iScrobbler vs. Last.fm

Just to start off, I’m of course talking about the official Last.fm client, not the entire website, versus the third party iScrobbler software. So if you’re using Last.fm on a Mac, you’re using one or the other to track your music, so how do they stack up?
First of all, they do pretty much the same thing in the same way. Once submissions are on, they’ll track songs once they get half way through or about 4 minutes into the song if its something really long (Red Sparrowes, Isis, Mars Volta, etc…). However, Last.fm can be used to play the last.fm stations as well, like the neighbors station or recommended station. This is a cool feature, but I have to say that I almost never use it. I end up skipping 9 out of 10 songs anyway. I love the website’s recommendation engine when it lays it out in text, but when it just shuffles through the bands randomly, that filtering I would have done myself takes way too long. So for me, I just cross that off the cool feature list. Now the client just feels bloated. On the other hand, iScrobbler sits in the top bar, very unobtrusively tracking whatever iTunes plays. It won’t play stations, but what it will do, which the last.fm client can’t, is sync with your iPod. One thing I didn’t like about the Last.fm client was I felt it gave inaccurate weekly charts, because it couldn’t track what I was listening to on my iPod, which is where I listened to most of my music anyway. iScrobbler on the other hand will sync the playcount of the songs you played on your iPod once you plug it back into your computer, using a specified playlist(i.e. Recently Played.) iScrobbler is also able to put together charts of your most listened to tracks and artists before they’re compiled for the week on your last.fm page.
So what I’m saying is, if you’re really into listening to the last.fm stations, and don’t mind knowing you have an extra app open, last.fm is great, but if you don’t care for those stations and don’t want that bloated app sitting on your dock, try iScrobbler. And learn to the love that iPod feature. Your stats will start to look so much more accurate to what you’re actually listening to.