I have decided to delete my SoundCloud profile. I do not know how long I have had that account, but if I were to take a guess, probably 13 or more years. I have been considering deleting the account for awhile, it is one of the few corporate owned social media profiles I have. Here is the quick rundown for why:
- I stopped paying for SoundCloud Pro to cut back on monthly expenses
- I stopped paying for SoundCloud Go (their streaming service) after I installed Navidrone to remotely access my music collection
- I focus on uploading my music to my website, which made SoundCloud redundant
- The enshittification of SoundCloud is slow, but still present, and I felt increasingly uncomfortable posting my music on their platform
- The website has become more and more frustrating to use as they add more and more dark patterns into the interface
- I finally got around to rebuilding the music section of my website, which I will share more information about in another blog post
- I haven't logged in and used it for a couple years
Now for the reasons why I still think most people would be happy sticking with SoundCloud:
- Access to some incredible underground music that you won't find anywhere else
- Their music discovery algorithm was great! It was the only algorithm I actively participated in its tracking of my behavior
While I still think it's the best commercial streaming service online, it's not enough to keep me around. My ugly website will always be cooler than a polished profile on somebody else's computer.