course you do - you're a male music fan

VOILA

It put me in touch with someone 2 years ago that is now my best friend.

It gives you 'neighbours' who share the same music taste as you - and they're always nice when you leave a message on their page saying "HI, WE HAVE SUPER COMPATABILITY!!1"

The radio is a really good way of finding new, decent bands you haven't heard.
CHARTS.
Full length, streamable songs with more choice per band than myspace.
CHARTS.
The listings for tours are useful.

It's a great site, the problem being it gets better the more you use it. When you listened to enough music for it to know your music taste well (about 5,000 tracks i reckon) the site will suggest bands that complement and contrast your music taste.

The events calender is fucking amazing too. It tells me when any band that I like are playing a show in London.

one of the best things on the internet!
I love looking at what other people are listening to, and its an easy way for people to find out what music you're into!

but i hate it when embarrassing tracks get scrobbled and you have to remove them from your profile. anyone else guilty of this?

that you are forced to listen to cool music, just so that you can say how much cooler your charts are than others. Brilliant!

statistics!
charts!
the strange thrill of being able to see what other people are listening to RIGHT NOW!

plus, it makes it a lot easier to fill in those boxes that say 'music taste'.

but at least no twit can 'poke' you

It's really interesting to look at other people's LastFms to see what they REALLY listen to. A friend of mine stopped using his when it became apparent that he generally lied about his music taste. LAST FM NEVER LIES!!!

Does it really have any other use? It is hideously self indulgent.

but I don't listen to much music on my computer as my speakers suck so it kinda doesn't work very well with my CD player and Decks.

therefore I am ever indebted.

Install the programme and forget about it for a few months.
Check your profile after that and see if it does anything for oyou.

What more do you want then that?

8 days before its actually release
http://www.last.fm/music/Portishead/Third

sorry if this is old news

i have the problem that now i only listen to music on my laptop. cos ive got a newer ipod, it's plays don't get scrobbled and then my weekly charts will be inaccurate (Shockhorror!). so now i never listen to my ipod round the house. just carry my laptop everywhere so tracks are reliably scrobbled.

relating this has made me realise how much last.fm rules my life. anyone else suffer this much? please?

Why do so many of my top songs have 1 more play on last.fm than they do on my itunes?

Answer me that, eh.

All of these things have already been mentioned through the thread but last.fm is just plain great.

Recommendations: last.fm will recommend you new music based on what you are already listening to. This is brilliant, it introduced me to bands like Okkervil River, Wolf Parade, Neutral Milk Hotel, Decemberists, I could go on, but you get the point.

Also, the event recommendations are really good, basically shows you gigs that are being played in your area by the bands/artists you listen to.

It is also cool to see what your friends are listening to and find people with exactly the same taste in music as you. And charts and stats about your music habits are also cool.

In summary, last.fm rules.

but only have my work computer at the mo, so can't actually listen to anything. It all sounds like an ace concept, but I can't work out it's search facilities. How the heck do you find friends? I don't want to use my hotmail contacts or send invitations.

.....and probably always will be, the first tab that I open up on my browser, every day.