Long live last.fm!

"Aaahhh - I love it when the bass rattles everything in the kitchen"
jemimakiss

So the beautiful new last.fm is live and I'm loving it! There's a lot on offer out there that's confusing and time wasting. Unless you're a geek journo, what's the point of chopping and changing all the time? You end up spending more time setting up, re-finding your friends and putting in your music preferences. "If it ain't broken don't try and fix it" and last.fm was never bust but now it's better.

It's hard to explain exactly why. Yes, it looks better, it takes all your media player tunes into account, charts and recommendations are updated immediately and yes, the player is on nearly every page. Admittedly, I have had the odd problem in losing music when changing page but on the whole it's pretty reliable. Yes, it had a few problems on launch but let's just call that a victim of its own success and the tekkies seem to have it under control now.

Feature updates are a necessary duty to keep users onside but the thing that does it for me is the new design and navigation. It's simpler, cleaner and smarter at the same time offering a musical mystery tour anytime you want. As, my musical journey continues, I'm being offered more relevant choices. It's like someone has made a compilation tape for me with all my favourite stuff on - even stuff I've never heard of.

The journey through artist and track info passes you by until you realise that you've been cliking away for ages without thinking. It works. The videos are nicely organised against each artist, album or track and, whilst they're mostly pulled in from YouTube, you always find what you're looking for without clutter. Video also works in the same way as music so you get offered better choices the more you play.

It's not like me to give so much praise to anyone or anything. So I better stop before I get a new reputation. But it's rare to see a good British web application working the way it's supposed to. Long live last.fm. A haiku dedication seems only right and proper now.

New look last fm
Easier, cleaner, smarter...
British 2.0!

So be my first and best last.fm friend www.last.fm/user/haikuriosgeorg