Music

Last.fm is my latest obsessive project. It is, on the surface, a run-of-the-mill steaming audio site. What it offers, however, is much more robust. The majority of sites that feature streaming audio allow you to choose and rate artists and songs that are played. The site which I would imagine has market share is Launch.com and rightfully so since they let users rate artist, song and album on a 6-point scale. Last.fm only uses essentially a 3-point scale. You may "love" a song, "ban" it or simply let it play through. If you let it play through it is added to your music profile and future songs are catered to you based on it and others. If you "love" it, the same thing applies, though you have an option to select a radio station comprised of those tracks alone. If you "ban" the song, it will, in theory, never be played for you again.

This is not as accurate as Launch.com. I know that is what you are grumbling about now. And it isn't, but where Last.fm differentiates itself is in "scrobbling."

What is Scrobbling?

Scrobbling a song means that when you listen to it, the name of the song is sent to Last.fm and added to your music profile.

Once you've signed up and downloaded Last.fm, you can scrobble songs you listen to on your computer or iPod automatically. Start scrobbling yourself, and see what artists you really listen to the most. Songs you listen to will also appear on your Last.fm profile page for others to see.

Millions of songs are scrobbled every day. This data helps Last.fm to organise and recommend music to people; we use it to create personalised radio stations, and a lot more besides.

You download -- what I have noticed to be relatively benign -- software from which you may play streaming audio or run passively while you listen to music from your hard drive. While the software runs, each song scrobbled contributes to your online profile for future recommendations.

What I like most about the service, however, is that you may make recommendations to other registered users. Hypothetically say that you and I are friends and I know a decent amount about your music tastes and I listen to something (either on the internet or from my computer) that I think you will like, I can click "recommend" and type in your username and you receive an invitation to listen to that song on my suggestion.

Neat, huh?

My profile, under the name privatjokr (big surprise there, right?) is located here. Let's be friends...

(Edit: To listen to the Loved Tracks Radio and make customized personal radio stations you have to subscribe which turns out to be $3.00/month, sorry.)