Here’s how it works: you open the Last.fm player and tell it an artist you like. It then plays you similar artists via streaming radio (128kbps MP3). If you listen to at least 50% of the song, it is “scrobbled” which is a silly way of saying “remembered as something you like”. You can also express your love for tracks which as far as I can figure just adds it to your list of loved tracks. Conversely you can also ban tracks so they aren’t played again. Another awesome feature is the Winamp plugin which records the songs you listen to in Winamp and contributes to the scrobbling database. The website even matches you up with other Last.fm users with similar tastes in music!
The software is apparently open source for those worried about what info it actually collects. And yes, there are Linux (source) and Max OS X players too. There’s also an iTunes plugin, and it can even scrobble your iPod’s usage data.
So far, I’ve tried music similar to Hybrid, Massive Attack and Pendulum and have gained an appreciation for some awesome artists I hadn’t heard much of before, including Thom Yorke, Air, Zero 7, Everything but the Girl, Lamb, Layo & Bushwacka, Morcheeba and The Crystal Method. I haven’t let the scrobbler loose on my collection yet because I’m still enjoying all the fresh stuff it keeps dishing out!
There’s only a couple of downsides that I’ve noticed about Last.fm. Firstly, I feel sort of obliged to switch it off if I’m not within earshot for a few minutes so I don’t give false positives. You can still listen with scrobbling turned off though. Secondly, if you skip too many tracks in a row it sometimes runs out of tracks and you have to switch to another station. This is apparently due to radio licensing laws which restrict the number of tracks that are available at any one time. In my opinion these are pretty minor for the benefits you’re getting.
I totally love it! It’s a great way to hear new music, and much better than plain old streaming radio because you can skip tracks you don’t like. They even have widgets you can chuck up on your website/blog! Check out my profile.
Thom Yorke is from Radiohead, I really like the song home by zero 7, lamb is also good. Actually i like most of those you talked about. Scrobbling sounds like something the BFG would have done. No i am not talking about the Doom BFG. You Snozzcumber.
Cool, I didn’t know that about Thom. I wouldn’t have picked it from his music. I’ve been listening to Leftfield’s similar artists today. Not bad either. But there’s some hip-hoppy stuff in there which I skip.
Fine. Well if I’m a Snozzcumber, you’re a Frobscottle!