Not much happens in music streaming but a new disruption is ahead

3 innovation and digital news in 1 minute. Every Monday. Episode 284

News 1. Spotify — the master of personalisation

Spotify, the number one music streaming app in the world. Through Machine Learning, personalised songs, playlists and podcasts are suggested to users on the app. Even personalised content for pets or an own year in review playlist with Spotify Wrapped are personalised features in-app. Opinion: Spotify has fought its way to the top alongside all the other audio streaming apps. In particular, the ability to recommend curated and personalised content is what sets Spotify apart.

Spotify continues to be state of the art in music streaming business with ever new small initiatives of personalisation and enhancement.

News 2. SoundCloud — still alive

SoundCloud, the Berlin-based music streaming app within the Top 5 in the German iOS AppStore. Not only original songs can be streamed directly via the artist’s profile. The focus is primarily on emerging artists and remixes, which can also be commented on by the community. Opinion: SoundCloud is the underdog of music streaming apps. As with all streaming apps, songs and podcasts can be listened to but SoundCloud takes the music experience to another level — a more interactive, a more experimental one. It’s like a playground for established and aspiring artists and should not be missing on any mobile phone.

Cool concept but no major updates — the niche of “emerging” artists keeps SoundCloud afloat for now.

News 3. TikTok — the new playground for upcoming musicians

Not really a music streaming app but still very rooted in music is TikTok. Songs are promoted via the app from well-known artists or amateurs. First drafts of small artists are shown to the community and then especially uploaded to SoundCloud. Opinion: Through TikTok, artist-consumer interaction is rethought. Artists can proactively respond to the wishes of consumers. Although songs are uploaded to Spotify and SoundCloud it’s only a matter of time before TikTok will try to reduce churn.

How TikTok will react to this exactly remains exciting — SoundCloud prepare to defend your small niche artists!

Author is the research team (10 trend scouters) at specialist Space and Lemon Innovations (Hamburg, Berlin) — scouting innovations in main tech geographies, AI development, virtual worlds and e-commerce. Excerpts of research are gathered here in original weekly news since 2016, always with an opinion — no re-write of TechCrunch.

Come back next Monday and share your opinion.