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Last.fm Shoots Down Rumors Over U2 Album Leak
nandemoari writes "Internet radio site Last.fm has denied reports that it told the record industry which of its members had listened to a leaked U2 album. The site claims the entire story, published by Techcrunch, was made up.
Last week the record industry became extremely concerned after U2's forthcoming album appeared on several torrent file sharing sites. While there is no way any users could have acquired the album through Last.fm, the site's statistics suggest that more than 8,000 users have played the unreleased album on their machines."
Very often I see comments dismissing any reasons for not freely giving out any and all seemingly-trivial personal information...
Well, this is the perfect situation for justifying the desire for what is now often considered excessive privacy. While some information alone may not seem sensitive, the conclusions others' might draw about you from it, combined with other info (like your profile data), may indeed be worth protecting.
Of course, if no one gave out any information, the internet would be very blank... So clearly a balance between giving out personal info and linking that personal info together is necessary. For example, the only way I'd submit my playlists to Last.FM is if it were done in an anonymous fashion, such that my user account doesn't link back to me, my IP, or any other personally-identifying info. Otherwise, I'd be happy to include some profile info, but don't count on getting my playlist too!
Even if they were reporting it, the moment they started acting on the fact the ID3 tags showed leaked albums, people would change all their ID3 tags to leaked albums in protest.
While most industries rely on the tried and true Producer/Consumer model of customer relationship, the record labels treat their source of money as a Prosecutor/Criminal relationship. Let's see how long people are willing to pay money to be treated that way.
Any new albums coming out I'm not supposed to have? I'll make some fake tracks and tag them appropriately. Heck, I'll even rate them unfavorably! Haha!
I remember when somebody released fake U2 tracks with miscellaneous burping, farting, and cursing noises. They were a damn sight better than the album.
The album is available for preview on Spotify and Spotify is integrated with last.fm, so is it possible the 8000 last.fm users who listened to the tracks are perfectly legal Spotify users?
Don't be crazy anymore!
Or, given the way last.fm works, 8,000 people submitted the names of the album tracks to the site. Which you could just do by re-tagging other files, or just submitting whatever you felt like to the web service.
The fact that 8,000 have apparently listened to the album, based on their last.fm submissions, doesn't mean any of them actually have. Of course it doesn't mean they haven't either; it's just that last.fm data is hardly authoritative.
Yeah, I had a sig once; I got bored of it.
God has called me to tell the story you are about to read. It was
excruciating for me to relive it as I wrote the words. But, I knew
that it was God's Will for me to follow through. I believe, at some
point, it will be my son's story to tell, but until he's ready to do
so, I'll tell it. It is my prayer that this story will plant a
spiritual seed in the hearts of many and set them on the path to
discovering just how magnificent God's power and glory really is. My
story spans many pages, but please read every word of it, even if you
feel that some of the content is irrelevant to your life. Since it
was God's Will for me to write this, I have to believe that His Holy
Spirit is within these pages. And, where His Holy Spirit is,
blessings, too, will be.
In my mind, I had always pictured that if anything ever happened to
one of my children, I would just start screaming and never stop. On
April 17th, 2005, at about 9:30 a.m., in a hotel room in Dallas,
Texas, I was awakened from a dead sleep by my husband's frantic words
that I will never forget as long as I live: "TAMMY, SOMETHING'S
HAPPENED TO BRANDIN!" Brandin, my son who was 16 years old at that
time, had been critically injured.
In the midst of my hysteria, I gathered what little information there
was at the moment from Brandin's very distraught Grandmother. He had
been involved in a rollover accident and had been ejected from the
vehicle. She only knew that he was critically injured and that he was
being airlifted at that moment to Everett Tower, a Severe Trauma
hospital in Oklahoma City.
There is no description for the torment I felt on that 3-hour trip
from Dallas to Oklahoma City. My prayer is that no mother ever has to
be in a position to ask God to please forgive any sins her son may
have committed if he should die without getting the chance to ask
himself. I went back and forth between that and begging God to save
his life, and the hysteria continued. My worst fear was that he would
die with no one there who loves him. Thank God my sister and
stepmother lived in Norman, OK, so they were able to get to Everett
Tower shortly after he arrived and give me updates until I could get
there.
I knew before I walked in the hospital that Brandin had suffered a
severe blow to the head and that he had considerable damage to his
face and brain. But, nothing on earth could have prepared me for
walking in that ER and seeing my baby.... broken... lying there
lifeless. He appeared to have gauze packed in the right side of his
head where the impact occurred. I add such a gruesome detail not to
exploit Brandin's injuries but to help you, the audience, to
understand the severity of his condition. Words cannot describe the
sheer terror I felt. I just knew I'd lost him.
His list of injuries was extensive. He had crushed almost every bone
in the right side of his face except his lower jaw. They were
concerned that he could lose the use of his right eye. He had
bleeding at the base of his brain. The impact had shifted his brain
to the left side of his skull. But, of the most concern was the fact
that his right carotid artery, where it branches and goes inside the
skull to feed the right side of the brain, was completely occluded
(blocked). That, combined with all the other trauma, put him at a
very high risk for stroke. Brandin was in a drug-induced coma in an
effort to allow his brain every opportunity to heal. He would need
reconstruction on the right side of his face, but that was secondary
to the brain injury and would have to wait until his brain had healed
enough to withstand a surgery.
The paramedics had placed a device known as a "bolt" in his head,
which measured the pressure in the brain. It was measured by a
number, and if that number climbed too high,... Well, I don't know what
would have happened because I never had to find out, thank God.
Once the medical team felt that Bra
Is it just my observation, or is eldavojohn an idiot?
I think the bigger problem we have is that people are still listening to U2!
that 8000 people hearing it, have guaranteed 8000 no-sales.
It's terrible.
The poor music industry, I feel so sorry for it. For years and years they have driven the marketing machine so that everyone absolutely must get the album on the day it's out, or as soon as possible. Mostly due to the way the charts are calculated by sales peaks, but also because everyone wants money now.
And now people can't wait for the release day anymore. Geez. Who would have guessed?
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Has the record industry found what it's looking for?
AT&ROFLMAO
When I began writing this letter, I had the notion that I would write about something positive and optimistic instead of going on about how vexatious U2 is. Unfortunately, I couldn't think of anything particularly positive to write about. So, instead, I'll just tell you that U2's little schemes are bound to fail. Before I launch into my rant, permit me the prelude caveat that some of the facts I'm about to present may seem shocking. This they certainly are. However, I am rather disturbed by U2's internecine attitude that we should love things and use people instead of the other way around. As an interesting experiment, try to point this out to it. (You might want to don safety equipment first.) I think you'll find that some people have said that within the deleterious milieu of corporatism exists the opportunity for U2 to cause riots in the streets. Maybe. But I'm more inclined to believe that the key to U2's soul is its longing for the effortless, irresponsible, automatic consciousness of an animal. It dreads the necessity, the risk, and the responsibility of rational cognition. As a result, U2's exegeses are a logical absurdity, a series of deductions from a premise that has been denied. Speaking of absurdities, U2 thinks it's good that its metanarratives break down traditional values. It is difficult to know how to respond to such monumentally misplaced values, but let's try this: I have a plan to work beyond the predatory plasticity of its campaigns of malice and malignity. I call this plan "Operation pronounce the truth and renounce the lies". (Granted, I need a shorter, catchier name but that one will do for now.) My plan's underlying motif is that it is not news that larrikinism appears to have triumphed. What speaks volumes, though, is that I've never bothered it. Yet it wants to paralyze any serious or firm decision and thereby become responsible for the weak and half-hearted execution of even the most necessary measures. Whatever happened to "live and let live"?
We must learn to celebrate our diversity, not because it is the politically correct thing to do but because its thesis is that it never engages in damnable, inconsiderate, or hideous politics. That's totally stroppy, you say? Good; that means you're finally catching on. The next step is to observe that you should not ask, "Why can't U2 value a diversity of approaches without needing to rank them as better and worse?", but rather, "What will be the outcome of U2's quest for world hegemony?". The latter question is the better one to ask because I didn't want to talk about this. I really didn't. But U2 has stated that 75 million years ago, a galactic tyrant named Xenu solved the overpopulation problem of his 76-planet federation by transporting the excess people to Earth, chaining them to volcanoes, and dropping H-bombs on them. That's just pure sensationalism. Well, in U2's case, it might be pure ignorance, seeing that while we do nothing, those who achieve total world domination are gloating and smirking. And they will keep on gloating and smirking until we identify, challenge, defy, disrupt, and, finally, destroy the institutions that focus too much on one side of the equation and not enough on the broader perspective of things.
U2's comment that embracing a system of barbarism will make everything right with the world is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. Not only did all of us misfortunate enough to have to listen to it make that comment become dumber as a result but I allege that a lot more people now understand why I suspect that if you're the type who dares to think for yourself, then you've probably already determined that I intend to look closely at U2's views to see what makes them so effectual at breaking down our communities. I should expect to find--this is a guess that I currently lack sufficient knowledge to verify--that you don't have to say anything specifically about U2 for it to start attacking you. All you have to do is dare to imply that we should embrace the cause of self-determination and recog
I still think "Negativland" is U2's best album. I actually paid for it too.
...technology owns YOU!
What if they implemented something along the lines of 1 time credit card numbers. Imagine you could be assigned a very random set of characters associated with your identity that would allow you to register for services and only trusted sites had access to the 'true' information.
Then again, using a service such as this implies a central server with all the information and that is scary just by itself.
Bored at work? Play Game!
http://blog.last.fm/2009/02/23/techcrunch-are-full-of-shit
"leak" is the right term, escaping like a trickle of urine down bono's juddery stack heeled old geezer leg.
Universal Australia accidentally released the album for sale for a period of two hours, 2 weeks before the planned release date. That is how the album was leaked in the first place
Many fans, including U2 Blogs, made accounts with Universal Australia and bought the tracks within that two hours for about $20. UMG can't just sell people MP3s for $20 and ask for them back- sale done, game over.
... should have done it at the CBS buy-out but I got lazy.
Last.fm has denied the rumour, but really, reality check time... a pig in a skirt is still a pig, even if you f**k it some of the time...
How I will miss recommending totally inappropriate drum and bass tracks to my French classical music loving friend ("you have the music tastes of a 15 year old") and weird novelty songs to my sensible sister ("my brother is an idiot") and recording all the crap I play in Amarok on the last.fm playlist
I'm not sure if I'm playing into a woosh moment, but paypal has a free "secure card" service that generates such one-time-use credit card numbers..
Paypal introduces secure cards
Belief? Hope? Preference?The Existential Vortex
Who cares about U2 anyway!?!? Seriously, I hope they only have 8,000 listeners in the whole world but even then that's too many.
Why?
You see U2 sued the living bejesus out of the band Negativland over some utterly silly shit and U2 denied it for the longest time but then a few years ago U2 got caught in a lie. The link is to a conference in which one of Negativland's members happens to find the very person who gave a copy of their album to U2, a manager for REM. Yeah, lie to us some more Bono.
No, you did not walk into a whoosh, you did however miss the reading comprehension. The poster clearly alluded TO the existence of 1 time secure credit cards and was not suggesting the invention of technology he clearly knew to exist already.
All my torrents are downloaded by my cat. I've designed a device where my cat clicks. It's not my responsability.
Will my cat be prosecuted?
Please see the official response from last.fm on our blog: http://blog.last.fm/2009/02/23/techcrunch-are-full-of-shit
Last.fm - join the social music revolution
I turned off scrobbling the moment I installed last.fm.
Bono's singing sounds like Ned Beatty squealing in Deliverance.
Top Tracks
1. Simon & Garfunkel - The Sound of Silence
2. Tears for Fears - Everybody Wants To Rule The World
3. Yasunori Mitsuda - Another Telmina
4. Joe Hisaishi - River Side
5. Air - Alpha Beta Gaga
6. Led Zeppelin - Going to California
6. Jeff Wahl - Linus and Lucy
8. Joe Hisaishi - Summer
9. djpretzel - Zelda 64 Pachelbel's Ganon OC ReMix
10. Berlin Chamber Orchestra, Peter Wohlert - Brandenburg Concerto No.6 in B flat major
Oh the embarrassment.
And why should I care?
Apparently he once said:
"I've just written a 17-verse poem entitled, "U2 - Four Heads Up One Arse".
Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it.
The "record industry" did not become concerned about the U2 leak nor did it make the inquiry with Last.FM. The Recording Industry Association of America ("RIAA") did, presumably on behalf of Universal Music its largest and most powerful member. This isn't a matter of semantics. There are thousands of recording musicians in the U.S. and around the world who are not represented by the RIAA nor do they share their agenda.
linking is the new terrorism :)
I think their bigger problem is not its distribution. For this album, U2 should be trying to get this crap out for free and PAY piratebay and tagoo.ru to host this rubbish and include their crappy CDs with EVERY MCDONALDS HAPPY MEAL! This is, hands down, the worst U2 album ever! It is absolutely uninspiring and pitiful - you can definitely tell that this is just an attempt to make money - they are not even trying, there isnt a shred of their prior talent in it. This album to music is what Velveeta cheese is to cheeses - it is pasteurized and devoid of flavor and texture. U2 is DEAD.
I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered. My life is my own.
Bono, whilst playing a gig in Glasgow, got the whole crowd to be silent and then began slowly clapping his hands. He got the crowd to clap along for a while, the stadium quiet except for the rhythmic clapping...
After a short period Bono spoke, saying that everytime he clapped his hands a child in Africa died...
Suddenly, from the front row of the venue a voice broke out in thick Scottish brogue, ending the silence as it echoed across the crowd, the voice cried out to Bono "Well stop ****ing doing it then!!"
it is released each time the geographically challenged one and his three mates releases something.
When you're playing something you have no possible legal right to play, turn off the scrobbling.
How about storing that info on one's personal server?
Or encrypted and signed, then spread in the cloud, and you'd just hand out private keys that'd able to decrypt parts of the information, to trusted parties.
Replying here so that it's at the top, rather than it being lost in the deluge.
My local alt rock station played the album, in full, every track, the day before the leak hit everywhere. Not only were they broadcasting it over the air, they have a 192kbit live stream out over the Internet that can be accessed from anywhere in the world. (http://www.livelifelive.fm ... sadly, it's blocked by my work filters.)
Something tells me the leak has nothing to do with Last.FM.... nasty rumours about them sharing info, etc., is really just fearmongering.
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb
See also: Negativland Interviews U2's The Edge
What's the ugliest part of your body? Some say your nose, some say your toes, but I think it's your mind. -Zappa
Trent Reznor is giving away NIN's new album for free, and still making a load of money on the album through online, CD, vinyl and DVD sales. (see [1] and [2])
I say kudos to this man, and his slightly innovative, yet very successful method of distributing music. I have not yet paid for the album, but already downloaded the mp3 and flac version, and I like it! I guess I will try to buy the vinyl, if I can get it in any of the record stores here.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nine_inch_nails#Ghosts_I.E2.80.93IV_and_The_Slip_.282008.E2.80.93present.29
[2] http://www.nin.com/
[--- PGP key and more on http://www.root42.de ---]
No, seriously- I don't believe there is even a real dispute here anyway. U2 does not qualify as music, so what's the debate?
That solution may be fine for you, and that's all and good, but what about the exhibitionists among us? After all, it's the exhibitionists who are affected by this, not you.
Personally, I'd just like an easy way to falsify this information (if desired). For instance with FireEagle, I can let everyone know where I'm located, but I can also lie about my location for whatever reason. The same goes with my play list, I should be able to publish my current play list, but I should also be able to import my amazon wish list of songs I am going to buy (as soon as they become available) and publish it as a my current play list. I should also be allowed to make up song names and artists names to throw all my friends and family for a loop. And let's say, should I ever decide to listen to "The New Kids on The Block" (or some other god-awful boy band that for some reason plays incessantly in my head), I should have a way to filter it out so that I can avoid the very public embarrassment of everyone of my friends finding out about it.
And when I said "should", I really meant "I'd like to". I do realize that no web site is obligated to fulfill my every wish. And I also do realize that my opinion only represents a very tiny portion of users on the internet, and that for most users -- sharing no information publicly whatsoever is the default move -- and for those users -- I have no problem -- I don't even have any desire to change their minds on this matter.
Please...everyone knows their plow, say that an album was stolen , the tracks are missing, or that someone has caught some download of preview snips of a song, and presto, free advertising for their new album. They have done this so many times, I am ashamed to say that U2 used to be a band I respected because they actually tried to give messages to people about what was going on in other places then our own, but I guess this economic crunch has everyone in a bind!
Did you even read the summary? Nobody said the leak had anything to do with Last.fm, rather just that Last.fm's stats say that over 8000 of their users have played tracks from the leaked album, so Last.fm knows who did acquire copies of the leaked album.
The "hype through radio" days are over.
Earlier, it was common practice to hand out a few promo-CDs to DJs (and stuff their pockets to play it) to get listeners interested, though you could buy the disc nowhere. Then after weeks or even months of anxious waiting you could FINALLY get it, and lo and behold, no matter how crappy, it went from zero to top instantly because the hype around it was all it took for everyone to JUST WANT IT.
Now guess how well this kind of hype works in a world where it is trivial to distribute any kind of data (i.e. also music) instantly globally?
Release the damn CD when it's done. When you rely on hype DJs, you open yourself to this kind of problem. Stop dangling the CDs in front of your potential customers and tease them "Naaaah, you cannah get it yet, gotta wait, gotta wait...". We're not kids, you're not Santa Claus and the release date ain't Christmas. We're customers, you are vendors, sell it or we'll take it!
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.