Social Music Curation That Works

Abstract

Social interactions, such as sharing songs and listening together, are fundamental to the experience of music. Yet our understanding of these interactions and how they influence social dynamics with today's streaming platforms is lacking. To better understand successful instances of social music practice, we conducted a two-part study to investigate real-world usage of collaborative playlists (CPs). Using an exploratory survey, we queried CP users on characteristics---Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How---and practices around favorite CPs, which serve as concrete examples of successful social music curation on streaming platforms. We found these playlists to vary in group sizes, purposes, listening contexts, engagement behaviors, and content attributes. We also observed significant cross-category interactions; for one, group size led to differences in perceived roles and frequency of actions within users' favorite CPs. Subsequent interviews confirmed favorite CPs as being exemplary of success, and users further elucidated factors that engender and hinder CP success. Together, our results underscore the importance of social motivations for engaging in CPs and of building greater understanding around these experiences. To these point we derived six design implications to inform development of CP platforms and online music platforms at large.