Social Networking Watch: News on the Social Networking and Social Media Industry

Last.fm Introduces A Subscription Fee For Streaming Music Via Its Mobile Apps

READ WRITE WEB - Feb 7 - The personalized music streaming company Last.fm has announced that its radio service will become an ad-free, subscriber-only feature on iPhones and Androids, starting February 15. Last.fm Radio will remain free via its website and desktop app as well as for U.S. and U.K. users of Xbox Live and Windows Mobile 7 phones. FULL ARTICLE @ READ WRITE WEB

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Last.fm Reveals £2.84m Loss

TECH CRUNCH - Dec 3 - Last.fm, the music startup acquired by media giant CBS in 2007 for $280M (£140m), made a loss for 2009 of under £2.84M ($4.45M). The loss posted in 2008 was £17.11M, reflecting the high costs of streaming music, which the company has now cut. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH

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Last.fm And MySpace Blocked In Turkey?

MASHABLE -- Sep 20 -- Last.fm and MySpace are the latest sites to be added to Turkey’s block list. Web users in Turkey are already prevented from accessing YouTube and Facebook. Access to MySpace and Last.fm is banned by a Turkish court…this ban may be a consequence of a case filed by Turkish Union of Music Producers (MÜYAP) in order to protect music rights. Turkey has 7th largest and most engaged online audience in Europe with its 27M Internet users. FULL ARTICLE @ MASHABLE

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Zoosk Introduces Last.fm And Netflix Integration Into Online Dating Profiles

PR NEWSWIRE -- May 19 -- Zooskers can easily link their Last.fm and Netflix accounts to their Zoosk Date Card by providing their Last.fm username or a link to their Netflix queue's RSS feed. Once a user links their accounts to their profile on Zoosk, music picks made on Last.fm and movie titles selected on Netflix will automatically appear on the user's Zoosk Date Card. FULL ARTICLE @ PR NEWSWIRE

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Last.fm Temporarily Backs Down From Subscription Fees

MASHABLE -- Mar 30 -- Last week, Last.fm announced that they would soon start charging users that live outside the US, UK, and Germany about $4 per month to continue using the streaming radio features of its site. They’ll be delaying the move until a few much requested features are delivered to users including the option to pay via premium SMS and integrating subscriptions with the Last.fm API. FULL ARTICLE @ MASHABLE

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Last.fm Kills Off Third Party Mobile Apps

MASHABLE -- Mar 25 -- First, Last.fm announced that international users (those living outside of the US, UK, or Germany) will have to start paying for radio streaming, and now they’ve effectively banned all third party mobile clients. In a post on their official blog, Last.fm is stressing that “the mobile device restriction isn’t set in stone” and that they “may be able to make an exception”. FULL ARTICLE @ MASHABLE

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Last.fm To Charge Subscription Fee

READ WRITE WEB -- Mar 25 -- Last.fm will "soon" require users outside of the US, UK and Germany to pay €3.00 per month to keep the music rolling. In blog comments on the announcement, the company explained that those three countries were the only ones where ad sales were proving successful enough to monetize the free music that way; elsewhere the money will have to come out of listeners' pockets. FULL ARTICLE @ READ WRITE WEB

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Did Last.fm Hand Over User Listening Data To The RIAA?

TECH CRUNCH -- Feb 20 -- According to a tip we received from an irate friend who works at CBS that last.fm recently provided the RIAA with a giant dump of user data to track down people who are scrobbling unreleased tracks. Last.fm says: "To our knowledge, no data has been made available to RIAA." FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH

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Layoffs At Last.FM Confirmed

TECH CRUNCH -- Dec 11 -- CBS Interactive is laying off people across several of its properties. Employees at social music site Last.FM were let go. CBS bought Last.FM in 2007 for $280m. One source puts the number of layoffs at as many as 40 people, mostly from Last.FM's London HQ, which has a total staff of 95. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH

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Coldplay Are To Last.fm As Beatles Were To Billboard

READ WRITE WEB -- Dec 7 -- last.fm has released its most popular songs, albums and artists of 2008. The rankings come from last.fm's database, based on number of listeners. The Top 10 tracks is absolutely dominated by Coldplay's Viva la Vida. The music had to be released in 2008 to qualify for the charts. Last.fm says it currently has 43m distinct pieces of music from more than 12m artists in its database. FULL ARTICLE @ READ WRITE WEB

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Interview With Last.fm Founder Richard Jones: Part 2

READ WRITE WEB -- Oct 2 -- This is Part 2 about business models; following on from Part 1 about last.fm and its competition.

Q: What have been the main challenges and opportunities for you and your team in becoming part of a much larger company?
A: The opportunities are obviously huge. We've been working with CBS on some hugely effective cross-promotions in the States, most recently the 'Listen Again' campaign in tandem with CBS Television shows like Swingtown, We're growing massively, over 100 staff in the London HQ now.

Q: What is last.fm's business model going forward?
A:  Advertising continues to be the driving force.

Q: If you could put yourself in the shoes of an independent, unsigned musician, what kind of things would you do online to get your work out there?
A: The Artist Royalty Program is just one of the ways you can utilize Last.fm as an independent musician. Upload as many tracks as you can, tag them well, join some groups to spread the word, kick off a Powerplay campaign to start the ball rolling, and the system makes sure your music reaches the right ears.
FULL INTERVIEW @ READ WRITE WEB

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Interview With Last.fm Founder Richard Jones: Part 2

READ WRITE WEB -- Oct 1 -- Here is the 1st part of the interview with Last.fm Founder Richard Jones. We wanted to find out last.fm's reaction to the launch of MySpace Music and the rise of Imeem.

Q: What differentiates last.fm from other services?
A: The navigation through the mass of music is now the priority for music fans. We have a unique recommendation system to help our users find stuff suited to their taste.

Q: Where last.fm sits in terms of licensing with the 4 majors and independents?
A: We have music from 3 of the majors, and renegotiations with Warner are ongoing. We ensure all labels and artists are paid when their music is streamed on the site.

Q: How crucial do you think mobile apps will be when competing against the likes of MySpace, Imeem and Pandora? Do you think you have any advantages over your rivals in this area?
A: Mobile is hugely important to us. At the moment the iPhone dominates, and our only competition there is really Pandora, which is limited to the US whereas our app is available in the US, UK, Canada, Germany, Spain and France, with more countries to come.
FULL INTERVIEW @ READ WRITE WEB

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Bebo Puts Open Media Platform To Good Use Through ESPN

MASHABLE -- Sep 9 -- Bebo users can include premium music and video content in their profiles. At launch, Bebo had a long list of media partners, including BBC, Yahoo, Last.fm, MTV Networks, and ESPN. Now, the partnership with ESPN is actually visible to users, who can access ESPN's short videos through Bebo's open media platform. FULL ARTICLE @ MASHABLE

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Facebook Narrows The Traffic Gap

MASHABLE -- Aug 18 -- While Facebook recently took the worldwide lead in social networking traffic, MySpace has been quick to point out that they still occupy the top spot, the US market. With 34.3m visitors in July, Facebook still sits well behind MySpace with 59.2m, but MySpace has stopped growing in the US (down 3% y-o-y according to Nielsen). LinkedIn continues to grow quickly, registering more than 10m monthly uniques in July. Music focused social networking application provider Imeem also had a big month, registering 3.9m unique visitors, placing it handily above competitor Last.fm (2.4m). FULL ARTICLE @ MASHABLE

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Last.fm Experiences Sharp Growth

NEWS TIP -- Aug 15 -- According to the latest comScore report, Last.fm has experienced a 20% increase in uniques and a 36% increase in total minutes in the U.S.  Additionally, Last.fm saw a dramatic 208% year-over-year increase in total minutes spent on the site and a 62% increase in unique visitors, corresponding to a 90% increase in visitor engagement.

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Imeem Dials Up Volume Of Traffic

SF CHRONICLE -- Aug 11 -- Imeem has has attracted millions of users worldwide, in July becoming the No. 1 streaming music site in the U.S. according to Compete.com. In June, Imeem had more than 27m unique visitors, with about 65,000 registered users visiting the site each day, according to comScore, which ranked it as one of the biggest and fastest-growing social networks in the U.S. Imeem also claims more than 85m total unique visitors of its widgets. But this year, Imeem will face competition from CBS's Last.fm and MySpace, which plans to roll out MySpace Music next month. FULL ARTICLE @ SF CHRONICLE

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Social.FM In The Deadpool

TECH CRUNCH -- Aug 4 -- Social.FM, the three year old startup which helped users discover music through their social network in a similar manner to Last.fm, has shut down.  Social.FM was the re-branded Mercora, which launched in June 2005 and raised $5 million from Norwest Venture Partners.  Competition from Pandora and Last.fm made it change its strategy towards a social network. Social.FM may also have suffered from the huge jump in royalty rates for webcasting music. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH

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Last.fm Launches API 2.0

READ WRITE WEB -- June 30 -- The popular social music service Last.fm features an API that lets anyone build their own programs using Last.fm data, whether those programs are on the web, on the desktop, or on a mobile phone. The new version of the Last.fm API will now allow any application or device deep integration with the Last.fm platform. According to their blog post about the launch, their goal is to offer "the most comprehensive social music API on the web." FULL ARTICLE @ READ WRITE WEB

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