need.
Research methodology
This research is based on the primary and secondary data.
Primary data is obtained with the questionnaire and the
secondary data has been collected from different types of
sources as local and international journals, articles, web
sites and published and unpublished thesis, reports, blogs,
articles etc.
Content validity
In this study the content validity of the survey
instrument ensured by
Printed and digital books
Extensive Literature Review
Though the content are ensured by various ways mentioned
above all the content from this paper are own contribution
of the researcher.
Data collection and analysis
For the current study researcher has analysed the data and
made it easier to understand. To collect the data from the
respondents researcher has designed questionnaire which
consists of 10 questions. Questionnaire was made available
online to the respondents through google form. The details
of data collection and analysis done are as described below:
Collection of the data
This research is based on the primary and secondary data.
Primary data is obtained with the questionnaire and the
secondary data has been collected from different types of
sources as local and international journals, articles, web
sites and published and unpublished thesis, reports, blogs,
articles etc.
Data analysis
Researcher has done a survey on a mix of artists as well as
listeners so as to understand the reasons for preference of
audio streaming platforms Soundcloud and Mixcloud. The
survey samples of the study were selected from the peoples
whose age varied from 18 to 30. Questionnaire was made up
of 10 questions which were focused on the aim of study.The
discussion of this survey and the division of the responses
are done on below basis:
Mix of artists and listeners selected as samples
Questions formed to get a view of preferences of
both the artists and the listeners on various music
platforms.
Researcher has calculated mean of all responses received.
The conclusions based on the calculated mean are as shown
in below table:
International Journal of Multidisciplinary Research and Development
92
Table 3: Conclusions based on the calculated mean
Mean
Values
Hypothesis
Description
1 to 1.67
Null Hypothesis
The apps used for audio streaming are as per the preference (personal choice) of
the listener
1.68 to 2.34
Non- Directional
Hypothesis
The apps used for audio streaming are as per the genre of music the listener or artist is interested
in
2.35 to 3
Directional Hypothesis
The apps used for audio streaming are as per the length of the content and the type of the content
(singles or mixes)
Source: Designed by researcher
From the analysis made it has been observed that the
torrents trends are as follows
Today's listeners are listening to tracks which are
around or over an hour and hence the numbers of mixes
being produced by various artists are increasing day by
day.
Researcher has surveyed various listeners and artist to
find the length of the content they are listening to and
analysis says that most of the listeners prefer audio
content which are more than 30 minutes going up toand
above an hour.
Listeners are grasped to be favouring to listen to singles
on Soundcloud.
Nevertheless the number of listeners using Soundcloud
is high; it is not the single runner in this race for audio
platforms. The other platforms like Saavn, Gaana,
Spotify and Youtube are also widely used.
For the analysis of Non-directional hypothesis, researcher
has asked the sample a specific question understand whether
the genre of the music affects their choice of the audio
streaming platform. The analyses of the responses received
are as follows:
In most cases the audio platform is not selected on the
basis of genre.
Variables used for the study
Dependent Variable - Length and Type of track (single
or mix)
Independent Variable - Genre of music
Extraneous Variable- Choice of listener for the platform
Conclusion
In this paper researcher has focused on comparative study of
SoundCloud and MixCloud. Researcher has drawn the
conclusion of the study by analysing the authentic data
received from respondents which was collected through
primary data collection method. In this paper researcher has
find out the reason for what makes SoundCloud and
MixCloud the leading platforms in the market. Further
researcher has described about the factors on the basis of
which Soundcloud and Mixcloud are selected for audio
streaming by the listeners and the artists.In continuation to
this researcher come up with the conclusion that the
platform selected by the artist is mainly based on two
factors. The first factor is the type of the track to be
uploaded and second one the length of the track.
It has been observed during the study that, Soundcloudat
present allows uploading of both single tracks as well as
mixes. Voluminous artists favour having their tracks as well
as mixes on a single audio platform. It is favoured when the
length of mixes is petitei.e. less than 180 minutes as the
uploads till this track time are allowed from a free account
rather than a paid Soundcloud account. Whereas,
Mixcloudcountenances the upload of only mixes and does
not allow single tracks. Consequently,Mixcloud is favoured
by artists who have to upload mixes of more than 180
minutes. For artists predominantly working on mixes,
Mixcloud is the go to platform. Researcher is happy to share
that, directional hypothesis is proved as positive that the
platform preferred is on the basis of the track length.
Limitation
The present paper is focused on comparison of
Soundcloud and Mixcloud.
There were a few limitations confronted by researcher while
conducting this research. These have listed below:
Like any research, the data has been collected for a few
samples and is not a comprehensive list.
The age group surveyed was between 18 to 30. Hence,
the results hold good for this particular age group only.
The method used for this is only on the basis of the
questionnaire considering the time available for the
research.
The availability and readiness of the samples surveyed.
Topics for further research
Grounded on the type of the content researcher would
recommend that the audio streaming app should be selected
for artists who famine to upload single tracks, there is or
using Mixcloud. Mixcloud can be used only for mixes.
Henceforth, for the artists who effort only with mixes,
Mixcloud would be the utmost favoured alternative. Other
alternatives such as Beatport are also available. Though
Soundcloud can be used for mixes a single audio platform
for uploading all the work of an artist may be favoured by
the artist.
Soundcloud does countenance uploading tracks or mixes up
to 180 minutes using their free membership but for above
that we need to use the paid service of Soundcloud. Also the
threatof copyright strike is high on Soundcloud. For artists
functioning with single tracks, Soundcloud is seen as the go
to option as it is more artists oriented. Single tracks can be
uploaded on numerousplatforms such as Spotify, Amazon
Music, Gaana etc. Subsequently, researcher suggest below
topics for future research:
Copyright issues for soundClouds
MixCloudImoprt from SoundCloud
References
1. https://www.slant.co/versu5/739/20852/~soundcloud
vsmixcloud
2. https://www.hossmusic.com/soundcloud-vs-rnixcloud/
3. https://www.quora.com/Which-is-the-best-site-to-
upload-a-DJ-mix-new-song-SoundCloud-orMixcloud
4. http://support.mixcloud.com/customer/portal/articles/15
International Journal of Multidisciplinary Research and Development
93
7235-single-tracks-why-can-t-i'- upload-songs.
5. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single
6. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DJ mix
7. https://www.digitalditips.com/2018/04/mixcloud-get-
much-better-dis/
8. https://blog.liveschool.net/soundcloud-or-mixcloud/
9. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixcloud
10. https://en. wikipedia.org/wiki/Live-set
11. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_mixing_(recorded_
music)
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mixcloud-best-site-upload- song/
13. http://support.mixcloud.com/customer/portal/articles/15
7231-uploading-what-type- of-content-you-can-upload
14. https://blog.songtrust.com/how-to-2/the-costs-of-music-
publishing
15. https://www.hypebot.com/hypebot/2017/03/the-costs-
of-music-publishing.html
