Mixcloud are changing the playback experience for free listeners (for the worse)

[Steve]

If you don't have a paid account, the following limits will soon apply: -

 

1. You'll be able to skip forwards, but not backwards.

 

2. You'll only be able to listen to the same show/mix up to 3 times in a rolling 2 week window.

 

3. You won't be able to listen to shows/mixes that feature more than 4 tracks from the same artist, or more than 3 tracks from the same album.

 

To get around the above limitations, as well as removing ads and being able to see track listings upfront, there are 2 paid plans, the second of which is new: -

 

1. Mixcloud Select. This is a Patreon-like subscription where you can subscribe to an individual creator. The minimum price is $2.99 per month, but the creator can set it higher if they want to. The creator gets a share of the revenue, although I'm not sure what the split is. Currently there's only 40ish creators that you can subscribe to, but it will be expanded in the future. I don't know how this works in regards to copyright, for example, if you're a mix DJ playing songs you don't own the rights to, I don't know if you'd be able to make money from Select.

 

2. Mixcloud Premium. This is $7.99 per month and applies to all of the content on Mixcloud, rather than you supporting an individual creator via Select.

[TBearOne8III]

yeah, i got the same email. its always some type of cash grab. i think the not being able to rewind thing is not new. how long will it be before we have to get our mixes cleared before they will actually be posted to the public?

[Tbtf]

Wowwww... so trash R.I.P NTS

[Wax On]

People are really gonna moan at a subscription model?

 

Theres a fuck ton of content on there, youve had it free for years, they tried to monetise for artists from the start and now theyre trying to monetise for the DJ too...whats the problem with that?

[TBearOne8III]

wax, this only works if the dj actually gets paid. i dont post original tracks. all my mixes are derived of other peoples music. so who gets the check?

[Steve]

It's just going to lead to fewer plays for DJs like us.

 

Let's face it, we're not going to get people supporting us with the $3 per month plan.

 

Making the product worse for free users will push some people into subscribing, but I think it will ultimately just push more people away from the platform or make them use it less. $8 a month is not exactly big money, but people have all kinds of monthly outgoings and I think a ton of people will answer "is this worth paying $8 for?" with "no".

 

I think SoundCloud gets it right, because they don't target listeners with their Pro plan. I pay for Pro so that I can upload more than 3 hours of content, and so that I have no limit on downloads. It's like paying for a web host that also provides me with an audience. It's not targetting the people who want to listen to my stuff, which then has a knock-on effect of making the platform even more shitty for me. I do like the $3 a month idea that Mixcloud are doing, even though I'll never make any money from that, but if they combined that with a clone of SoundCloud's Pro plan, that would have been far better than targetting listeners IMO.

[Wax On]

It's just going to lead to fewer plays for DJs like us.

 

Let's face it, we're not going to get people supporting us with the $3 per month plan.

 

Maybe not you or I, but maybe there are people it will benefit.

 

 

wax, this only works if the dj actually gets paid. i dont post original tracks. all my mixes are derived of other peoples music. so who gets the check?

 

Do you deserve the check? Ultimately we're all trying to capitalise on other people's music, so we've gotta eat it if we don't get paid.

 

I got kicked off Soundcloud with about 200K plays for copyright infringement cos I was posting mashups. it's not my music so what place do i have to complain?

 

Making the product worse for free users will push some people into subscribing, but I think it will ultimately just push more people away from the platform or make them use it less. $8 a month is not exactly big money, but people have all kinds of monthly outgoings and I think a ton of people will answer "is this worth paying $8 for?" with "no".

You could say the same for Netflix though, no? I'd prob get more value from a Mixcloud sub than Netflix

 

Apologies for a lack of good grammar - been a looooong day!

[Steve]

The people who will benefit from that $3 thing are the small minority of big names that attract the most followers.

 

In terms of perceived value, there are similarities between Mixcloud and Netflix, but I think if you put barriers in the way of people on Mixcloud, they are more likely to go elsewhere than pay $8 a month for it.

 

SoundCloud is a PITA in terms of copyright infringement, but it's just inside the top 100 most popular websites worldwide, while Mixcloud isn't even in the top 3,000. This is why a lot of DJs still upload mixes to YouTube and SoundCloud, even though they risk having them removed - cos it's where the audience is.

[Wax On]

I havent got a problem with a few DJs benefiting a lot from the $3 option - fair play to them

 

What I do thing is questionable is channels like soul cool who have uploaded loads of great mixes but that arent their own. I appreciate having a way to listen to these, but dont think they ought to be paid in the way mix creators/curators should be.