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Friday, April 08, 2011

Scrobble Amazon Cloud Player Tracks to Last.fm with a Userscript [Userscripts]

Source: http://lifehacker.com/#!5790017/scrobble-tracks-to-lastfm-from-amazon-cloud-player-with-a-userscript

Last.fm is one of our favorite music recommendation and statistics engines, and if you've fallen in love with Amazon's new Cloud Player service, you're probably looking for a way to scrobble the songs you listen to. This script will do the trick.

Last.fm is pretty powerful, but only really works well if you keep scrobbling what you listen to. The more you scrobble, the more accurate your recommendations will be. To make sure your Last.fm account keeps up with your cloud listening habits, just install this userscript into Chrome, Firefox with Greasemonkey, or your other favorite compatible browser. Then reload Cloud Player, and you'll notice a Last.fm option in the upper right hand corner. Click it, authenticate your Last.fm account, and let the jamming begin. From then on, Cloud Player will scrobble anything you listen to from that browser to Last.fm.

Amazon Cloud Player with Last.fm Scrobbling for Greasemonkey

You can contact Whitson Gordon, the author of this post, at whitson@lifehacker.com. You can also find him on Twitter, Facebook, and lurking around our #tips page.

Pandora mobile app found to be sending birth date, gender and location information to ad servers

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/04/07/pandora-mobile-app-found-to-be-sending-birth-date-gender-and-lo/

We still haven't heard much more about that Federal Grand Jury investigation into Pandora and other mobile apps over privacy concerns, but an independent security firm has now gone ahead and taken matters into its own hands. According to an analysis done by the folks at Veracode, Pandora does indeed seem to be sharing more information about you then it lets on. More specifically, they found that the Android app (they haven't yet gotten around to the iOS version) "appears" to be sending information about users' birth date, gender, Android ID and GPS location to various advertising companies -- bits of information that the firm notes could be combined to determine who someone is, what they do for a living, and even who they associate with. For its part, Pandora is simply declining to to comment at the moment, and we're guessing that's unlikely to change anytime soon given the aforementioned investigation. Hit up the source link below for Veracode's complete findings.

Pandora mobile app found to be sending birth date, gender and location information to ad servers originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 07 Apr 2011 19:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Ars Technica | source

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White Nexus S with AT&T 3G bands hands-on! (video)

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/04/07/white-nexus-s-with-atandt-bands-hands-on-video/

Well, what do we have here? Sure enough, it's that coveted white Nexus S with AT&T-compatible 3G that we mentioned yesterday, and we just got our dirty little paws on it thanks to a friendly tipster. This particular handset was purchased from Negri Electronics, and it's both unlocked and running Android 2.3.3 (Gingerbread), the version that just barely started rolling out to existing AWS Nexus S units in February. As you can see, it's pretty much identical to the current model, except of course for that white tuxedo and 850 / 1900MHz-friendly 3G radio. Feast your eyes upon Google and Samsung's latest prodigy in our gallery below, and hit the break for our hands-on video.

[Thanks, Steve]

Gallery: White Nexus S with AT&T 3G bands hands-on!

Continue reading White Nexus S with AT&T 3G bands hands-on! (video)

White Nexus S with AT&T 3G bands hands-on! (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 07 Apr 2011 19:34:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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HTC Droid Incredible 2 struts its stuff in leaked press shots? (Updated)

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/04/07/htc-droid-incredible-2-struts-its-stuff-in-leaked-press-shots/

If you had any doubts about HTC's Incredible S making it to our shores, they're probably dissipating as we speak -- not only has the phone obtained Verizon's shiny red checkmark, it's now got the robotic eye of Sauron staring at us with ferocious intensity. PocketNow obtained these pictures of the likely Droid Incredible 2 without naming so much as an anonymous source, and we wouldn't be surprised if it's Verizon's way of reminding us that the handset is rapidly on its way to market. You'll find two more pictures at our source link.

Update: Android Central got hold of some new shots of the actual phone itself, which shows off its model number ADR6350 and firmware 2.2.1. Thanks, Bla1ze.

HTC Droid Incredible 2 struts its stuff in leaked press shots? (Updated) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 07 Apr 2011 20:32:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Droid-Life | source

PocketNow | Email this | Comments

Facebook's Open Compute Project shares plans for energy-efficient data center

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/04/07/facebooks-open-compute-project-shares-plans-for-energy-efficien/

We know, you've seen an awful lot of Zuckerberg and crew here lately, and the Facebook news just keeps rolling in. This time the social networking giant is doing some sharing of a different sort by offering public access to the specifications and best practices behind its new, more efficient data center in Prineville, Oregon. According to the company, the center, built in collaboration with AMD, Dell, HP, and Intel, has boosted energy efficiency by 38 percent while lowering cost by 24 percent. The information now available through the Open Compute Project includes technical specs and mechanical CAD files for everything from servers to building design. Basically, if you want to erect your own multi-million dollar Facebook-style data center, you've got the go ahead. Full PR after the break.

Continue reading Facebook's Open Compute Project shares plans for energy-efficient data center

Facebook's Open Compute Project shares plans for energy-efficient data center originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 07 Apr 2011 21:37:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Open Comput! e Projec t | Email this | Comments