LastFM

What is Last.fm?
Last.FM (formally known as AudioScrobbler) tracks the listening habits of a user and uses that information to make recommendations for more music the user may like, match them up with other Last.fm users with similar tastes, and create customized streaming radio stations. Plugins are available for most common media players that automatically send information to Last.fm while a user is listening to music.

For further information about Last.fm, read the Last.FM FAQ.

How does XBMC support Last.fm?
Once you have signed up for a Last.fm account, you can enter your username and password in the Music Settings. You must do this before any Last.fm stuff will work in XBMC.

Then simply add a source to Last.fm through the GUI. (Last.fm is one of the selectable sources.) This will add a link in Music and the Music Library that allows you to browse your Last.fm radio stations (categories).

Submissions
Submissions are how Last.fm keeps track of what you are listening to. Currently, there are only two options in XBMC used to configure your submissions, which are also configured through Music Settings.

Submit Songs to Last.fm - Determines whether XBMC submits information about the songs you listen to out of your own collection. This includes audio files as well as CDs. You should tag your files with valid information in order to get the most out of the Last.fm service. MusicBrainz and Tag&Rename are two popular programs that you can use to easily tag your audio files. Audio CDs can automatically pull information from the FreeDB service. This feature is built into XBMC.

Submit Last.fm Radio to Last.fm - Determines whether XBMC submits the songs you listen to via the Last.fm streaming radio stations. The main use of this feature is to avoid adding songs you may not like to your Last.fm profile.

Once you have configured submissions, play a few songs, then look at your Last.fm profile on their webpage. You should see the songs you just listened to show up in Recent Tracks. Some of the other stuff in your profile will take a while for the Last.fm service to calculate. The Last.fm FAQ explains how this works.

Browsing
Ok, you can look at your listening habits using the Last.fm website, but who wants to use their computer all the time? XBMC is all about letting you spend entertainment time away from the computer. Thankfully, you can access the most important parts of the Last.fm website fom the comfort of XBMC after you have added a source as explained above.

I'll leave it up to you to play with this rather than try to explain everything. I will, however, address a few common questions I've been seeing.

Common Questions

 * What do accounts cost?
 * Standard accouts are free. Premium accounts are $3.


 * Why are my recent tracks disappearing?
 * Tracks recently listened to by xxxxxxx will only have songs in it if you have listened "recently", something in the last few hours.


 * What speed internet connection do I need?
 * Radio stations stream at 128 kbps, and there is no way to change this. If your internet connection cannot keep up with this, you're out of luck on the radio stations, but you can still use Last.fm to track your listening and get recommendations.


 * Why doesn't the "personal" radio station work?
 * The "personal" radio station can only be listened to if you have a premium Last.fm account.