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Good question! Who has an answer?

I’m sure a lot of the already grown-up startup-companies just like the supposed cool touch of mysticism that comes with the term. Forever young, that’s what they wanna be.

Talking about Soundcloud (and to stay with that image): They were probably hyper-fast-forwarded from childhood to their teenage years now, with a special hormon mix of talent, passion and being in the right place at the right time – injected by amazing people –, to now preparing to manage the short phase of teenage angst (“Damn, world’s sooo big!”) before soon not only taking full responsibility for themselves but also carrying the load of leading the interwebs when it comes to all sorts of audio with a communication twist. (Oh boy, there must be a gazillion of mistakes in this monster sentence, but you’ll probably get the idea.)

kirklove:

This morning David posted this:

“Ask what’s hot in Berlin’s startup circles, and you’ll hear one name over and over: SoundCloud.”

The quote struck me as odd. Because I don’t think of SoundCloud as a StartUp. I’m not saying that to be a dick. The exact opposite in fact. I think SoundCloud is an amazing and successful company. One of the best out there. I’m a huge fan. I don’t know the stats, though I’d wager they have 50 to 60 full-time employees now. Maybe more. It wouldn’t surprise me. They have serious capital in their coiffeurs. Top-notch investors. Proliferation across the web. And, of course, lots of happy paying customers (aka users). So when does one remove the mantle of StartUp and start calling yourself a business? I’m asking in earnest. 

Is it simply because they are not public? Is it because a StartUp isn’t necessarily profitable? Is it because they haven’t achieved the much ballyhooed “product-market fit” I really want to know. Look, I work for a StartUp. We’re seven really hard working people in a little room in SoHo. I love it. Though at some point I want to be a company. Sooner than later.

You can substitute virtually any tech company in the last three years for SoundCloud. Behemoths like Foursquare, Tumblr, and heck even Twitter. Are they all StartUps still?

Maybe it’s different for the tech-space. I’m new to it that’s for sure. Though in my head if I took out a loan, had a lease, hired a few people and opened a bakery, I’m a small business not a StartUp. Why the differentiation in Tech?

Don’t get me wrong – I’m all for the StartUp mentality. It leads to great things. Stay lean, be hungry, disrupt, build, iteriate, challenge, have fun, all that. That should never change. Ever. Though hiding behind or using the label StartUp too long could also have detrimental effects as well like not finding a pressing need to actually start making money so you can stay around forever.

As I started this post, I’m not trying to be a dick here. I really want to know. 

Woohoo. Boom!

Tumblr and SoundCloud both are fantastic communities of people expressing themselves through the things they create; we think bringing them together is like a match made in heaven. So from today, we are thrilled to announce along with the fine folks from Tumblr that you can now easily share the sounds you create to Tumblr!

Here’s what we’ve made possible:

Record and share to Tumblr:

Capture any audio on-the-fly with our iPhone and Android apps and share your recordings directly to your Tumblr blog. This is super neat for impromptu interviews, commentary, breaking news, comedy or poetry - heck, pretty much anything you hear around you.

Meet Tumblr’s David at a spontaneous Tumblr meetup in Berlin? Hit the record button:

Here are some other nice recordings from Maura, Bijan, Caroline, David & Alex.

Auto-publish your new sounds and favorites:

In your advanced SoundCloud settings, you can now choose to automatically push favorites and new sounds you created to your Tumblr blog. Save time when sharing the sounds you create!

Super-easy sharing:

Found something on SoundCloud you like? Easily post to Tumblr by pushing the Share button on SoundCloud or grab the url and post it as an external source on Tumblr Audio posts.

Search SoundCloud on Tumblr:

When creating an audio post, you can now search, preview and post audio from SoundCloud to Tumblr.

Oh and in case you hadn’t noticed, we’re all big fans of Tumblr and a number of staffers use it every day for their personal blogs. Find out who does and follow at will!

Thank you team Tumblr for your hard work on getting this out in the wild. We can’t wait to see what happens when people capture and use sound in their everyday lives, ultimately making the web less silent.