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Last.fm is now independent

support.last.fm

131–140 of 232 posts

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#131
Many many years ago I wrote a small platform to serve as an off-ramp for Last users. They had just been acquired and it wasn't going over super well with users. "What I listen to" (coworker suggested the name), shortened to wilt.

17 year old me had no idea what I was getting into. It was the best and worst project I've ever worked on.

A lot of respect to the guys and girls still working on Last and I'm very excited to see where it goes from here.

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#133
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Man i love last.fm even though it's been technically superseded (for most people) by Spotify's recommendation features.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 don't think the recommendation engines behind Spotify, Youtube Music, etc compare to the recommendations I got from last.fm over the years. The algorithmic ones seem to have a bunch of issues that bug me as a long time music listener and someone with a large music library. - their memory is short as hell so you can listen to something for a while, stop and then it'll suggest it to you later as something to "discove…

One really annoying example of YTM's algorithm is it (or whoever works on it) doesn't understand that a genre can have diverse sounds and instruments, so it will recommend songs that all sound the same.

Like if I start listening to house music, it will just recommend 100 songs that have organ 2 [0], even though house music is more diverse than that. Then it forces me to thumbs down the music, which also isn't what I want to do, because I have no idea what effect it's having on my recommendations. Is it just going to stop recommending house music altogether? Is it going to stop recommending songs with organ 2? Is it smart enough to understand that I just want less and not none? I do like organ 2, I just don't want to drown in it when I'm trying to find new music.

Or I will thumbs up a phonk song and it it just floods me with phonk remixes of pop songs.

Last.fm, on the other hand, seemed to have some way of towing a line of different enough without going too far. Both YTM and Spotify algos just do cookiecutter similarity.

[0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iq61C8gndjM

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#134
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Man i love last.fm even though it's been technically superseded (for most people) by Spotify's recommendation features.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 don't think the recommendation engines behind Spotify, Youtube Music, etc compare to the recommendations I got from last.fm over the years. The algorithmic ones seem to have a bunch of issues that bug me as a long time music listener and someone with a large music library. - their memory is short as hell so you can listen to something for a while, stop and then it'll suggest it to you later as something to "discove…

Great summaries. I also have a real affection for my last.fm discovery, and I think it had everything to do with "deep discovery" going deep into the related artists pages. It really shaped my relationship to music and my love of music discovery and I sometimes find I don't click with people whose idea of discovery is The Algorithm(TM).

I tried to import my music life into Google Music, uploading my lifetime of libraries there. When they wound that down I just lost trust in online services and now do it through Nextcloud, which honestly is pretty awesome imo. There's no algorithmic suggestion for better or worse, but none of the "who ordered that" style assumptions imposed on you by the system like those you outlined above.

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#135
Is anyone using last.fm in 2026? This made sense when people were playing MP3s in their Windows Media Player or Winamp, but as 99% of the people just stream music now, what is the purpose of this service?

It has been maybe a decade since I met someone who actually uses the service.

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#137
post #135

Is anyone using last.fm in 2026? This made sense when people were playing MP3s in their Windows Media Player or Winamp, but as 99% of the people just stream music now, what is the purpose of this service? It has been maybe a decade since I met someone who actually uses the service.

My partner swears by it for the Data when scrobbing with Deezer (and formally spotify.) He pays for it.

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#138
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.

The advantage of last.fm is that it doesn't host the content, so it doesn't shape the music you listen to like using Netflix would shape the content you watch, it's content neutral.

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the recommendation engines behind Spotify, Youtube Music, etc compare to the recommendations I got from last.fm over the years. The algorithmic ones seem to have a bunch of issues that bug me as a long time music listener and someone with a large music library. - their memory is short as hell so you can listen to something for a while, stop and then it'll suggest it to you later as something to "discove…

Cannot call lastfm algorithm advanced in any sense. Just opened Amon Tobin page: "similar artists: Kid Koala and DJ Kush", which is an impressively shallow understanding of the last 20 (!!) years of his life, and this happened with almost every artist on the platform, because the average sum of tastes of every listener does not exist in reality. E.g. in the case of Amon Tobin, Kid Koala is the average of similarities…

do you know of a better recommendation algorithm?

Re: Last.fm is now independent

#140
post #135

Is anyone using last.fm in 2026? This made sense when people were playing MP3s in their Windows Media Player or Winamp, but as 99% of the people just stream music now, what is the purpose of this service? It has been maybe a decade since I met someone who actually uses the service.

I can’t stand streaming and wanted to get off all streaming services and now self host every single piece of my digital media. Last.fm is an important component for the music side of my services in order to use the last.fm api to track listens and provide recommendations.
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