VODAFONE BRINGS LAST.FM MUSIC

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Vodafone Group Plc

17 December 2008

 



17 December 2008

VODAFONE BRINGS LAST.FM MUSIC EXPERIENCE TO MOBILE PHONES

Vodafone Customers around the world to 'Scrobble' Music from Mobiles to Last.fm Profile and Access Artist Recommendations

Vodafone and Last.fm today announced a collaboration which, for the first time, will bring the Last.fm music experience to Vodafone customers. 

From today, millions of Vodafone customers throughout Europe and India, Australia and New Zealand will be able to access Last.fm's social networking music features via their mobiles. The new mobile application includes Last.fm's scrobbling functionality that tracks what users listen to in real-time and builds them an online music profile based on their listening habits.

Last.fm is a music entertainment platform, with an active community of over 25 million users in more than 200 countries. Through its unique Scrobbler system, Last.fm builds a profile of each user's music taste by tracking what they listen to in real-time via their computer and now from their mobile. Last.fm can then use this information to intelligently recommend new music to each user based on their music preferences.

Customers who are new to Last.fm can register from their mobile and check out what their friends are listening to. In addition, customers in Germany will be able to click through directly to the Vodafone Music Store to sample and buy any music recommended by Last.fm.

Javier Foncillas, Head of Branded Content at Vodafone Group, says: 'Music continues to be a major passion for our customers and that's why Vodafone consistently delivers a superior music experience in a number of different ways to ensure people get the music they want, how and when they want it. With Last.fm, Vodafone continues to pioneer social networking on mobiles, delivering a new, relevant and unique music experience, to millions of customers, across our high speed, reliable network.' 

Martin Stiksel, Last.fm co-founder, says: 'It's really exciting to be launching our scrobbling mobile phone application with Vodafone. We're working hard to ensure that the Last.fm experience is available everywhere, from your desktop through hardware to phones, and this is another big step towards that goal.'

The Last.fm application is first available to download from Last.fm at www.last.fm/vodafonescrobbler, to selected Nokia handsets including the N95, N96, N78 and 6210. All of the handsets are available from Vodafone stores, online and via indirect channels. Other handset models will follow soon.  

Local language versions of the application will be available in some markets including Germany, Spain and the UK from launch. English versions will be available in all other Vodafone markets.

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For further information:

Vodafone Group

Investor Relations

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Media Relations

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About Scrobbling

The Last.fm Scrobbler is an application that tracks, in real-time, what songs you listen to using your iTunes, Windows Media Player, iPod, MP3 player and more. Last.fm then uses your listening data to build your personal Last.fm music profile. The Scrobbler works in the background, automatically updating your profile every time you listen to music. Using this data about your listening habits, Last.fm can intelligently recommend new artists, events, videos and other Last.fm users based on your music taste.

About Vodafone

Vodafone is the world's leading international mobile communications group with approximately 280 million proportionate customers as of 30 September 2008. Vodafone currently has equity interests in 27 countries across five continents and over 40 partner networks worldwide. For more information, please visit www.vodafone.com

About Last.fm

Founded in 2002, Last.fm is a CBS Corporation (NYSE: CBS.A and CBS) owned free global music platform. Last.fm offers music fans millions of tracks in every genre for free-on-demand and radio streaming thanks to partnerships with Universal, EMI, Sony BMG, CD Baby, independent aggregators The Orchard and IODA, and more than 150,000 independent artists and labels - without the need to sign up or download any software. As well as being able to access tracks for free - a service which has seen Last.fm become the fastest-growing free online music network in the U.S. - music fans can also share their music preferences by linking their media player to the Last.fm database. As a result, Last.fm can intelligently recommend songs, artists, local concerts and even other members based on their musical tastes. Last.fm also supports unsigned artists by offering them an unprecedented Artist Royalty program through which they can earn revenue directly from Last.fm every time their music is streamed. Learn more about Last.fm at http://www.last.fm/

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