Last.fm founder Richard Jones responded forcefully today (Feb. 23) to accusations that the company had given user data to the RIAA in order to track illegal downloads of U2's upcoming album, “No Line On the Horizon." Jones’ refutation follows a similar denial made by the RIAA on Saturday.
The controversy started with the leak of U2's “No Line On The Horizon" last week. The album appeared on file-sharing sites after Universal Music's Australian arm accidentally began selling downloads two weeks early. But on Friday, the technology blog Techcrunch sparked privacy concerns when they posted a rumor claiming that Last.fm, the CBS-owned music streaming and social networking site that allows registered user to keep track over their digital listening habits by “scrobbling" tracks played on computers, MP3s players and other streaming sites, had shared private user data with the RIAA that could identify individuals who had listened to the unreleased U2 tracks.
“I denied it vehemently [in] the Techcrunch article, as did several other Last.fm staffers," Jones wrote today in a post on the company's blog. “We denied it in the Last.fm forums, on twitter, via email. Basically we denied it to anyone that would listen, and now we're denying it on our blog."
The controversy started with the leak of U2's “No Line On The Horizon" last week. The album appeared on file-sharing sites after Universal Music's Australian arm accidentally began selling downloads two weeks early. But on Friday, the technology blog Techcrunch sparked privacy concerns when they posted a rumor claiming that Last.fm, the CBS-owned music streaming and social networking site that allows registered user to keep track over their digital listening habits by “scrobbling" tracks played on computers, MP3s players and other streaming sites, had shared private user data with the RIAA that could identify individuals who had listened to the unreleased U2 tracks.
“I denied it vehemently [in] the Techcrunch article, as did several other Last.fm staffers," Jones wrote today in a post on the company's blog. “We denied it in the Last.fm forums, on twitter, via email. Basically we denied it to anyone that would listen, and now we're denying it on our blog."
