Last.fm
- October 05, 2005
- 7 comments
This morning as I was scanning my various feeds, I saw Maury over at RAILhead Design gushing over a free, online music service called last.fm. He made a pretty convincing case to go check it out, so I did.
The guys who made this also made Audioscrobbler. It’s basically a place where you can keep track of the music you’ve been listening to, find other people who have similar tastes in music and hopefully discover new music you like.
They explain it quite well:
You get your own online music profile that you can fill up with the music you like. This information is used to create a personal radio station and to find users who are similar to you. Last.fm can even play you new artists and songs you might like. It’s addictive, it’s growing, it’s free, it’s music.
They weren’t kidding about the addictive part because I’m hooked. I’ve already discovered several bands I’ve never heard of before like Marumari, Freescha, Lackluster, Apparat, Gimmik and Bola.
How did last.fm know I liked this kind of music? There are two apps you download in order to get the most out of the service. The first one is the Audioscrobbler plugin that monitors the music you’re playing in iTunes (or whatever app you use to listen to music). It uploads that information to their server where it’s all displayed neatly for you and others to check out. It then uses that information to find other people with similar music tastes and to recommend other music you might like.
That’s where the second app comes in, which is my favorite feature of last.fm. It’s a music player that let’s you listen to ad-free, CD-quality music based on music you or others like. You can also enter in the name of a band you like, and it will create a custom playlist of similar music for you to listen to. You can skip tracks if you’re not interested, mark favorite tracks or ban tracks you really don’t like.
I only signed up this morning, but I can tell this will be one service I won’t get bored with easily. If you’re into music and like finding new stuff, then I highly recommend it.
If you’re interested, you can check out my last.fm page to get an idea of what the service is like.
Hey Les, good to hear you like it too. I checked out your profile and added you as a friend.
Can you see why the last.fm player is my favorite part of the service? It’s awesome! The more music you play, the more accurate your neighbors are. I think I remember reading that you need to play around 300 songs before the service starts recommending spot on stuff.
I became a paid member for a couple reasons. The first was because I don’t mind paying for a service I use a lot. By a lot, I mean check it a couple times a day. Flickr, del.icio.us and Google AdSense are other services I use a lot.
The other reason is because it gives you more options on the last.fm site. If you’re a paid member, there are more options available to you when you click on “Start Radio” on the site. And more options are available when you’re checking out artists and songs.
Plus, $3/month isn’t a lot for something I’ll be using quite a bit.
eliza Kane (freire)
October 6, 2005
Cleve
October 7, 2005
Russ
Chris, this is awesome. Thanks for posting it. I’ll have to make a post about it myself. Here is my last.fm profile. I’ve barely started using it so not much is there, but I’m loving the last.fm player. I’ve looked into social music services before, but that was years ago. They were never quite right or didn’t work with the apps I used at the time. Last.fm seems to get things nailed just right.