I'll admit, there are several things I do like about the new last.fm format. I like the emphasis on statistics, I like the incorporation of users' album data. However, the list of things I dislike is quite a lot longer... But to keep things brief, the main pet peeves of mine are: one, the colossal white-space & blanketed simplified emptiness the new design exhibits, and two, the abolishment of User About Me sections. And I'm not alone. A lot of people are angry about the death of their About Me sections.
People really loved them. I can't really pinpoint a reason as to why, but my guess would be that it had something to do with it being the last bastion of social-networking customisation. In this new facebook-focused, smartphone-centered internet wasteland, we're told exactly what the internet should look like. Gone is the emphasis on displaying a user's personality via customisation. Where there were networks like bebo and myspace that put emphasis on experimenting with code, are now standardised web designs overpopulated with adverts.
Although there's little we can do for the bubbly re-design, there's just that little bit of hope for the About Me. A small, insignificant -- yet pleasantly applicable -- workaround.
The main issue with the new About Me section is that it's no longer an infinite space and therefore no longer a blank canvas for users to post song lyrics, images of their favourite bands, user-made widgets highlighting novel statistics or even links to their other social-scrobbling networks like Goodreads.
There's a measly 200 character limit. Our musical displays have been turned into a single micro-blog post, they've effectively been twitterfied, and it's absurd. You can't even use the old bbcode, or html code in the box. It's just bare text. There is a small saving grace though. You can resurrect your personal About Me section somewhere else (for example, a blogging site). Here's how:
- When you do go to edit your About Me section , last.fm have, under an obnoxious "It's All About You" subtitle, provided you with the coding for your old last.fm profile. Copy this and for future reference make more copies, notepad works fine.
- Next, use a bbcode to HTML converting tool. The one I used was: http://www.bbcode-to-html.com/
- Now open a blog and a blog post that in someway reflects your username and last.fm (just for a bit of personal touch). Obviously, try to use a blog name that is under 200 characters.
- Paste the code into the HTML viewing section of the blog's edit section, then preview, iron out the creases if there are any, and post.
- Finally, head back to last.fm and add your new, yet extremely inconvenient, external link to your blog post.
The likelihood is that you'll get very little traffic from other users, but at least, for the time being, you should be able to enshrine your beloved last.fm About Me somewhere on the internet.
