What are these "badges" called?

Question

They're usually used to tell the user that a list is empty, or a resource could not be found, or that a resource may be unavailable.

SoundCloud has one here for tracks without any comments:

Or if there are no tracks on a profile:

I would love to incorporate these into my design, as they help fill the empty space there would be when there is no content.

Answer 1

You described an empty state, or zero-data state. Examples of empty states are a list with no elements (no comments on the track, like in your image or no tracks), a search query with no results.

The most basic empty state displays a non-interactive image and a text tagline.

You can read more here:

• Empty states | Google
• Designing For The Empty State | Codrops
• UX Best Practices: Designing the Overlooked Empty States | Invision