http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/31/nyregion/31owen.html?_r=1

As I promised earlier, here is a video I shot shortly after I received my Kindle 2 over the weekend. More to come as I get into it a bit more. Enjoy!

Pandora Blackberry Application

That’s right folks! I don’t know about you but I have personally been nagging Pandora for a Blackberry application, even before they gave one to the iPhone users first.

I have already installed the application on my Blackberry Curve 8310 (with AT&T) and can tell you already that it seems to be a lot more responsive than the Slacker Radio Blackberry app (which is still not bad at all). I have not seen any option to cache stations just yet, which may keep some users on Slacker, but I have yet to dig around for that.

If you already have a Pandora account, upon signing into the service on your phone you will see all of your stations that you have already created. You can also create a new station very easily (enter artist name, song name, or classical composer and the rest you are familiar with). If you do not have a Pandora account, you have the option to create on after you have downloaded and opened the application.

From your Blackberry head to http://pandora.com to download. From your desktop computer visit http://pandora.com/blackberry for more information.

Enjoy!

Courtesy of Pandora

I recently “sat down” with Tom Conrad, chief technical officer at  Pandora Internet Radio, to ask him what the Pandora team is working on. 

Probably one of the most exciting things  for Pandora users is ability to listen to their stations anywhere they can acess the Internet. That is why users will be happy to know Pandora is working hard to expand.

“Our overall strategy –with respect to mobile — is to be everywhere our listeners want us to be. There’s no iPhone religion, or Palm religion, or anything-religion at Pandora,”  explained  Conrad who oversees Pandora’s mobile strategy and development. “If our listeners want us, for example, on the Blackberry or on Google’s Android then it’s only a matter of time until we deliver that solution.”

Currently, Pandora is available through Sprint, AT&T and some Verizon phones.

While working hard to expand, the Pandora team needs to take a lot into consideration when introducing a Pandora application to a new phone.

“We look first and foremost for phones that we think will provide a great Pandora listening experience,” said Conrad. “Pandora works best on a phone with a great user experience, a great audio subsystem, a beautiful screen, a standard headphones jack, and operating systems that are well suited for streaming.”

 ”In the case of AT&T and Sprint, we have close partnerships that have brought Pandora to 30 so-called “feature phones,” he added. “In the case of smartphones like Windows Mobile, iPhone, and Palm our relationships with smartphone OS vendors are paramount.”

The main concern for the folks over at Pandora is making sure the customer is happy.

“We’re hard at work on three main things: improving the quality of Pandora playlists (this is a never ending task for us; there is always room to improve on how Pandora responds when you tell us the name of your favorite artist or song), delivering Pandora to an ever-widening group of mobile listeners, and finally setting Pandora free from the PC in your home so that you can listen from your stereo, TV, or tabletop radio,” explained Conrad.

Curious to know what else the Pandora team was working on I tried to pry out some top secret information form Conrand, however, he was reluctant to give out any information to new and upcoming Pandora phone applications but did note that they are working on applications for more Windows Mobile phones and the Palm Pre.

Things look promising over at Pandora and I may have that Pandora application for my BlackBerry soon.

We spoke up, or out, and Facebook seemed to listen. Or, well, they were probably just concerned that they could have killed the most successful social networking site ever to launch. Whatever their motives, I think this it is a good thing that Facebook removed the revised Terms of Service they published on Febuary 4th, and have reinstated the previous version.

In an effort to heal the wound that they created, Mark Zuckerberg said in this blog post that they are looking for your input to craft the next TOS:

If you’d like to get involved in crafting our new terms, you can start posting your questions, comments and requests in the group we’ve created—Facebook Bill of Rights and Responsibilities. I’m looking forward to reading your input.

I don’t know about you, but the fact that they published the February 4th edition of the TOS speaks volumes. Sure, it was a nice gesture for them to remove this TOS after hearing the negative feedback, but I think it revealed what they are really going to try and go after in the end.

What are you thoughts about all of this? Will you trust Facebook with your content now that they reinstated the original TOS? Will you participate and try to help Facebook write the new Terms of Service?

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I first read about the release on Crackberry.  CB heard about the release from Boy Genius Report.

So here’s the run down:

-The 8900 is slated to come to an AT&T store near you sometime in February. 

-The Pearl Flip will make its AT&T debut a little later. March sometime.

-According to BGR, the 8900 will run about $199 as the Pearl Flip will go for about $99. And I quote BGR “Possibly lower if AT&T really wants to churn and burn.”

Okay some specs on the phones. 

First the 8900

-It is equipped with WiFi. This is something I wish my 8310 had.

-It does have GPS.

-It looks very similar to the BlackBerry Bold, except the 8900 is smaller.

-The 8900 will NOT  have 3G.

-And of course it has all the other bells  and whistles of other BlackBerry’s.

Now the Pearl Flip 8220

-It is BlackBerry’s first flip phone.

-It’s a flip phone with the power of a BlackBerry.

-The Pearl Flip does not have GPS.

-It will have WiFi.

I know I cannot wait till the 8900 hits AT&T. I’ll write my opinion on the phone as soon as I get a chance to try it out.

Electronic Ads Now Watching You

Now, advertisers have the option to spy on you. Well, maybe “spy” is a harsh word, but it is essentially what they are doing. When an advertiser uses an electronic display at a mall, for example, there could be multiple cameras looking at you, from within the display, studying you, while you look at the ad. Once the software running the camera determines your gender, age, and even race, it will display a relevant ad that you may be interested in.

Like this article pointed out, it is very similar to “Minority Report“:

The concept is reminiscent of the science-fiction movie “Minority Report,” in which Tom Cruise‘s character enters a mall and finds that retinal scanners identify him and prompt personalized ads that greet him by name.

But this technology doesn’t identify people individually — it categorizes them by outward appearances.

Although this is great news for advertisers, I’m hesitant to think that this is not an invasion of privacy…in some way. What do you think? Have you heard of this before? Does it bother you?

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• These Ads Watch You, Too (abcnews.go.com)