Last.fm To Start Charging International Users

tdobson writes "The popular online radio service Last.fm has announced that users outside of the UK, USA and Germany will need to start paying 3 Euros (about $4.40 USD/£2.80 GBP) per month to continue streaming music on their service. Last.fm doesn't offer much of a reason as to the change, other than writing on their blog that '[t]here will be a 30 track free trial, and we hope this will convince people to subscribe and keep listening to the radio.' Already, there appears to be quite a backlash in responses so far, amongst subscribers and non-subscribers of all nationalities — has this killed Last.fm's appeal, globally?"

Comments

It was nice while it lasted

[Anonymous Coward]

I love Last.fm
I'm a regular listener and found many new interesting bands. Not only have I bought their albums, but also went to local concerts that I wouldn't have heard about otherwise.
I will NEVER pay for an internet service.
Remains the question: Are there any alternatives?

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[Rathum]

Pandora Radio is a good one.

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[Anonymous Coward]

Pandora Radio is a good one.

Yes, it's a great alternative....

visiting the pandora.com homepage =

Dear Pandora Visitor,

We are deeply, deeply sorry to say that due to licensing constraints, we can no longer allow access to Pandora for listeners located outside of the U.S. We will continue to work diligently to realize the vision of a truly global Pandora, but for the time being we are required to restrict its use. We are very sad to have to do this, but there is no other alternative.

We believe that you are in Australia (your IP address appears to be x.x.x.x). If you believe we have made a mistake, we apologize and ask that you please contact us at pandora-support@pandora.com

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[RuBLed]

I will NEVER pay for an internet service.

I'm with you AC except for that line. If you are willing to pay for a tangible thing or a real world service that you love, why not an internet based one? Or you only love it because it was free and nothing else? I find that reasoning very popular with other people too. Any insights why people?

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[umghhh]

NEVER is a strong word. It seems there are limits what current business models can do and what you seem to like so much i.e. fee free service may not be feasible in nearest future due to the fact that advertising revenue is not there.

There has been an article on Economist website about the end of the free lunch. The article itself is rather simplistic but what can you expect from economists - anybody that reads news recently should know that they ain't that smart either. They maybe onto something though - majority of web services will need some other revenue than advertising or it will collapse. Whether this eliminates the whole business model I doubt but we are going to see anyway.

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[ItsColdOverHere]

Shoutcast to the rescue, yes you have no control over the track selection but it's free, the actual streaming providers are completely decentralised and I've found that recently I'm not really using the next and ban features of Last.fm. Yes Last.fm will be missed but it was by no means indispensible.

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes I'm willing to elaborate.,

When I pay for a product I expect something from it. Tangible things are just that, tangible. I have it now, I have it tomorrow, so the value retains.
When I pay for a 'real world service', I do so reluctantly. I do this only because:
a: Law dictates it. For example car insurance.
b: I can't do it myself in a realistic manner.
Internet services are even further out of the question, since I
a: Get nothing out of it,
b: I can do it myself better.

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[MrAngryForNoReason]

Internet services are even further out of the question, since I
a: Get nothing out of it,
b: I can do it myself better

What is the problem then? If you get nothing out of Last.FM as an internet service, and can do better yourself then create your own streaming music service.

The contradiction of saying that you get nothing out of a service while at the same time complaining you don't have access to it is clear. As is the arrogance of saying that internet services have no worth because 'I can do it myself better'. If you can then why don't you?

Your argument that a service has no value because it doesn't offer something you can keep is rather flawed. Would you not buy a hotdog because you can only eat it once? Would you not go to the theatre or cinema because it is a finite experience?

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[totally bogus dude]

Those last responses don't hold up to even a superficial analysis.

a: Get nothing out of it

It's already been established that the person in question (possibly you) "loved" the last.fm service and used it regularly, so claiming they "get nothing out of it" is obviously hogwash.

b: I can do it myself better

This isn't always the case, and in this particular example doesn't seem to be. The OP stated they'd found new bands via the last.fm service, so at the very least last.fm must have music s/he/you doesn't have. Further, last.fm has access to a large database of listening habits it can use to recommend things to you, which is something which I'm pretty sure even a mighty AC doesn't have. Also, are there any alternatives? implies knowledge that it is providing something they can't provide themself (or they can't provide themself, if you're the same AC).

I think the "tangible" argument seems reasonable, in a completely unrational kind of way (but we're humans, so we're supposed to be irrational). So, last.fm is a streaming service where you'd be paying for an "experience" rather than an actual product you can keep. What about paying for music or games or videos that you download, rather than coming in a box? Are these intangible as well, even though you can interact with it and keep it forever (I'm assuming no DRM so you can make backups and burn physical copies and so on)? Where does the line between "tangible" and "intangible" get drawn, for you?

Assuming you pay for your internet connection, what makes that tangible? It is, after all, just a service that will cease to be of any benefit to you if you stop paying the monthly fee. What about electricity bills?

I guess these fall under the "cannot do myself" reasoning; what I don't understand is why internet services are automatically excluded from this, despite it being quite obvious that there's a lot of things you can't reasonably do yourself that others can. Yes, you could build your own last.fm-like service and somehow get loads of people to use it, but I don't think it meets the "reasonably" criteria; as in, it'd be a fuckload of work. But somehow not having to do all of that work while still enjoying the benefits it'd bring isn't worth a few dollars a month?

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[ross.w]

I don't pay for the radio I listen to over the air. Why would I pay for it just because it comes from a web site?

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[daniorerio]

He was talking about making *better* coffee, which includes grinding beans on a regular basis to ensure you have fresh coffee...

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[Monsieur_F]

Is deezer available in Australia ?

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[xaxa]

I don't pay for the radio I listen to over the air. Why would I pay for it just because it comes from a web site?

Maybe because there aren't any adverts.

That's the reason Last.fm are giving for charging: they have advertising for British, German and American markets, so they don't need to pay. They don't have advertising for users in other countries, so they need to pay.

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[TheP4st]

Why would I pay for it just because it comes from a web site?

Perhaps because it is possible to influence the type of content played to a much wider degree than by changing frequency and it have the ability to give recommendations based on your preferences. Which airwave radio station can provide that service?

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[Locklin]

Last.fm *is* advertising.

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[commodore64_love]

>>>Tangible things are just that, tangible. I have it now, I have it tomorrow, so the value retains.

So you never rent VHS or DVD movies??? Or a car? Or a plane or train ride to XX destination? Simply because you can't keep those services in your pocket or on a bookshelf?!?!? That's just weird. Renting last.fm is no different than renting Satellite radio, satellite tv, or cable tv on a monthly basis. I'd happily pay that fee.

You're just one of those stupid Entitlement Generation persons, who thinks he should be able to steal service from others without payment. "I want it free therefore I should have it!" Reminds me of my 8 year old.

Re:It was nice while it lasted

[Anonymous Coward]

I use Pandora from Canada practically every day.

The solution is to use Tor, configured to only use US exit nodes, along with FoxyProxy, configured to run www.pandora.com through Tor. Because the audio servers aren't in www.pandora.com and don't do geolocation, as long as you connect to the website from a US host, you can connect to the audio servers directly, thus getting full speed audio.

Depends

[Gothic_Walrus]

has this killed Last.fm's appeal, globally?

Depends on what they're using it for. I might be a minority, but I hardly ever use the radio feature - I use the site as a way to track what I've been listening to, and use the recommendations to find new artists to buy or download from iTunes or Amazon.

Huge database

[Extremus]

They have a huge database of listening habits and cannot make money on it. It will be a good example of incompetence.

Re:Many people care about "free"

[BRSloth]

Perhaps advertising simply does not support Last.FM's licensing deals

Yes, it does. One of the comments there, by the same author of the post, says that the revenue from ads in USA, UK and Germany are enough to pay for the bandwidth and licensing fees they have to pay. Everywhere else, it's not enough and that's why they are charging other countries.

The free Internet was fun, its over

[martijnd]

This is simply a realization that free won't pay for their massive bandwidth costs (and no doubt the royalties they need to pay).

A million websites have been launched, and died, after their operators realized that advertising could never cover their costs.

If you look around, banners for sites that have 2 million page views p/month go for as low as US$ 45 p/month. Even if you plaster a site with them you can't scrape a living out of this. Sure, some struck it lucky, but most will die.

Facebook, Twitter, cool toys, but dead men walking ; and they will be replaced after they die. Will you pay a monthly subscription fee to use either one of them?

Facebook is just a blog, a few hacks can string existing blogs together and create the same functionality. Twitter can be done in P2P fashion.

The good times were good, now the money men come calling.

Re:The free Internet was fun, its over

[Elrond, Duke of URL]

I'm not sure what you mean by Facebook and Twitter as "dead man walking." Aren't these two of the fastest growing websites (in terms of members) on the internet? (And if you mean "they'll die eventually" then you too are a dead man walking...)

Wild inaccuracies aside, I think the GP meant that, so far, Facebook has yet to turn a profit. It's getting bigger and bigger and becoming ever more full of features, but there business plan seems to be "if we get big enough, we'll eventually make money through scaling".

I don't know, though... given their vast userbase and the site's general usefulness (*so* much better than Myspace ever was), it really seems like they should be making a good deal of money. But they're not. Even venture capitalists will only throw money at something for so long. :)

What about Spotify?

[Biotech9]

I haven't touched last.fm since I got spotify. I've heard it's not available world-wide, but seeingas it's free and legal, surely this is the future of public music?

It has an iTunes-ish inerface, but has access to millions of artists, and the normal selection of radio-stations. As Well as the great features of being able to make and share play-lists with friends or create an open playlist for a party.

Do many people here use it? IS it a known service? And does anyone want an invite?

Economics, not discrimination

[guyminuslife]

The big thing is international licensing. Pandora doesn't limit its services because it's xenophobic or because it thinks foreigners shouldn't be able to listen to online music---they do it because the copyright holders are nutty about controlling the markets abroad. I recall reading somewhere that the licensing costs generally don't justify the expenses for international audiences. (Something like this.) So you can either block access to international traffic, or you can try to make it profitable. Last.fm probably isn't losing much (relatively speaking) by losing its international audience, but apparently they still want to keep their service available overseas.

So, to the posters above, please stop complaining about discrimination. This policy is most likely just the trickle-down piss from the record companies.

Bittorrent ftw

[Idiomatick]

Pandora, spotify, last.fm, Hulu. None of which are available in canada or most places outside the US. Bittorrent however is still free in both senses. That they couldn't roll these out internationally is bull. Maybe a few months lag time max to fix the deals internationally. Plus last.fm clearly has SOMETHING in place since they used to stream to everyone. It is somewhat amazing that i've been able to illegitimately listen to streaming music for 10 years now and business STILL hasn't got it right. I guess I should expect a good legit streaming show/movie site in about 2030.

Quality?

[SmallFurryCreature]

I recently was in the market for a new soundcard. Not just a soundcard but one that does 5.1 and EAX support for the games I play.

This is harder then it sounds because Creative is shooting straight for the bottom. Their new X-fi chip is so bad they had to allow a third party to use it to get a decent soundcard out. Oh well, luckily I am dutch and I could test the X-fi myself, simply by buying it, running it over the weekend, then returning it on monday when it didn't work out. Full money back. Tried another sound card, returned that too, money back.

Free internet services can pull all kind of crap but the moment I pay for something I am protected by dutch law. Not american "companies own your ass" laws, not british "we want to be american" laws, but dutch laws. The only country in the world where Sony was FORCED to replace ALL PSP's with any defective pixels and this policy has affected all LCD's for years. Pixel warranty? Only for those silly enough not to know the law.

Can Last.FM stand up to this? Can they provide a service with which I will be satisfied 100% or money back, no questions asked? Of course not.

That for me is the difference between paying for something and something being free. I expect and demand and have the law on my side to get my money worth. Even if it is "only" three euro. Frankly I have tried last.fm several times and their service is pretty bad. Spotty loading, slow, lack of pre-buffering and their recommendation system is hazy. It can't even tell bands apart so it will happily mix completely opposite music styles just because one band that is in the style you look for has the same name.

3 euro's? No thanks.

pay lastfm vs pay proxy provider

[Minupla]

OK the case for me purchasing an account on one of the US vpn providers keeps getting stronger. 4.40*12=52.80. Witopia provides VPN at USD 36/yr, and allows me to use it for the general case of any US service that geolocks (Hulu, Pandora, and the list keeps getting longer)

Why would I give Last more money for effectively less service?

Min