Google puts the Dead Sea Scrolls in the cloud, promises they won’t dissolve when you touch them

You think your finger grease does bad things to your smartphone’s touchscreen? Just imagine the horrors it would wreak on some ancient documents. As promised, Google has saved history the heartbreak of succumbing to your grubby paws by digitizing the Dead Sea Scrolls. Like pretty much everything else these days, the software giant has added the oldest known biblical manuscript to the cloud. Five scrolls are now available as hi-res images, which really you give the feel of their long-dead animal skin parchment. Google is also offering up English translations of some of the documents and is letting users add comments, because apparently historians weren’t too keen on letting people pencil in the margins of the real thing.

Continue reading Google puts the Dead Sea Scrolls in the cloud, promises they won’t dissolve when you touch them

Google puts the Dead Sea Scrolls in the cloud, promises they won’t dissolve when you touch them originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 26 Sep 2011 12:12:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Spotify on forcing Facebook upon users: ‘it seemed logical’

Spotify wants to be the next big thing in music, but a change to its service has created quite the uproar online: users can only get their Spotify on if they have a Facebook account. Of course, we knew this was in the works from the time it opened its doors to all Americans, but netizens were sufficiently vocal in their disdain for the change so as to elicit a response from the company. According to Spotify, most of its users are already on the Social Network — plus the service uses Facebook on the backend for its social features — so it made sense to integrate the logins. Rest assured, you don’t have to connect your account to Facebook unless you want to, and users still control what they share and don’t share in their Timelines. We understand why the move doesn’t thrill everyone out there, but we’re okay having one less username and password to remember. Change can be a good thing, ya know.

Spotify on forcing Facebook upon users: ‘it seemed logical’ originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 26 Sep 2011 18:03:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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On Wednesday, Amazon Will Unveil The “Kindle Fire”

fire

Last Friday, Amazon sent out invites to a press conference being held this coming Wednesday. They didn’t give away any details in the invite, but given our scoop earlier this month, everyone assumed it was to unveil the new Kindle tablet. We can now confirm this is correct. And we know a bit more.

On Wednesday morning in New York City, Amazon will unveil the Kindle Fire. Yes, this is the name Amazon has settled on, to help differentiate the product from the e-ink Kindles, which will still be very much alive and for sale. And while Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos will show off the Fire on stage, it won’t be ready to ship until the second week of November, we’ve learned.

Everything we’ve previously reported on the hardware remains the same. It will be a 7-inch backlit display tablet that looks similar to the BlackBerry PlayBook. Gdgt’s Ryan Block was able to dig up a bit more about the connection. Apparently, the Kindle Fire looks like a PlayBook because it was designed and built by the same original design manufacturer (ODM), Quanta. Even though Amazon has their own team dedicated to Kindle design and development, Lab 126, they wanted to get the Fire out there in time for this holiday season so they outsourced most of it as a shortcut.

Block’s sources seem very wary of this shortcut move. But having played with a DVT model myself, I can assure you that it’s better than the PlayBook because the software is better and, more importantly, the content available is much better. Amazon has built their own custom version of Android (that looks nothing like Android) and it utilizes their own Android Appstore. While that store doesn’t offer all the apps found in Google’s Android Market, Amazon has been rounding up the big app makers to get them on board for the Fire launch, I’m told.

Amazon has also been inking last-minute deals with the likes of Fox for movies and TV shows through their streaming video service which will be a key part of the Fire. And they have several publishers on board for magazine offerings, as Peter Kafka reports today. The Fire will rely heavily on Amazon’s MP3 service and, of course, the Kindle bookstore.

One thing I wasn’t sure about when I saw the device was if there would be an email client. I didn’t see one, but I thought maybe I missed it. Turns out there won’t be one included by default. Instead, you’ll be able to get one through the Appstore, or you can use the browser.

Another thing I wasn’t sure about was the chip inside of the device. I’ve now learned it’s a TI dual-core OMAP chip. This is the same chip used inside many newer Android devices. The PlayBook also uses it. I’m not sure what the

Aussie Researcher Cracks OS X Lion Passwords

daria42 writes “Thought your Mac was secure running Apple’s latest operating system? Think again. Turns out that in some respects Lion is actually less secure than previous version of Mac OS X, due to some permission-tweaking by Apple that has opened up a way for an attacker to crack your password on your Lion box. The flaw was discovered by an Australian researcher who has previously published a guide to cracking Mac OS X passwords. Sounds like Apple had better get a patch out for this.”

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Aussie Researcher Cracks OS X Lion Passwords

Senator Schumer blasts OnStar for ‘brazen’ privacy violation, calls for FTC investigation

Last week, OnStar issued a privacy notice informing customers that it would continue to collect data on vehicles still connected to its servers, even for those who have already canceled their subscriptions. The move elicited a chorus of protests from Democratic privacy advocates in the Senate, including Chris Coons, Al Franken and, most recently, Charles Schumer, who wrote a letter to the FTC yesterday calling for an investigation into what he sees as a bold violation of consumer rights. “By tracking drivers even after they’ve canceled their service, OnStar is attempting one of the most brazen invasions of privacy in recent memory,” the New York Senator said. “I urge OnStar to abandon this policy and for FTC to immediately launch a full investigation to determine whether the company’s actions constitute an unfair trade practice.” Find out more about OnStar’s new policy, after the break.

Continue reading Senator Schumer blasts OnStar for ‘brazen’ privacy violation, calls for FTC investigation

Senator Schumer blasts OnStar for ‘brazen’ privacy violation, calls for FTC investigation originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 26 Sep 2011 09:43:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Superior Anode For Lithium-Ion Batteries Developed

RogerRoast writes “The anode is a critical component for storing energy in lithium-ion batteries. The Berkeley Lab (D.O.E) has designed a new kind of anode that can absorb eight times the lithium of current designs, and has maintained its greatly increased energy capacity after over a year of testing and many hundreds of charge-discharge cycles. According to the research published in Advanced Materials they used a tailored polymer that conducts electricity and binds closely to lithium-storing silicon particles, even as they expand to more than three times their volume during charging and then shrink again during discharge.”

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Superior Anode For Lithium-Ion Batteries Developed