> if I didn't read Hacker News I'd be sitting there hitting refresh a bunch of times
Then I know some things that may help you in the future. At the bottom of almost every page at Last.fm there four columns of links. In the column named "Get Help" there is a link that says "System Status" which goes to: http://status.last.fm/ where you can see how different parts of the site are running and a short explanation if there is a problem. I've never seen the system status page go down, even when there are problems on other parts of the site.
One time when Last.fm had some problem the links at the bottom of the page went away. Since then I find it handy to have a bookmark to the system status page.
Another thing to check are the forums (I wanna say fora :-), especially the Web Site Support forum: http://www.last.fm/forum/21713 . Usually the users of the site notice problems before explanations go up at the system status page and someone asks a question what is going on. The staff usually answers, explain what is going on and sometimes say an estimate of when the problem will be solved. In short, there are more details in the web site support forum than on the system status page.
Hope this helps. :-)