Finally we decide to go with two visualizations:
- SpamCloud: The interesting or playful one
- SoundCloud RADAR: The informative one
We believe both work well in unison with each other!
This was our final set-up for DemoDay:
SpamCloud
SoundCloud is the world’s leading social sound platform where anyone can create sounds and share them. SoundCloud claims that their commenting system connects artists and fans and brings them closer together.
But is this premise actually fulfilled?
We analyzed comments posted on “Petal to the Maxx” by K.L. for the month of April and found that spam and SoundCloud user promotion (users posting links to their SoundCloud profiles) vastly outnumber actual comments. In reality, any real connection that could arise between artist and fans is instantly blocked by BS comments pushing real commenters out of view in the comment section.
SpamCloud is our visual representation of this circumstance.
Functionalities
Hovering over a comments displays the name of the commenter, the posting time on the song and the text of the comment.
SoundCloud RADAR
SoundCloud RADAR is an attempt to understand comments posted on SoundCloud. It is an exploratory tool that helps in finding and understanding patterns of commenting and spamming.
The visualization shows comments posted on “Petal to the Maxx” by K.L for the month of April. As they are posted in time, comments appear on the radial 24 h clock/calendar, revealing patterns in posting time and posting behaviour, but also highlights unusual, suspicious clusters of comments.
All comments are colour coded according to 3 categories:
- Regular Comments
- SoundCloud (SC) User Promotion
- Spams
Lines connect comments that are posted by the same user, bigger circles indicate multiple comments of the same category at the same minute.
A small histogram on top of the music progress bar shows the number of comments posted at a particular time in the song, which is a key feature of SoundCloud’s commenting system. The bottom of the screen displays the ratio of regular comments to spam.
Functionalities
Hovering over a comment highlights it (and all connected comments) and displays the name of the commenter, the posting time on the song and the text of the comment.
To filter comments according to their category, click on the comment categories in the key.
Hovering over the progress bar histogram highlights the comments that were posted at that particular moment in the song.