Blog: SoundCloud

Read our latest daily deep dives, hot takes, and exciting updates about the entertainment world. Check out the latest insight from your favourite analyst, or search by coverage areas - music, entertainment and fandom, creator economy and social.

IMS Business Report 2025

Cover image for IMS Business Report 2025

Mark Mulligan

23 Apr 2025

Today I presented the 11th edition of the IMS Business Report at the ever-brilliant annual electronic music industry conference in Ibiza. And who doesn’t like a conference in Ibiza?! The full report is available via the IMS website.

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Everyone wants to monetise fandom – but we must fix fan data first

Cover image for Everyone wants to monetise fandom – but we must fix fan data first

Olivia Jones

4 Apr 2025

Key takeaways from this blog: Fandom monetisation is booming, with MIDiA data showing how expanded rights is growing, driving labels to prioritise direct control over fan data instead of relying on third-party platforms.

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Bootlegging is the scourge of many industries. Could it be music’s greatest strength?

Cover image for Bootlegging is the scourge of many industries. Could it be music’s greatest strength?

Tatiana Cirisano

7 Feb 2025

The word “bootleg” has long left a bad taste in brands’ mouths. Quite literally defined as “illicit goods,” these unauthorised versions or replications of clothes, handbags, concert tees, and other items have long plagued brands.

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The unflattening of music

Cover image for The unflattening of music

Mark Mulligan

30 Jan 2025

Cultural trends

[This post builds on two other recent MIDiA posts: Background music and What got you here ] At the half way point of the decade it is a good time to reflect on how the business of music is reshaping the culture of music – and where this is heading.

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Sounds of 2025 | MIDiA and Splice name Pluggnb music’s fastest-growing genre

Cover image for Sounds of 2025 | MIDiA and Splice name Pluggnb music’s fastest-growing genre

Tatiana Cirisano

22 Jan 2025

Audience Insight

Cultural trends

With one of the largest, most sonically-diverse catalogues of sounds and samples, Splice provides the music that makes the music for producers around the world. So trends in what users are searching for and downloading on Splice can tell us a lot about the sounds of the future.

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Anti-algorithm, anti-perfection - the rise of a music counter-culture

Mark Mulligan

20 Dec 2024

Today’s music landscape is one defined by abundance and immediacy. In today’s chronically-online world, everything is over-ground, immediately. Scenes have to work really hard to be underground and even then, some eagle-eyed A+R or marketing person is going to see the buzz and try to bottle its essence for wider consumption.

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What Audible’s new royalty model means for its audiobook battle with Spotify

Cover image for What Audible’s new royalty model means for its audiobook battle with Spotify

Rutger Rosenborg

1 Aug 2024

Business Strategy

In early July, Audible’s blog broke the news that the company was introducing a new royalty model for audiobooks. Previously, according to Bloomberg’s Ashley Carman , Audible would do a “buyout”, paying a publisher an upfront fee to have their book on the service rather than distributing royalties according to titles or hours listened.

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Billie Eilish delivered a superfan masterclass

Cover image for Billie Eilish delivered a superfan masterclass

Kriss Thakrar

4 Jun 2024

While the industry standard for new releases has long been about scale and velocity, Billie Eilish, her brother Finneas, and Darkroom/Interscope, the labels behind their latest album Hit Me Hard and Soft , have delivered a masterclass in executing a superfan-focused release strategy.

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As Spotify's door closes on Soundtrap, another opens

Cover image for As Spotify's door closes on Soundtrap, another opens

Tatiana Cirisano

16 Jun 2023

Music streaming

Writing about a new era of music fluidity last month, we noted how streaming services might align more closely with creation, as Spotify has done by acquiring music creation platform Soundtrap. Well, that vision for Spotify is no longer.

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Spotify’s vertical feed could change music discovery, but not for the reason you think

Cover image for Spotify’s vertical feed could change music discovery, but not for the reason you think

Tatiana Cirisano

9 Mar 2023

Music streaming

Just a few years ago, Spotify’s Rap Caviar playlist was a harbinger for culture. But a lot has changed. Artists want (and need) to build deeper relationships with fans, and gen Z consumers want more active content experiences.

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Spotify is courting gen Z, but is it enough?

Cover image for Spotify is courting gen Z, but is it enough?

Tatiana Cirisano

13 Jul 2022

Music streaming

Spotify just made its first games acquisition by snapping up Heardle , a popular online game where players compete to guess a song by its opening notes. Heardle will remain a standalone website for now, although Spotify says it plans to integrate Heardle “more fully” into its app.

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Changing streaming’s royalty model will unlock a new music economy

Cover image for Changing streaming’s royalty model will unlock a new music economy

Kriss Thakrar

12 Jul 2022

Music streaming

Streaming Royalties

It has been an excellent year for the music industry as it enters a new era of growth . While streaming has been at the heart of this growth, there is an underlying tension between platforms and the artists that they depend on.

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Climate crisis awareness is entwined with entertainment behaviour

Cover image for Climate crisis awareness is entwined with entertainment behaviour

Hanna Kahlert

2 Feb 2022

Media and Marketing

Audience Insight

Despite the barrage of high-profile news items featuring so far in 2022, the climate crisis remains the high-stakes backdrop to our global future. MIDiA Research recently fielded a survey asking about consumers’ climate-conscious behaviours, cross-segmented against their normal entertainment proclivities – and some of the findings are surprising.

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NFL Adding Music to Its Playbook

Cover image for NFL Adding Music to Its Playbook

Alistair Taylor

4 Nov 2019

archived footage

curated playlists

The NFL continues expanding its reach with the news that it is providing both video and audio content to global streaming services Spotify and Tidal. This follows the NFL’s recently- announced partnerships with social platforms TikTok, Reddit, Facebook and YouTube.

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Why Facebook Can Be the Future of Social Music, But Isn’t Yet

Cover image for Why Facebook Can Be the Future of Social Music, But Isn’t Yet

Mark Mulligan

21 Mar 2019

Facebook messenger

Facebook recently secured licensing deals with music rightsholders in India , an important step in what has thus far been an underwhelming social music strategy since first inking rights deals in June 2018.

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Quick Take: Will Stream Djing be the Renaissance of Soundcloud?

Zach Fuller

19 Oct 2018

After a difficult two yearsthat saw acquisitions fall through and a lack of meaningful uptake of its subscription service, SoundCloud have needed some positive news. Reveredwithin the creator community though still struggling to make a profit, SoundCloud CEO Kerry Trainorannounced today at Amsterdam Dance Eventthat DJs will soon be able to mix and perform by streaming material from SoundCloud’s catalogue within DJ software programs.

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Spotify’s Tencent Risk

Cover image for Spotify’s Tencent Risk

Mark Mulligan

21 Sep 2018

emerging markets

NOTE: a previous version of this post referred to a non-compete clause with Spotify detailed in this SEC filing. I have been advised that the scope of this clause is narrower than I had originally interpreted.

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Article 13 – Laws of Unintended Consequences

Mark Mulligan

14 Sep 2018

[If this was Medium, it would say ‘long read’ – you’ve been warned] I do not normally add disclaimers or qualifiers at the start of blog posts, but given how divisive the whole Article 13 debate has become, there is a big risk that some readers will make incorrect assumptions about my position on Article 13.

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What Spotify Can Learn From The Roman Slave Trade

Mark Mulligan

13 Oct 2017

age of enlightenment

Believe Digital

OK, you’re going to have to bearwith me on this one, but let me take you back to 2nd century Rome… The Roman Empire was at the peak of its powers. Its borders stretched from Scotland down to Syria and across to Armenia, and throughout its dominions, Rome spread its culture, language, administration and military prowess.

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Spotify, Netflix And Instagram Make Gains In Q2 2017

Cover image for Spotify, Netflix And Instagram Make Gains In Q2 2017

Mark Mulligan

19 Sep 2017

candy crush saga

Since Q4 2016 MIDiA Research has been fielding a quarterly tracker survey across the US, UK, Canada and Australia to build a proprietary dataset that provides a unique insight into how digital consumer trends are evolving quarter-upon-quarter.

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