Like.fm is how Apple Ping should work
news.cnet.com
news.cnet.com
[+] I tested it and it was awful. I actually like iTunes and buy all my music there but Ping is just an abomination.
I have no idea about Like.fm since I've never used it, but I agree that Last.fm is better than Ping for now. However, I think that since Ping just comes with iTunes it will be able to garner a much larger userbase, which could make it much more valuable as Ping itself improves. Last.fm is just a little bit too nerdy/difficult for a lot of people to deal with.
I wanted Like.fm to be dead simple install and forget. You don't need to "love" tracks, you can just rate directly from iTunes like you normally do (if you do). And since my user base would be small, I bring Like.fm to the user base via the Facebook tab.
I think someone commented before that the trick is to get the average non-enthusiast user to install a program to monitor your music. Well if tech can't be made easier to use then mother's and grandma's wouldn't be using iPads today! So Like.fm is your less nerdy, easier to setup social music site.
Both ping and last.fm have a lot of potential when it comes to social integration but neither seem to focus on that. I hope like.fm will win based on the nice facebook integration and ease of use, but they'll have to work on their on-site user experience quite a lot before getting there.
And also I'm looking for help: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1662965.
Does anyone know how they did this?
Edit: To clarify my question, this is probably done with AJAX, but like.fm also updates the browser URL bar, without using a hash anchor fragment like gmail. Any idea how that's done?
I've seen this done using anchor fragments (in other words, only changing the part of the URL after the hash symbol). That's how gmail does it (gmail.com/foo#inbox).
This site seems to have some other method that doesn't require the hash. I've never seen this on any website, so I would really love to know how its done!!
I don't know what browser you're using, or if they're doing something to mask the URL that they're using, but in IE7, the url IS updated on anchor fragments. The links themselves point to something canonical looking (e.g., like.fm/user/home), but when you actually click on it, the url you end up at is clearly implemented using anchor fragments (i.e., like.fm/#/user/home).
For what it's worth, there's a bug in it on IE7, such that if I keep clicking the same link (even after I get there), it malforms, and keeps malforming with each click (though the pages still seem to work) -- like.fm/user/home#r//user//user//user//user/home
In fact ping would probably have been fine if they had had FB connect up and running.
It works like a charm in spotify and they don't seem to use any kind last.fm neighbors thingimagic.