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Just wondering if anyone knows of a SoundCloud alternative suitable for academic use. I'm really looking for something which will allow students to post and contribute sounds to a central site or page. For example a group of students might go on a field recording trip and can then all log in and post the best sounds they recorded. I guess it's personal logins and the ability to invite users to a group where they can share sounds which are important.

I also realise that with Soundcloud you can create groups and have users contribute sounds to the group. The problem with this is that as files are deleted from each account they are removed from the group. I need something which will also works as a record or archive - if you contribute a sound it's stored in the group permanently.

Thanks in advance,

Mark

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4 Answers

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I use a SoundCloud group for my students to share work with their peers and me - I then create a fresh group each year. This is then used to give formative feedback to the student community as a whole. The students then submit the final work on our internal system and I can given them individual summative feedback and archive the submissions. Not sure if this will work for you, but has worked for me for a couple of years now.

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So do they add tracks from their individual accounts to the group? I presume these are then removed if they delete the tracks from their personal accounts? For things like recording day trips I'd like to be able to keep a permanent accessible record online as a kind of archive of the trip, but it doesn't seem like SoundCloud has this functionality – Mark Durham Oct 26 at 20:55
@Mark Yes that is exactly what they do and if they delete the track it no longer appears in the group. This work for me, but if you want a permeant archive SoundCloud may not be the way to go. The only way I can see it working is if you post the permanent tracks to the group. – Bit Depth Oct 30 at 9:19
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I'm not aware of such a platform or website. But it is a good idea to have this functionality! The least you could do is contact Soundcloud, there really nice, and ask if the have any plans for this or if they might take it under consideration for certain projects/institutes.

Only other thing you could do is ask them if backing up the wav files is possible? A project I run, the Sound of the Netherlands, has this arrangment with Soundcloud. At least you could host it on your own soundcloud account afterwards.

Good luck!

Arnoud

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Thanks Arnoud, that's a good idea - it feels like Soundcloud have only really catered for the individual but I imagine an educational license option might be good for them to offer. Your project looks great, similar to the London Sound Survey here. In a future where all sounds are dated and geo-tagged automatically this sort of thing will be easier to create. – Mark Durham Oct 29 at 15:42
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I guess if it's to strictly control content, dropbox seems most apt

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It's more about creating a place where people can collect, group and play sound, rather than share files (unless I'm missing something with dropbox). The presentation of the sound is key. – Mark Durham Oct 26 at 15:18
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What about Freesound? It has the added bonus of contributing to the availability of good free recordings, which is, if you ask me, very academic.

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Only problem with Freesound is having to wait for the sounds to be moderated. I've had to wait nearly a fortnight sometimes for a simple ambience track to be approved. – Brendan Rehill Oct 27 at 16:27
@Brendan Ah, I didn't know that. Maybe I got lucky the times that I uploaded something, because they were pretty fast with their approval. – EMV Oct 28 at 11:50

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