# Why are all my followers on Soundcloud probably bots?



## sIR dORT

Whenever I post a track, someone follows me, and they usually have nothing posted except some weird "Submit your track - link in description" thing. Is this just something automatic, and is there a way to get it so that those who follow me aren't, for lack of a better word, bots?

David


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## CGR

Yes, this happens to me every time I upload a track. Maybe having a Premium Soundcloud account stops this type of spamming? I simply remove them from my followers list immediately.


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## ka00

I get those “submit your track” followers all the time too. But I’m pretty sure mine are all legitimate and extremely gorgeous women like their profile photos prove.


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## gsilbers

Well, if i buy soundcloud (or any social media) followers and all of their bots just click my profile to follow me then the system (soundcloud etc) will know its bots. Or it will be too easy to tell its not real followers.
therefore, those fake accounts just clicks a huge number or random profiles (like yours), ads, etc, follow all types of poeple etc so they look like real accounts. some or obvious. others have known how to hide it better.

for example:
http://www.buzzdayz.com/buy-soundcloud-followers/
10k followers all from the same account and someone else orders the serve with the same 10k will look dubious and also get soundclous to take down the accoutns.


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## J-M

I like those who like and follow after 5 seconds of posting a new track. Hilarious.


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## nordicguy

All I know is mine have great taste.


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## sIR dORT

CGR said:


> Yes, this happens to me every time I upload a track. Maybe having a Premium Soundcloud account stops this type of spamming? I simply remove them from my followers list immediately.


You could definitely be right. I usually keep them to pad my own ego (unless there desperate as you'll find) 


nordicguy said:


> All I know is mine have great taste.


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## chimazaydenn

Most of the popular accounts on SoundCloud are buying SoundCloud plays


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## coffeecomposer

I’d seriously encourage you to find a better platform than SC. If I’m not mistaken, they own the rights to everything you upload there.


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## Wassim Samad

MrLinssi said:


> I like those who like and follow after 5 seconds of posting a new track. Hilarious.


You must write great intros haha!


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## Adam Takacs

You own all the rights of your tracks. They have rights to listen to your music, all other uses are subject to copyright law. The rights owner (composer, artist) will not waive his rights by uploading. Let me know if I'm wrong.


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## synkrotron

CGR said:


> Maybe having a Premium Soundcloud account stops this type of spamming?



I'm afraid that having a "Pro" account does not help with people spamming your stuff.

I generally watch a new track for around an hour and instantly report each and every one for SPAM and they are normally deleted pretty quick.

I also report spammers of other peeps tracks, too, so apologies if you would rather have their SPAM on your SC tracks... Personally, I think that they are anathema.

cheers

andy


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## Anevis

Soundcloud is no good these days, imo. It used to be really good, but those days are gone. 

I only use it for sending demos and even that isn't good due to Soundcloud's horrible compression.

This thing with "bots" happened to me once or twice and it's annoying, because none of us want that, we want real people right? I don't think Pro accounts solves that. If you use to upload all your stuff for people to listen, try Bandcamp it's free, preview in high quality and people can even buy it there or look for an alternative. If you use it for demos etc.. then you don't have to worry much about those bots, I guess.


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## Steve Wheeler

I have pretty much stopped using Soundcloud because it's overrun with bots and offers no real advantages for me that I can see. For music players, I much prefer Reelcrafter, which has a ton of advantages over Soundcloud and is about $1 more per month than SC Pro for their top tier.


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## AndyP

Follow the track and you will find the missing DNC server that is still sending spam ...


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## synkrotron

Steve Wheeler said:


> Reelcrafter



I had a look at that.

I don't get it.

There are some examples and when I click on the first one, to the left of their "Gallery" page, it takes you to a page, created by Jesse Harlin, and it looks nothing like the image on the Reelcrafter Gallery page.

Furthermore, when you get to Jesse Harlin's website you are presented with a SoundCloud link.


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## Steve Wheeler

synkrotron said:


> Furthermore, when you get to Jesse Harlin's website you are presented with a SoundCloud link.



Oof. That's rough. 

Regardless, I'm using it on my site. I like it. It's got some handy features like the analytics/tracking. I strongly dislike the way Soundcloud's player looks and the insane amount of bots on their site. The social aspects are kinda neat, but don't really mean a lot for what I'm doing.


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## synkrotron

Steve Wheeler said:


> I'm using it on my site



Link, please, if you don't mind 



Steve Wheeler said:


> I strongly dislike the way Soundcloud's player looks



Fair enough. Personally I don't mind it.



Steve Wheeler said:


> the insane amount of bots on their site



I'm not entirely sure what you mean by "bots"


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## Steve Wheeler

synkrotron said:


> Link, please, if you don't mind



Sorry, would have posted one, but I wasn't sure what the policy was on VI-Control on self-advertising. I put it in my signature, which looks to be what most others are doing, but it's http://www.stevewheelermusic.net/music (www.stevewheelermusic.net/music)

Straightforward player. Nothing too fancy, but there are some customization options. Might explore that in the future when I rebuild my site (which it desperately needs). The fact that I can send clients reels to download and see when they've interacted with them is worth it to me. 

As far as bots, it's mostly just PMs that I get that are all some variation of (this is a recent message copy/paste): 

//
Нowdy hows it gоing
I'll bе more thаn glad tо рrеsеnt уour trасk
to mу SС Famous Ассоunts Nеtwоrk.
Аs a rulе, a trаck gains the fоllоwіng аctіvіty:
-> 209 new fаns, 3260 lіstenеrs, 315 lіkе and rеshаrеs, ехtra Vіdео Теaser.
Сhесk оut the lіnk in my profіlе heаdеr piсture
//

This is clearly a 100% bullshit offer. You can't guarantee fans, likes, and listens that aren't bots. It's one thing to do paid advertising to pitch to popular playlists (hooray for payola 2.0). It's quite another to guarantee listening/social metrics. 

I've got a whole inbox full of these, and Soundcloud seems to do little to police this sort of thing. It's a bummer because I like the idea of the social aspect of Soundcloud, though I feel like they haven't done a lot to extend on this more.


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## Mornats

It would be nice if the bots do me the courtesy of listening to my tracks but they don't even do that!


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## synkrotron

Steve Wheeler said:


> Sorry, would have posted one, but I wasn't sure what the policy was on VI-Control on self-advertising.



Well, in this instance I think we are fine because you posted a link with respect to an alternative hosting option and is still, in my opinion, on topic.

Had a quick butchers.

Nice a clean site you have there and the media players, which I am assuming are embeds from the Reelcrafter site, are also very clean and professional looking.


Regarding your SoundCloud page, which is here:-









SteveWheelerMusic


Listen to SteveWheelerMusic | SoundCloud is an audio platform that lets you listen to what you love and share the sounds you create.




soundcloud.com





Is this you? Looks like you, but I dunno, it could be "managed" by someone else.

I am surprised, in a way, that you are experiencing any real problems with "bots" and what have you.

You only have three tracks up, for starters.

But then when I look at your followers, and who you are following, then I see problems.

In fact, when I get a new follower, out of the blue, I look at the kind of music they create and I also look at who they are following and who follows them.

If you followed me, I would block you, instantly.

Why?

Because you follow this kind of account:-









Underground Awards


https://bit.ly/tawrepost / Strong Support Accept all styles from EDM to Hip-Hop & Rap music.




soundcloud.com





and









The Rhinocerosium


bit.ly/tracks_promo / Viral Your Music The Rhinocerosium – is part of the "Animal Music Network". We support artists around the world in different styles and genres of music.




soundcloud.com





and









The Rhinocerosium


bit.ly/tracks_promo / Viral Your Music The Rhinocerosium – is part of the "Animal Music Network". We support artists around the world in different styles and genres of music.




soundcloud.com





and









MIRA


Support artists around the world. Repost for your track with over 190 K followers: bit.ly/2QBnCwl NOTIFY US BY MAIL. [email protected] Join Us !




soundcloud.com






Also, you have these kind of accounts following you:-









djdianawilliamsb


Listen to djdianawilliamsb | SoundCloud is an audio platform that lets you listen to what you love and share the sounds you create.




soundcloud.com







Basically, if I see any kind of link to some kind of "paid promotion," I block.


You will find that a lot of your problems come from following, or being followed by paid promotion, or even "we'll repost your tracks" accounts.


I have over a thousand followers and I have checked every one for suspicious activity or possible links to suspicious activity. It's not an easy task, and I am not saying that I have been able to weed out all the rubbish, but I try.


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## synkrotron

Mornats said:


> It would be nice if the bots do me the courtesy of listening to my tracks but they don't even do that!



Well, sometimes they do, and there is absolutely nothing we can do about it.

Over the last couple of years I have had a couple of tracks of mine played exactly fifty times in one day.

Because I am a "Pro Unlimited" subscriber I get more detailed stats.

One of those stats is in regards to where your stuff is being streamed from.

The "bots" know this, I am sure, and if you click on the link provided by SoundCloud, in your stats, it invariably takes you to a page offering to get you listens and followers, for a fee.

As I said, nowt you can do about it.


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## angeruroth

Yup, the bots are really annoying. Maybe if you have 10k listeners you don't mind, but to me it's just an unwanted hassle.
Oh, and no, the premium options do not remove the bots. That's one of the reasons I turned my account into a free one.


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## rgames

I had a paid SC plan for a few years but got rid of it because it provided no value. YouTube is free and I get 100x to 1000x more plays there. And I don't see any issues with bots. Weirdos, yes, but not bots.

I hear that SC us useful for some genres (EDM maybe?) but I'd say it's mostly irrelevant. YouTube is free and you can get a bunch of tracks on Spotify and iTunes and a bunch of other relevant platforms for $29 through CDBaby. So paid SC is a complete waste of money and free SC is mostly useless as far as I can tell.

rgames


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## MartinH.

synkrotron said:


> Well, sometimes they do, and there is absolutely nothing we can do about it.
> 
> Over the last couple of years I have had a couple of tracks of mine played exactly fifty times in one day.
> 
> Because I am a "Pro Unlimited" subscriber I get more detailed stats.
> 
> One of those stats is in regards to where your stuff is being streamed from.
> 
> The "bots" know this, I am sure, and if you click on the link provided by SoundCloud, in your stats, it invariably takes you to a page offering to get you listens and followers, for a fee.
> 
> As I said, nowt you can do about it.



So you mean the one obscure black metal track of mine that got exactly 100 plays more than the others was not indeed better, but just got played by a bot? :(
Thanks for the info, I always wondered what was going on there.
Kind of makes soundcloud useless as a tool to A/B what people like, if you don't have the means to filter out bot activity, doesn't it?


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## Lionel Schmitt

Mostly it seems to come down to a company called "wasp records". That's the stuff with "submit your track - link in the description". 

I really wonder why that is going on since years, especially since a lot of it seems to be the same companies. Wasp records and a few follow buy things.

Can't soundcloud prevent these same individuals from creating new accounts? 
It really seems like they don't really care since there is not anywhere nearly as much spam on other platforms.


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## synkrotron

MartinH. said:


> So you mean the one obscure black metal track of mine that got exactly 100 plays more than the others was not indeed better, but just got played by a bot?



Yeah, possibly.



MartinH. said:


> Kind of makes soundcloud useless as a tool to A/B what people like, if you don't have the means to filter out bot activity, doesn't it?



Well, again, possibly.

But I use SoundCloud for one thing, and one thing only. To host my music.

The reason I pay is because I can't be bothered signing in to multiple accounts. "Pro Unlimited" allows me to upload as many tracks as I want with no limit on length or track. Some of my pieces are 25 minutes and longer, and I currently have around 150 tracks uploaded.

The amount of plays I take with a pinch of salt, currently at 58,632 since I signed up in 2012.

I think that downloads tell a slightly different tale and since 2012 my tracks have been downloaded 1500 times. As far as I know bots do not download tracks.

So I see myself as having at least some kind of "reasonable" exposure there.

Looking at my YouTube stats I joined in July 2015 and have only garnered 2203 views. That said, I only have eleven videos on public view there.

Bandcamp is the only other site I use for hosting my stuff, and only "finished" albums and a couple of singles. I consider that to me my "serious" stuff, whereas I stick everything I do on SoundCloud.

Since signing up to Bandcamp in 2015 I have only garnered 2600 listens, and of those only 780 are complete listens.


But you can't really compare and judge. Each site has its own pro's and con's.

Can't sell stuff on SoundCloud so I use Bandcamp for that.

I like to do the odd visual piece so that has to be YouTube, obviously,

SoundCloud has more of a community feel to it and I have made many friends on there and not just randoms popping in to say, "hey, great beetz bru!"


I'll be sticking with SoundCloud till they disappear. And they will, because nothing lasts forever.

MP3.com?


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## synkrotron

DarkestShadow said:


> Can't soundcloud prevent these same individuals from creating new accounts?



It doesn't look like they can. But they do delete the Wasp Records accounts within a couple of days, if not hours.


Thing to do is, report for SPAM as soon as they pop up on your site.

I report both the account that posted a comment, pointing to Wasp records, and then I visit the current Wasp Records page and report that too.

I report everything I don't like the look of basically.


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## Steve Wheeler

synkrotron said:


> Well, in this instance I think we are fine because you posted a link with respect to an alternative hosting option and is still, in my opinion, on topic.
> 
> Had a quick butchers.
> 
> Nice a clean site you have there and the media players, which I am assuming are embeds from the Reelcrafter site, are also very clean and professional looking.
> 
> 
> Regarding your SoundCloud page, which is here:-
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> SteveWheelerMusic
> 
> 
> Listen to SteveWheelerMusic | SoundCloud is an audio platform that lets you listen to what you love and share the sounds you create.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> soundcloud.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Is this you? Looks like you, but I dunno, it could be "managed" by someone else.
> 
> I am surprised, in a way, that you are experiencing any real problems with "bots" and what have you.
> 
> You only have three tracks up, for starters.
> 
> But then when I look at your followers, and who you are following, then I see problems.
> 
> In fact, when I get a new follower, out of the blue, I look at the kind of music they create and I also look at who they are following and who follows them.
> 
> If you followed me, I would block you, instantly.
> 
> Why?
> 
> Because you follow this kind of account:-
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Underground Awards
> 
> 
> https://bit.ly/tawrepost / Strong Support Accept all styles from EDM to Hip-Hop & Rap music.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> soundcloud.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> and
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The Rhinocerosium
> 
> 
> bit.ly/tracks_promo / Viral Your Music The Rhinocerosium – is part of the "Animal Music Network". We support artists around the world in different styles and genres of music.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> soundcloud.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> and
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The Rhinocerosium
> 
> 
> bit.ly/tracks_promo / Viral Your Music The Rhinocerosium – is part of the "Animal Music Network". We support artists around the world in different styles and genres of music.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> soundcloud.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> and
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> MIRA
> 
> 
> Support artists around the world. Repost for your track with over 190 K followers: bit.ly/2QBnCwl NOTIFY US BY MAIL. [email protected] Join Us !
> 
> 
> 
> 
> soundcloud.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Also, you have these kind of accounts following you:-
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> djdianawilliamsb
> 
> 
> Listen to djdianawilliamsb | SoundCloud is an audio platform that lets you listen to what you love and share the sounds you create.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> soundcloud.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Basically, if I see any kind of link to some kind of "paid promotion," I block.
> 
> 
> You will find that a lot of your problems come from following, or being followed by paid promotion, or even "we'll repost your tracks" accounts.
> 
> 
> I have over a thousand followers and I have checked every one for suspicious activity or possible links to suspicious activity. It's not an easy task, and I am not saying that I have been able to weed out all the rubbish, but I try.



Thanks for the kind words on the site! I actually want to redesign it a bit, as it's not as clean as I'd like. Gotta get the capital together and move over to Siteground for hosting. Bluehost is cheap and all, but it's slow as hell. 

Weird that you're only seeing three tracks. I definitely have a lot more listed on my end (actually past upload limit). Maybe it's just showing "top tracks" for you? If so, that's kinda weird that it's just showing that. I've got some set to private but I've got a lot more stuff that isn't. 

Good looking out on the followers/followed by thing. May clean up my list. I didn't realize that you could block people from following you. I'm also one that tends to follow back without much thought. Still think it'd be nice if Soundcloud policed some of the paid repost stuff, but I imagine they may be making money off of it somehow in the same way that Facebook makes money from click farms. 

Regardless, it's probably not the best best place for what I do, which is largely media composing, so I've been moving away from it a bit more. Reelcrafter is a better fit for me as a showcase and potential delivery platform. It's got unlimited uploads and reels (playlists) you can put together. You can also embed video which I've not tried yet. Not saying that everyone should move there, but it's pretty attractive for guys like me (so far; been a little less than a year). It's also made and run by Sam Hulick who was one of the composers for Mass Effect, which is kinda neat. 

Also, I do remember MP3.com. Discovered a lot of great music there. Was sad to see it go.


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## synkrotron

Steve Wheeler said:


> Weird that you're only seeing three tracks.



Yeah, really weird. There was definitely only three tracks visible yesterday and where it now says 37 it said three also. Not sure what happened there.


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## Darkly Pure

CGR said:


> Yes, this happens to me every time I upload a track. Maybe having a Premium Soundcloud account stops this type of spamming? I simply remove them from my followers list immediately.


Nope... speaking as a premium Soundcloud subscriber... those are about the only messages I ever get. Generally within minutes of posting I'll get the... 'Hiya... I love your track, I'd like to get you x amount of followers etc'. It's very annoying.


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## Emanuel Fróes

sIR dORT said:


> Whenever I post a track, someone follows me, and they usually have nothing posted except some weird "Submit your track - link in description" thing. Is this just something automatic, and is there a way to get it so that those who follow me aren't, for lack of a better word, bots?
> 
> David


same with me. My best friends


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## parapentep70

J-M said:


> I like those who like and follow after 5 seconds of posting a new track. Hilarious.


Once I posted a track that quickly got 1 like and was played zero times!! The bot loved the very first bar... And went to listen to the next profile.


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## Polkasound

Within moments of posting a track, someone commented, "_Lit_ 🔥"

My reply to the obvious bot was,_ "Interesting adjective for a Dutchmen-style waltz, but I'll take the compliment. Thank you."_


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## kgdrum

Polkasound said:


> Within moments of posting a track, someone commented, "_Lit_ 🔥"
> 
> My reply to the obvious bot was,_ "Interesting adjective for a Dutchmen-style waltz, but I'll take the compliment. Thank you."_


Lit 🔥


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## Michael K. Bain

sIR dORT said:


> Whenever I post a track, someone follows me, and they usually have nothing posted except some weird "Submit your track - link in description" thing. Is this just something automatic, and is there a way to get it so that those who follow me aren't, for lack of a better word, bots?
> 
> David


Mine are too probably. But let's look at it this way: It's probably a good thing. It just means that our music is too perfect for human ears to notice.


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## AlbertSmithers

Honestly bring it on. I'll take all the free bots I can get.


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