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Re:SoundCloud cuts jobs, closes SF and London offices by niftich on Thursday July 06, 2017 @12:47PM (#14711755)
I don't know how SoundCloud is managed and what their balance sheet looks like, but it's deeply unfortunate that a site that caters largely to up-and-coming musicians has so much trouble getting out of the red.

Presumably they're hurt by the presence of platforms such as Youtube or the 2010s' rebooted Myspace, where musicians can reach a larger audience and where both sides of the equation are subsidized by ads.

Meanwhile, more focused sites like Beatport appeared to have a successful recipe by selling actual tracks for download despite essentially offering unlimited streaming, yet even they ran into some trouble with their latest pivot.

It's a tough space to make money in, despite seemingly meeting a popular need.

Re:SoundCloud cuts jobs, closes SF and London offices by raesene6 on Thursday July 06, 2017 @01:01PM (#14711868)
As soundcloud are a UK registered company you can actually see all their accounts/filings here https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/06343600/filing-h...

looking at their accounts to Dec 2015 (latest available), they don't make great reading. The balance sheet value went from £8m to -£34m in one year...

Re:SoundCloud cuts jobs, closes SF and London offices by komodo on Thursday July 06, 2017 @01:09PM (#14711945)
I wonder what their terms were when they signed up with the labels to be yet another Spotify clone. If it was any sort of upfront payment that would hit them hard since I don't think they have many subscribers to their SoundCloud plus (or whatever it's called)