Пятница 15 Авг 2008, 6:10

Theres truckloads of "WE WANT TEH OLD LULZ.FM BAK" aficionados all over last.fm with their groups and ads et al campaigning to revert Last.fm's revamp.

Well, here i'd like to brainstorm (!) a few reasons or features which make the new Last.fm worth the change.

1)The Top Panel

Its left pretty much intact except for a change in coloring at the ends (read : faded sketch effects).

Also, the Paint it Black! and Simply red options have been moved, in a sense them being more visible than they previously were.

(Before the revamp, I didnt know you could change last.fm's theme for six whole months(!!!) before one drunken night i randomly clicked on Paint it Black! and was flabbergasted at the change. *Self Bonk*)

2)User Playlist
Its been given a spotlight now, earlier it was rather insignificant, now it has its very own media-playeresque feature, and it stands out rightaway.

So much for playlists being a rather unknown feature in the previous last.fm, clubbed with the Play User Radio feature.

3)USER PICTURE, NAME, And all the stuff about the user

(forgive me if i forget to mention anywhere that this makes me remotely reminded of myspace features)

Okay, this should be an interesting thing to comment upon, user pictures have been given a whole new impetus, with Improved clairty (????!!) and more spotlight on the man/woman/undefined beneath the account.

With your user name being more prominent than it used to be now, they also decided to make it known how many Playlists you had ( HEY ITS IMPORTANT RIGHT ) The Number of posts you had (was shown in the earlier version too) and best of all HOW MANY SHOUTS A USER HAS.

Now this of all things made me wonder the most. Who gives a damn about how many "Shouts" a person has?? Like, a shout is a thing written on a user's shoutbox by another user. So what is this supposed to be an indicator of? How popular the person is in last.fm?

Is Last.fm trying to imitate the "Scraps" concept introduced by Orkut? >:[

Skipping the extreme left panel we're now focusing on another important feature of this much publicised last.fm revamp.

4)THE RECENTLY LISTENED TRACKS SECTION!
Here behold the awesomeness, whenever you listen to a track you Pressed "love" or tagged it or added it to your playlist, it SHOWS!!

A tiny artin if you loved that track, or a tape icon if its in your playlist, it all shows whenever you listen to it! HOW SHMEXY! We all lurve lil cutey icons mirite?

Among other things, the good ol' palette way of presenting the user's recently listened tracks seems to have been buried. R.I.P.

(Prevents silly questions from users of the old last.fm who always wondered why one track had a huge picture while lots of others below it were only little squares)

Shifting to more intriguing revamp features, we have

5)-USER'S- LIBRARY!

Here behold the magnificence of your favorite artists, their pictures in last.fm getting a whole other worldly upgrade, all hi-res and other stuff k.

Also the number of times you played that artist appears in blue, bracketed too!

Aaand below it you have the indicator of how many times you pressed the "love" feature on your last.fm application.

Pale imitiation here :
"<3 Loved Tracks (Over 9000)
Last Loved : Tina Hefferson, Fayetteville, Arizona"

OOPS

Ok all things said lets get to the task on hand. To a bit left of that, you have another gray box displaying how many Playlists you have.

From what i've seen everybody's playlist is "untitled playlist" wonder if they even are going to notice that they have to name their playlist, if they even bother with creating one.

Then below it theres a rectangular box telling how many stupid dumb idiotic tags a user has, with the number thrown in for good measure.

6)TOP ARTISTS TOP TRACKS

Here we stumble upon the most important thing in a last.fm user's existence.

Seems this section has received enough attention it warranted.

You can clearly analyze a user's listening pattern over the whole span of the previous 12 months. No more posing behind top three black metal artists and listening to 50 cent in moderate amounts. Cause the average joe can now unmask your listening habits by a simple click, revealing what noise shit you listened to the past 7 days.

Now the only thing most affected by this "Breakdown of listened tracks" change is the top tracks section.

Users can now stop regretting about a track being their top listened to track forever, cause they can supplant it with last week's top track showing, if they display top tracks for the past 7 days. WEEE!

Now lets shift our focus to the left part of the new and revamped last.fm's features.

7)MISC FEATURES
ADS!! Now they get a Huge spotlight. Hrmpf, subscribers, its gone for you? >:{

Below the huge banners you have the about me section. Its been given more breadth this time around, so you can tell how great you are in a much more glorious way for more words.

And now in my opinion one of the most thought provoking (WAT?) changes in this new revamp, the
8)RECENT ACTIVITY SECTION!!!

Internet stalkers rejoice! Your job has been made HELLUVA easier with this brand new groundbreaking (privacybreaking ? :o) feature.

"You left a shout somewhere, but it’s since been deleted.
Wednesday afternoon"

Now this, dear reader, is what is called PURE WIN. This is of such pressing importance, it has to get a mention right? Wow k. What does THIS thing take record of?

kk let that lie aside.
The recent activity also lists on whose shoutbox the user has graced upon, and upon heading there, a whole new list of activites performed by another user of last.fm comes to fore and the cycle goes on.

Stalking made simple, all courtesy to one simple feature.

But one good thing out of this feature is it really points out how active the user is in employing the social facets of last.fm.

And below the recent activity section you have the friends of the user listed out. Pictures are kinda small though, my friends lost their visibility BOOHOO :((

And below it you have your journal entries listed. Not a bad move but my fingers hurt from scrolling down there to view it, a throwback to the days when your journal was right on top of the page!

And below it you have the groups the user has joined listed. Pretty neat thing right there, groups getting their picture shown, a radical change from them being a token list in a user profile in the old last.fm.
9)Neighbours, WHO ? WHERE? Oh wait its on the top, a tiny tab!
WHERE IS MA NEIGHBOR LIST? Waaaa i miss seeing the beautiful photogenic faces of my lovely neighbours in the bottom of my page :((

And dear reader if you have indeed read this far, and if you also have the energy to scroll down 10,000 feet, you finally chance upon the most beloved feature ever, the

10)SHOUTBOX !!!!!!!!!

Its at the very bottom of the page, the end result of all your hard scrobbling efforts, the place where another user glorifies/mollifies your music taste, reviews your user picture, inquires about your country's sovereignty, flirts with you with all the e-love he/she can muster, and a lot of other otherworldly things of utmost importance

Its the epitome of your glory in last.fm, your shout box, and such an awesome (!!??!!???!!) feature should indeed be at the very bottom of the user page right? So that its at the end of the road (page, rather D:) for everyone who took the risk of coming by your profile?

If you've read this far, were gallant enough to face up to this wall of text, then there you go, these are the ten things i like about the new last.fm

-ROLL CREDITS-

RadioheadMuseburzumsatyriconanarchy clubensiferumchildren of bodommadonnabritney spears50 centlimp bizkitlinkin parkdrudkhmarilyn mansonslipknotmetallicairon maidendimmu borgirimmortalvarg vikernescradle of filthred hot chilli peppersnine inch nails