Jan 13, 2016
A new Google Chrome extension has been released which allows SoundCloud users to hide reposts.
As any SoundCloud user will understand, this is really, really cool news for combatting those pesky reposts, endlessly clogging up your feed. In the same way that hiding unwanted Facebook spam makes relevant scrolling easier and less irritating, so too will this extension allow you to both discover the newest music on your feed, and share new music as an artist, without the frustration of sifting through countless reposts.
In addition to hiding reposts, you can actually block specific songs from ever showing up again on your feed. Kind of like Facebook hiding and unfollowing - but for music.
The extension was created by Eric Lorentz, also a musician, who explained his reasoning to Pigeons & Planes:
“I created it because I was tired of seeing reposts over and over again in my feed. From artists trying to bump their tracks to the top of Streams multiple times per day, or playing grab-ass and cross-promoting each other. Instead of having to unfollow, or just deal with missing out on tracks that are getting totally buried under reposts, I needed a happy medium to keep SoundCloud being a place I can find new music I love. I added the Permahide feature for the worst offenders (people reposting their track repeatedly over any amount of time). And I made it automatically remove promoted content because ads are annoying, but at any rate there’s no valid reason companies like Goldman Sachs should have a SoundCloud. I mean, come on.”
“As an artist and a user, I would love to change some very core things about SoundCloud, but as a professional I know that they would vastly undermine SoundCloud as a company. Some of the more viable changes I would love to see might include an overhaul of their recommendation / Explore system, and expanded options for artists (especially those paying for Premium). I’d love to see them spend more time listening to users’ needs, but I can’t fault them for being stuck in the label industry’s vice grips.”
Download the extension right here.