CBS buys Last.fm

By London_Phil Last edited 202 months ago
CBS buys Last.fm
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One of Londonist’s favourite web 2.0 communities, last.fm, has just been bought up by American firm CBS for a rather tasty $280m (£142m). Whilst it may not have been sold for as much as other social networks (such as News Corp's £294m MySpace purchase and Google's $1.65bn buy-out of YouTube), it does mean that last.fm can stay in London and still keep its open source nature.

Dave explained what Last.fm is all about much better than I can when he introduced their new clubnight a few days ago:

Once you register at their website you can download and install software that tracks the music you play. This tracking enables you to discover music based on what you already like as well as meet people with common interests. Your user profile displays a summary of your listening habits, events you are planning to attend and a radio station with tracks by your most-played artists. These mod cons come at a price, however, as it means you can no longer lay false claims to an eclectic taste: people will find out that you really listen solely to nu-rave.

Danny Rimer, a board member of Last.fm, said the acquisition would allow CBS to expand the music site's business model across multiple media outlets: "Last.fm will maintain its creative culture and develop as a separate entity, while leveraging the resources of CBS."

This Londonista has watched as last.fm evolved over the years, through days of downtime and database faults, and this sounds like the best thing for the company – they haven’t sold out completely, yet now have backing from the big boys.

Last Updated 30 May 2007