Last.fm and Audioscrobbler on Metafilter

Page 1 of 21 2 Next

- RJ said...
- Staff
- 27 Jul 2004, 11:31
Last.fm and Audioscrobbler on Metafilter

The queuemuncher choked over the weekend when no-one was around to give it a slap. It's running fine now, with a backlog to clear. There will be a delay in songs hitting your profile until the backlog is cleared (later today).
Update: backlog cleared. Webserver is on fire.

Just noticed a post on the mighty Metafilter mentioning Audioscrobbler and Last.fm, so here is a short statement clarifiying a few of the points that were raised:

Audioscrobbler.com and Last.fm are run by the same team, on the same hardware. Musical profiles work across both systems, so you can login to Last.fm with your 'scrobbler profile to listen to your radio station. Last.fm is 100% legal, paying a license fee to the MCPS/PRS in the UK, who distribute the license fee to the appropriate labels/artists.

We're aiming to provide a useful service to indy labels and artists (and the music industry in general) at the same time as building up our user-facing free services to help music reach the right people.

Last.fm style intelligent radio will be coming to Audioscrobbler.com soon. We've recently finished an upgrade to the Last.fm auto-DJ to make use of data from 'scrobbler profiles. (Last.fm is 128kbps broadband only)

Information wants to be beer.

[quote][b][user]RJ[/user][/b] said: [i]The queuemuncher choked over the weekend when no-one was around to give it a slap. It's running fine now, with a backlog to clear. There will be a delay in songs hitting your profile until the backlog is cleared (later today).[/i] [b]Update:[/b] backlog cleared. Webserver is on fire. Just noticed a post on the mighty [url=http://www.metafilter.com/]Metafilter[/url] mentioning Audioscrobbler and Last.fm, so here is a short statement clarifiying a few of the points that were raised: Audioscrobbler.com and Last.fm are run by the same team, on the same hardware. Musical profiles work across both systems, so you can login to Last.fm with your 'scrobbler profile to listen to your radio station. Last.fm [b]is 100% legal[/b], paying a license fee to the MCPS/PRS in the UK, who distribute the license fee to the appropriate labels/artists. We're aiming to provide a useful service to indy labels and artists (and the music industry in general) at the same time as building up our user-facing free services to help music reach the right people. Last.fm style intelligent radio will be coming to Audioscrobbler.com soon. We've recently finished an upgrade to the Last.fm auto-DJ to make use of data from 'scrobbler profiles. (Last.fm is 128kbps broadband only)[/quote]
Edited by RJ on 27 Jul 2004, 15:22

Permalink Quote
- giveuptheghost said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 11:36
I hope Matt updates his post about it.

-Scott

[quote][b][user]giveuptheghost[/user][/b] said: I hope Matt updates [url=http://a.wholelottanothing.org/archives.blah/007951]his post[/url] about it. -Scott[/quote]

Permalink Quote
- said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 11:41
My + vanished today and is still gone. Is this going to be fixed or do some of us need to send emails in?

[quote][b][user][/user][/b] said: My + vanished today and is still gone. Is this going to be fixed or do some of us need to send emails in?[/quote]

Permalink Quote
- RJ said...
- Staff
- 27 Jul 2004, 12:26
Re:

Quoth onebyone:
My + vanished today and is still gone. Is this going to be fixed or do some of us need to send emails in?
The + is valid for 1 month after you use the paypal button on the donate page.. perhaps it expired? Feel free to email me about it - rj at a/s .com

Information wants to be beer.

[quote][b][user]RJ[/user][/b] said: [quote][b]Quoth onebyone[/b]: My + vanished today and is still gone. Is this going to be fixed or do some of us need to send emails in?[/quote] The + is valid for 1 month after you use the paypal button on the donate page.. perhaps it expired? Feel free to email me about it - rj at a/s .com[/quote]

Permalink Quote
- Insolent said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 12:34
Nice to see the muncher err, munching again!

"The more you know, the less you understand."

[quote][b][user]Insolent[/user][/b] said: Nice to see the muncher err, munching again![/quote]

Permalink Quote
- Injektilo623 said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 12:46
So all the songs we listened to will eventually go through?

[quote][b][user]Injektilo623[/user][/b] said: So all the songs we listened to will eventually go through?[/quote]

Permalink Quote
- RJ said...
- Staff
- 27 Jul 2004, 12:51
Re:

Quoth Injektilo623:
So all the songs we listened to will eventually go through?
yes

Information wants to be beer.

[quote][b][user]RJ[/user][/b] said: [quote][b]Quoth Injektilo623[/b]: So all the songs we listened to will eventually go through?[/quote] yes[/quote]

Permalink Quote
- szalonykp2 said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 13:11
keep up your great work and do not listen to moaners!:)))

and you - muncher - just munch, munch, munch...

[quote][b][user]szalonykp2[/user][/b] said: keep up your great work and do not listen to moaners!:))) and you - muncher - just munch, munch, munch...[/quote]

Permalink Quote
- giveuptheghost said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 13:19
Wow, this thread got hijacked fast.

[quote][b][user]giveuptheghost[/user][/b] said: Wow, this thread got hijacked fast.[/quote]

Permalink Quote
- said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 13:32
I don't necessarily see why mentionning your + vanishing for no reason during the outage, when it could have happened to others for all you know, or making sure that the songs will count is hijacking the thread. It did after all start out addressing the problems with audioscrobbler lately. It was not just on Last FM.

Regardless, I will leave the thread alone now. The last thing I want to do is argue with folks here of all places.

[quote][b][user][/user][/b] said: I don't necessarily see why mentionning your + vanishing for no reason during the outage, when it could have happened to others for all you know, or making sure that the songs will count is hijacking the thread. It did after all start out addressing the problems with audioscrobbler lately. It was not just on Last FM. Regardless, I will leave the thread alone now. The last thing I want to do is argue with folks here of all places.[/quote]
Edited by a deleted user on 27 Jul 2004, 13:32

Permalink Quote
- giveuptheghost said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 14:02
Quoth onebyone:
I don't necessarily see why mentionning your + vanishing for no reason during the outage, when it could have happened to others for all you know, or making sure that the songs will count is hijacking the thread. It did after all start out addressing the problems with audioscrobbler lately. It was not just on Last FM.

Regardless, I will leave the thread alone now. The last thing I want to do is argue with folks here of all places.
I wasn't just referring to your reply but the others as well, and I didn't say anything (and wasn't going to) before the other replies, in fact. So, it wasn't (just) you. :)

[quote][b][user]giveuptheghost[/user][/b] said: [quote][b]Quoth onebyone[/b]: I don't necessarily see why mentionning your + vanishing for no reason during the outage, when it could have happened to others for all you know, or making sure that the songs will count is hijacking the thread. It did after all start out addressing the problems with audioscrobbler lately. It was not just on Last FM. Regardless, I will leave the thread alone now. The last thing I want to do is argue with folks here of all places.[/quote] I wasn't just referring to your reply but the others as well, and I didn't say anything (and wasn't going to) before the other replies, in fact. So, it wasn't (just) you. :)[/quote]
Edited by giveuptheghost on 27 Jul 2004, 14:24

Permalink Quote
- Muggsy147 said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 14:23
Seems most songs are thrown away now. Am I correct in saying this?

[quote][b][user]Muggsy147[/user][/b] said: Seems most songs are thrown away now. Am I correct in saying this?[/quote]

Permalink Quote
- Smiff said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 14:24
heh, my first thoughts on trying last.fm were 'this is too good to be legal' but didn't worry about it too much. of course you're not stupid enough to run an illegal site so publicly (sp?). i'll go back and see what it plays me now :)

" We've recently finished an upgrade to the Last.fm auto-DJ to make use of data from 'scrobbler profiles. (Last.fm is 128kbps broadband only)"

i'm confused about this - Last.fm has always used my AS profle, it's all that's there. how else could it pick songs, i've listened to about 10 on the radio. i'm confused.

[quote][b][user]Smiff[/user][/b] said: heh, my first thoughts on trying last.fm were 'this is too good to be legal' but didn't worry about it too much. of course you're not stupid enough to run an illegal site so publicly (sp?). i'll go back and see what it plays me now :) " We've recently finished an upgrade to the Last.fm auto-DJ to make use of data from 'scrobbler profiles. (Last.fm is 128kbps broadband only)" i'm confused about this - Last.fm has always used my AS profle, it's all that's there. how else could it pick songs, i've listened to about 10 on the radio. i'm confused.[/quote]
Edited by Smiff on 27 Jul 2004, 14:42

Permalink Quote
- giveuptheghost said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 15:07
Recently as in around June 6. :)

[quote][b][user]giveuptheghost[/user][/b] said: Recently as in around [url=http://www.last.fm/forum/897/_/3866]June 6[/url]. :)[/quote]

Permalink Quote
- vallis said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 15:29
Re:

Quoth Muggsy147:
Seems most songs are thrown away now. Am I correct in saying this?

Looks that way to me

[quote][b][user]vallis[/user][/b] said: [quote][b]Quoth Muggsy147[/b]: Seems most songs are thrown away now. Am I correct in saying this?[/quote] Looks that way to me[/quote]

Permalink Quote
- Smiff said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 17:09
giveuptheghost, before that, like a year ago, an old copy of my AS profile was in lastfm, but stuck. definately AS because i hadn't used last.fm for more than a few test listens . that's how my artists got the the top of my AS list, they were counted double when last.fm data was merged back into AS. somethign weird happened. it's not worth trying to fix now.

[quote][b][user]Smiff[/user][/b] said: giveuptheghost, before that, like a year ago, an old copy of my AS profile was in lastfm, but stuck. definately AS because i hadn't used last.fm for more than a few test listens . that's how my artists got the the top of my AS list, they were counted double when last.fm data was merged back into AS. somethign weird happened. it's not worth trying to fix now.[/quote]
Edited by Smiff on 27 Jul 2004, 17:10

Permalink Quote
- Gemini9857 said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 17:18
Glad to see it working right again.

[quote][b][user]Gemini9857[/user][/b] said: Glad to see it working right again.[/quote]

Permalink Quote
- crenz said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 18:00
Seems that once the queue muncher is started, it throws away songs...?

[quote][b][user]crenz[/user][/b] said: Seems that once the queue muncher is started, it throws away songs...?[/quote]

Permalink Quote
- DoctorT said...
- Subscriber
- 27 Jul 2004, 18:21
Re:

Quoth crenz:
Seems that once the queue muncher is started, it throws away songs...?

Not always, but when problems occur, anything can happen. Everything of mine from the 23rd and 24th, as far as I can tell, was entered into my profile. However, it does appear that submissions at one point were dumped (You can see this in the stats graph until it scrolls off with time). Only one of my submissions from the 25th and 26th made it into my profile. Todays submissions seem to be going in just fine.

_{iScrobbler/Mac Support Group}

[quote][b][user]DoctorT[/user][/b] said: [quote][b]Quoth crenz[/b]: Seems that once the queue muncher is started, it throws away songs...?[/quote] Not always, but when problems occur, anything can happen. Everything of mine from the 23rd and 24th, as far as I can tell, was entered into my profile. However, it does appear that submissions at one point were dumped (You can see this in the stats graph until it scrolls off with time). Only one of my submissions from the 25th and 26th made it into my profile. Todays submissions seem to be going in just fine.[/quote]
Edited by DoctorT on 27 Jul 2004, 18:23

Permalink Quote
- amiantos said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 18:32
Such ignorance from the blogging community. Everything must be illegal! ;)

Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt.

[quote][b][user]amiantos[/user][/b] said: Such ignorance from the blogging community. Everything must be illegal! ;)[/quote]

Permalink Quote
- DoctorT said...
- Subscriber
- 27 Jul 2004, 19:02
Re:

Quoth amiantos:
Such ignorance from the blogging community. Everything must be illegal! ;)

All it takes is looking at the bottom of the Last.fm page:

MCPS/PRS registered and paying artists since 2002

And there is this from their FAQ:

Is Last.fm Legal?

Yes. We pay the MCPS/PRS a license fee which gives us permission to broadcast the music. Our license fee is distributed as royalties by the license authority.

_{iScrobbler/Mac Support Group}

[quote][b][user]DoctorT[/user][/b] said: [quote][b]Quoth amiantos[/b]: Such ignorance from the blogging community. Everything must be illegal! ;)[/quote] All it takes is looking at the bottom of the Last.fm page: [quote]MCPS/PRS registered and paying artists since 2002[/quote] And there is this from their FAQ: [quote][b]Is Last.fm Legal?[/b] Yes. We pay the MCPS/PRS a license fee which gives us permission to broadcast the music. Our license fee is distributed as royalties by the license authority. [/quote][/quote]
Edited by DoctorT on 27 Jul 2004, 19:23

Permalink Quote
- RNR said...
- Staff
- 27 Jul 2004, 19:20
Evening all . . .

Quoth Smiff:
heh, my first thoughts on trying last.fm were 'this is too good to be legal' but didn't worry about it too much.
aah, that sounds nice. well, here we go we are as legal as it gets, and paying for that.

another thing:
Last.fm has always used my AS profle, it's all that's there. how else could it pick songs, i've listened to about 10 on the radio. i'm confused.
well, actually there is pure Last.fm profiles, too. on last.fm you can 'add' any song/album that we have on the site to your profile, which is the a fast way of building your profile.

now, on the 6th of June (thanks giveuptheghost) we included AS profiles for the first time in the neighbour calculations (which we wanted to do for ages, but we got sidetracked by broken hardware for 6 months ;-)). As a consequence we started displaying 'scrobbled' tracks on last.fm, too.

But at that point the radio scripts couldn't tell if a song that was only scrobbled is also in the Last.fm catalgoue (believe me it's a bit complicated), so now 2 weeks ago, we managed through the work of mr. radio (mischa) to be able to do exactly that. so all songs from AS profiles that are in the last.fm catalogue can now by heard on the radio.

basically, last.fm and audioscrobbler been on the same servers / sharing the same office / eating lunch together / working on both together, and we love it! sorry to keep you all in the dark, but hey, we haven't figured this one out yet either. have fun.

Both kinds of music: Rock & Roll - SFTRI

[quote][b][user]RNR[/user][/b] said: [quote][b]Quoth Smiff[/b]: heh, my first thoughts on trying last.fm were 'this is too good to be legal' but didn't worry about it too much. [/quote] aah, that sounds nice. well, here we go we are as legal as it gets, and paying for that. another thing: [quote]Last.fm has always used my AS profle, it's all that's there. how else could it pick songs, i've listened to about 10 on the radio. i'm confused.[/quote] well, actually there is pure Last.fm profiles, too. on last.fm you can 'add' any song/album that we have on the site to your profile, which is the a fast way of building your profile. now, on the 6th of June (thanks giveuptheghost) we included AS profiles for the first time in the neighbour calculations (which we wanted to do for ages, but we got sidetracked by broken hardware for 6 months ;-)). As a consequence we started displaying 'scrobbled' tracks on last.fm, too. But at that point the radio scripts couldn't tell if a song that was only scrobbled is also in the Last.fm catalgoue (believe me it's a bit complicated), so now 2 weeks ago, we managed through the work of mr. radio (mischa) to be able to do exactly that. so all songs from AS profiles that are in the last.fm catalogue can now by heard on the radio. basically, last.fm and audioscrobbler been on the same servers / sharing the same office / eating lunch together / working on both together, and we love it! sorry to keep you all in the dark, but hey, we haven't figured this one out yet either. have fun. [/quote]
Edited by RNR on 27 Jul 2004, 19:23

Permalink Quote
- DoctorT said...
- Subscriber
- 27 Jul 2004, 19:25
sorry to keep you all in the dark, but hey, we haven't figured this one out yet either. have fun.

Uh, turn the light switch on? ;-)>

_{iScrobbler/Mac Support Group}

[quote][b][user]DoctorT[/user][/b] said: [quote]sorry to keep you all in the dark, but hey, we haven't figured this one out yet either. have fun.[/quote] Uh, turn the light switch on? ;-)>[/quote]
Edited by DoctorT on 27 Jul 2004, 19:25

Permalink Quote
- giveuptheghost said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 20:24
now, on the 6th of June (thanks giveuptheghost) we included AS profiles for the first time in the neighbour calculations...
Actually May 26 (last reply was June 6; my bad). :)

[quote][b][user]giveuptheghost[/user][/b] said: [quote]now, on the 6th of June (thanks giveuptheghost) we included AS profiles for the first time in the neighbour calculations...[/quote] Actually [url=http://www.last.fm/forum/897/_/3866]May 26[/url] (last reply was June 6; my bad). :)[/quote]
Edited by giveuptheghost on 27 Jul 2004, 20:25

Permalink Quote
- mathowie said...
- User
- 27 Jul 2004, 21:43
can't possibly be legal

I'll update my post, but I said "can't possibly be legal" because the service reminds me so much of the ill-fated My.MP3.com service of yesteryear. That service only let you stream your own purchased and ripped music to yourself, and they still got shut down for holding what were essentially copies of the submitted tracks. Last.FM allows you to stream anyone's entire collection, none of which were uploaded, so I don't see how you guys can possibly weather a storm brought upon you by the RIAA.

It seems like they'll follow the same procedure they used to shut down my.mp3.com, and I'd hate to see either last.fm or audioscrobbler go, since they're such useful little apps.

[quote][b][user]mathowie[/user][/b] said: I'll update my post, but I said "can't possibly be legal" because the service reminds me so much of the ill-fated My.MP3.com service of yesteryear. That service only let you stream your own purchased and ripped music to yourself, and they still got shut down for holding what were essentially copies of the submitted tracks. Last.FM allows you to stream anyone's entire collection, none of which were uploaded, so I don't see how you guys can possibly weather a storm brought upon you by the RIAA. It seems like they'll follow the same procedure they used to shut down my.mp3.com, and I'd hate to see either last.fm or audioscrobbler go, since they're such useful little apps.[/quote]

Permalink Quote