Microsoft has confirmed more details about its slew of social networking tools that are due to launch this autumn in the next Xbox 360 firmware update. It’s not all good news if you’re not already ponying up for the pleasure of Xbox LIVE Gold status. If you’re a Silver account holder and want to listen to the new Last.fm service, you’ll be limited to a three hour ‘trial’ per month. With adverts.
If you’re paying money for an Xbox LIVE Gold account, you get unlimited access, but the same video advertisements. Last.fm will provide a £3 per month subscription service that will get rid of the adverts. It’s not yet clear whether you can choose to subscribe to the Last.fm service and circumvent the Silver subscribers three hour limit.
All in all though, it sounds rather mercenary. Three hours per month is a little bit useless, particularly from a service that is designed for extensive listening – unlike services like Spotify, Last.fm won’t hook you up with specific tracks, but will point you to the artist and similar artists that it thinks you might like, so extended listening is needed to get the most out of it.
Ironically, if you’re using Last.fm from a web browser, you don’t need to pay a penny, there are no time limits, and you don’t even have to sign in! (Unless you want all the other social networking services the site is famous for.)
So what’s next – are Silver members going to be limited to 30 tweets per month? Are you only going to be allowed to have three Facebook friends until you sign up for an annual Xbox LIVE Gold subscription? We can understand that Microsoft wants more users’ credit card details on its system (and removing them again is like trying to talk a Scottish copper out of a speeding fine), but nixing one its best new social networking services can’t be the best way of doing it, right?
