I noticed last.fm a few days ago via Joe Thorn. Now Joe has a post up on it. It's a free music player that plays according to your musical preferences. So for example, I tell it I like Rogue Wave, Wilco, and The Avett Brothers and it plays music from these guys as well as from groups and singers who are in the genre ranges of the ones I like. Pretty cool.
You can skip songs you don't like (even block them so they won't be played again) and mark the ones you really like. There is much more to the site than this, but this should be reason enough to check it out.
That is the best banner. This thing has been around since like 2002, so it has a pretty wide user base. Everyone should check it out.
Posted by: Joe Thorn | 02/27/2006 at 02:44 PM
It's very similar to something called "The Music Genome Project" which you might can check out here: http://www.pandora.com/ It also lets you listen based off of selections, edit out artists/songs, etc. and it seems to have a fairly large database.
Enjoy,
Brent
Posted by: Brent | 02/27/2006 at 03:49 PM
I have not used Pandora, but have read of it. It sounds very cool too. Here is a helpful post comparing Last.fm and Pandora. [link]
Posted by: Joe Thorn | 02/27/2006 at 04:45 PM
Great find Joe. Thanks.
Posted by: Steve McCoy | 02/27/2006 at 04:58 PM
Thanks for the tip. I am loving the mix that last.fm put together for me tonight...
Posted by: sled dog | 02/27/2006 at 10:26 PM
Even more than the music genome project, you can seed your last.fm account with data on the music you listen to. I have a plugin installed with iTunes so that every time I listen to a song, last.fm knows about it. Then it can make useful recommendations about what I might like, who my musical neighbors are, etc.
The last few new artists I found and fallen in love with have all been through last.fm recommendations. It's worth it.
Posted by: Chris | 02/28/2006 at 07:17 AM
Isn't the constant buffering annoying to you? What am I doing wrong?
Posted by: Roger | 02/28/2006 at 12:23 PM
I haven't had any issues at all Roger.
Posted by: Steve McCoy | 02/28/2006 at 12:27 PM
Once again, it seems you've been looking through my CD collection.
I've also been loading up my last.fm profile to see how it reacts to my self-imposed play list. I loaded the WinAmp module and it works great.
They have neat tools to post your most played artists and songs on your own website, but I can't seem to find a way to post the last 10 tracks played.
Posted by: Van Edwards | 02/28/2006 at 01:18 PM
Not related to lastfm or pandora, just thought you might be interested in this recent interview with the Avett Brothers:
http://www.indyweek.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A28385
Enjoy.
Brent
Posted by: Brent | 03/02/2006 at 09:02 AM
Roger,
I was having a similar problem. Every time I went to use my browser (firefox), the last.fm player would mute. I selected "use external player" under options and played it through i-tunes - problem solved.
brad
Posted by: Brad R | 03/02/2006 at 09:56 AM
thanks for the heads up on last.fm
i've been using it since you posted and it's been great...
Posted by: stew | 03/06/2006 at 10:18 PM