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Last.fm is now independent

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Re: Last.fm is now independent

#21

Post by fontain »

"The company has generated an operating loss for the year to 31 December 2024 of £690,252 (2023: profit of £1,509,544) and revenue of £2,215,381 (2023: £1,960,340). As at 31 December 2024, net liabilities were £45,506,488 (2023: £44,855,202)."

"The financial statements have been prepared on a going concern basis on the grounds that Paramount Global has confirmed that it will continue to provide financial and other support to Last. FM Limited at least for the next twelve months and thereafter for the foreseeable future to enable Last.FM Limited to continue to meet all its liabilities as they fall due."

I wonder what their financing plan is, and what shape this independence will take, whether Paramount is retaining a minority ownership take? Seems like they might just be able to scrape break even based on current revenue.

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#22

Post by alejoar »

ale wrote: post #6

Man i love last.fm even though it's been technically superseded (for most people) by Spotify's recommendation features. It just fit so well in the zeitgeist of 2000's indie scene, microblogs, early social media.

I just think it's beautiful that I can see all the music I've listened to since 2005 (back when it was still called Audioscrobbler, before the Last.fm rename). And I never stopped scrobbling in all that time!

I love these kinds of stats and being able to see how my taste has changed across more than 20 years, since I was a teenager.

I do miss the old community forums they had integrated back in the day, though.

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#24

Post by cdrnsf »

There's still a ton of value in the historical recommendations on last.fm's site. What its future looks like, I'm not sure. I'd love to know who is going to operate it now that it is independent.

I'd recommend ListenBrainz for folks interested in similar tracking and some recommendations with clearer ownership.

For my own historical interests, I have a Navidrome plugin writing to my own API and surface charts across time periods by querying the postgres database it writes to.

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#25

Post by verelo »

punkbit wrote: post #16

Last.fm used to be special, but this was a long time ago. Just tried to login, recovered the password and seems that its just a tracker nowadays. In the past I could listen to music and drop a comment, meet new people, etc.

Came here to say the same. I don't even know what this product is anymore. The website makes it sound like its about music but there is no music? I'm lost.

The last time I paid for LastFM was some time in 2009...but the home page just isn't clearly telling me what the service offers.

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#26

Post by alejoar »

alejoar wrote: post #22
ale wrote: post #6

Man i love last.fm even though it's been technically superseded (for most people) by Spotify's recommendation features. It just fit so well in the zeitgeist of 2000's indie scene, microblogs, early social media.

I just think it's beautiful that I can see all the music I've listened to since 2005 (back when it was still called Audioscrobbler, before the Last.fm rename). And I never stopped scrobbling in all that time! I love these kinds of stats and being able to see how my taste has changed across more than 20 years, since I was a teenager. I do miss the old community forums they had integrated back in the day, though.

I just remembered that I met one of my best friends to this day through Last.fm. It was 2009 or so, and you could leave messages on concert pages.

I posted asking if anyone wanted to go with me since I didn't want to go alone, and she sent me a message.

Good times.

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#27

Post by ricardobeat »

punkbit wrote: post #16

Last.fm used to be special, but this was a long time ago. Just tried to login, recovered the password and seems that its just a tracker nowadays. In the past I could listen to music and drop a comment, meet new people, etc.

It was special way before playback was introduced. The tracking is the reason I've been using it for 22 (!) years.

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#28

Post by cesarvarela »

Scene_Cast2 wrote: post #11

I remember Last.fm's value proposition was 1) discovery and 2) community. (1) is (mostly, for most people) covered by "feed" algorithms of Spotify and YouTube. I wonder how they're going to position themselves now.

To me, it always was the scrobbler. I've been tracking what I listen to for 15+ years.

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#29

Post by quirino »

last.fm is one of my very favorite services. It's rough around the edges in some parts, but I've gotten incredible value from it. A couple of websites built on it that I check out from time to time:

- https://lastfmviz.netlify.app/ - shows what you've been listening to as a grid of album covers. You can scroll down as long as you want. It's cool to look back and remember where I was when listening to specific music.

- https://lastfmstats.com/ - generates tons of rankings, line charts, racing bar charts, etc. A couple I like: "Artist streaks" (I listened to Pavement tracks 122 times in a row in August 2023), "Unique artists in a single month" (225 in July 2025) and "Unique weeks per artist/album/track" (good to identify what you're always listening to vs. what you listened to heavily in a specific time)

- https://pmcdonough8133.github.io/last.timer/ - shows your listening rankings by hours, minutes instead of just scrobble count. This really should be a default feature in the site, as some artists have average track length 2-3x times of others.

If you use Spotify, another site I've had loads of fun with is https://explorify.link/.

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