Google's cars grabbed emails and passwords

Kindle Wireless Reading Device, Wi-Fi, 6" Display, Graphite - Latest GenerationGoogle Inc admitted for the first time its 'Street View' cars around the world accidentally collected more personal data than previously disclosed -- including complete emails and passwords."

'Inflation to moderate to 6% by Dec end'

'Inflation to moderate to 6% by Dec end': "The Planning Commission today exuded confidence that inflation would moderate to 6 per cent by December end from over 8 per cent currently, mainly on account of good farm output."

Because of this Dec month future is going to raise today

Gold may gain further; but all-time peak distant

Gold may gain further; but all-time peak distant: "Gold futures are likely to extend gains for third straight quarter in December, as investors seek a safe hedge against global uncertainty."

SEBI hikes limit for retail investors to Rs 2L for public issues

SEBI hikes limit for retail investors to Rs 2L for public issues: "SEBI hikes limit for retail investors to Rs 2L for public issuesThis will cut the numerous applications investors sometimes make in the name of relatives to get more shares."

I might have earned more if this rule was bought before an year

Robust inflows lift Sensex 137 points

Robust inflows lift Sensex 137 points: "Continued robust foreign portfolio investments and firm world equities helped BSE Sensex notch a 0.7% gain on Monday, led by financials and metal makers."

Exports jump 23% in Sept, fastest in 2 yrs

Exports jump 23% in Sept, fastest in 2 yrs: "India's merchandise shipments in September rose at its fastest pace in two years, clocking a rise of 23%, or some $18 billion."

Tech World Welcomes Digg Refugees With Open Arms

Tech World Welcomes Digg Refugees With Open Arms: "

This morning most of us woke up to the disappointing news that social news site Digg, once a promising destination for Silicon Valley talent, was losing 37% of its staff as well experiencing key executive departures.

While the usual armchair Twitter quarterbacks responded to the what the layoffs mean for the ailing site, another more positive trend was also evidenced; People making it clear that the kind of top tier engineering talent that worked for Digg was welcome at a spectrum of high profile startups and full fledged techcompanies.

As I’m hearing that the talent pool of experienced engineers in the Bay Area is currently in short supply, this layoff might be a boon for local startups looking to add skilled staff. Some of the companies that have already expressed interest in hiring include Twitter (above), Groupon, GDGT, O’Reilly Alpha Tech Ventures, IGN, Styleseat, various First Round Capital portfolio companies and AT&T Interactive.

It looks like SimpleGeo founder and former Digg Lead Architect Joe Stump is curating the tweets and offering support and introductions help to the 25 people laid off. If you hear of anyone else who is tweeting about hiring, please link to them in the comments.

5 Most Engaged Brands in Social Media

5 Most Engaged Brands in Social Media: "

The Social Media for Business Leaders Series is supported by The Awareness Social Marketing Hub, an enterprise-grade application for marketers who manage multiple social channels. Learn more here.

If you are a major brand and you aren’t using social media, well you probably aren’t a major brand. The truth is, to stay competitive brand need to be investing in social media as a way to really extend themselves to their customers. This is 2010 and consumers have options … lots of options. Social media is one way to create unique opportunities to show your customers who you really are and what you and your products stand for. Advertising and cultivating an image is still important, but it’s interacting with your customer base that creates loyal customers. Show them that you care, and you are involved in what they say, think and feel about your products, and they’ll be grateful. The results will be in your profit margins. Like most things, some brands do it better than others. Engaging in social media is about being extremely open, creative, and extending yourself across a wide range of platforms — with depth.

We’ve comprised a list of five brands who are most engaged in social media, and the impressive lengths they’ve gone to when connecting with consumers.

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1. Starbucks

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Starbucks is on just about every corner in the real world, and that’s the same strategy they’ve taken online as well. When it comes to a web presence Starbucks has made their mark on Twitter, Facebook, YouTubeFoursquare, mobile apps and with their own social network My Starbucks Ideas. They have dominated the social media landscape, creating active and engaging profiles on a variety of platforms. And according to various reports they are the most engaged brand using social media, and for a few years running.

Take a quick look at the coffee giant’s Twitter page, and you’ll see the company has just over 1 million followers. The next thing you’ll notice is there is a lot of conversation going on. Starbucks is keeping busy responding to mentions, apologizing for bad experiences, and just carrying on some interesting conversations with their followers.

Meanwhile on Facebook, more than 15 million people will admit to Liking the brand. And Starbucks is trying to make buying product as integrated and seamless as possible. Take for example the Starbucks Card Facebook application they introduced this past April, and just recently announced that customers could now “Give a Gift” and credit their friends’ cards too.

And that feature is an idea born out of their community site, My Starbucks Idea. The Seattle-based caffeine king wants to know what you want from Starbucks, and they are listening. Here consumers are asked to share their ideas, and let them know what you think of other ideas as well. Discussions are encouraged, and the community votes to see ideas become reality. The “Give a Gift” idea was suggested way back in 2008, and drew more than 42,0000 votes. It may have taken some time for the idea to become a reality, but it shows that Starbucks is listening to their customers.

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2. Coca-Cola

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Always Coca-Cola. As one of the most universally recognized brands, it’s not surprising that Coca-Cola is the second most engaged brand according to Famecount. Just like Starbucks, Coke is active on Twitter engaging in conversation with its 142,000 followers. Given that it has a world wide following it’s appropriate that many of the tweet are written in many different languages. In addition to it’s overarching brand, each drink it produces also has it’s own Twitter page.

On Facebook its kind of astounding that 14.6 million people Like the soft drink empire, but the company has done a good job of keeping things interesting and interactive. The Page is a hub of all sort of activity, from social good initiatives like Live Positively where fans voted for America’s favorite park to receive a $100,000 grant, posting fan photos, videos, and something called Expedition 206 — 365 days, 206 countries, one mission. “Happiness Ambassadors” traveled the globe looking for happiness. They blogged and posted photos and videos of their travels and fans could vote in polls on things like where they are the most happiest.

And on Coca-Cola’s YouTube channel, the soda company launched “Unlock The Secret,” a viral video campaign featuring Coke’s inventor and Doc Pemberton. By clicking on bottle links in the videos, viewers are taken to the @docpemberton Twitter page, their Ahh Giver app on Facebook that allows users to send a message to a friend delivered in video format by the Coke polar bear, and to Coke’s Smilezier a novel feature that allows you to record the sound of your own laughter and listen to other people as well. All of this ties together Coca-Cola’s brand of happiness, and they’ve done an interesting and original job engaging with consumers online.

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3. Oreo

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Oh-Oh-Oreo, is the third most engaged brand according to Famecount, and for a brand that’s been around since 1912, racking up 11.7 million Likes on Facebook is a great way to prove that good products have real staying power. For Kraft, makers of the delicious black and white cookie, Facebook outreach has been their main strategy. While other brands are engaged across the board, Oreo hasn’t leveraged Twitter at all yet. So the Oreo Facebook Page is a place to find recipes, photos of fans enjoying the cookie, videos, and games like Twist To Win for a chance to win the Double Stuff Racing League (Shaquille O’Neal, Apolo Ohno, Eli Manning and Venus Williams). The DSRL’s videos are the main focus on Oreo’s YouTube channel, with videos of interview with the athletes, commercials, and behind the scenes footage.

Kraft Foods: How Oreo Learned to Fish Where the Fish Are, presented by Beth Reilly from GasPedal on Vimeo.

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4. Skittles

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Skittles may also sound a little weird to be making this list, but they have an amazing online presence, starting with their website — a vibrant landing page that invites you to “Experience The Rainbow” and scroll down the page. First you are met with a really strange four minute commercial featuring a intellectually-challenged fellow rambling about the little candy piece of the rainbow, and the option vote if liked it or hated it. Moving further down the page, fans are asked to upload photos and videos if they think they’re funnier than the rainbow. Keep scrolling and you’ll find fan photos and picture posted, and you’ll be asking yourself why you kept scrolling, but you probably aren’t part of the “rainbro” demographic Skittles is trying to reach with their site. On another site, Share Skittles, YouTube videos of fans eating skittles are posted.

While Skittles hasn’t quite figured out how to leverage Twitter, logging just over 6,000 followers, and producing some really weird tweets, over 11 million likes show they managed to figured out how to make use of Facebook. Features like Mob The Rainbow, another strange but really innovative effort that strives to bring fans together to create something big. The first mob was a massive outpouring of Valentine’s Day greeting to a person who doesn’t get much love — a parking enforcement officer. Fans were asked to either make a card on the site or get the address and send one on their own — 43,037 sent cards. Since the launch of Mob The Rainbow last year, fans have completed three mobs, with a fourth one to “crash” an 85-year-old grandmother’s birthday party currently underway. It’s an brilliant way to engage their audience with social good and keep their quirky image alive.

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5. Red Bull

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Red Bull is a brand that is associated with a lot of things — late night last minute studying, late night partying, way too early morning meetings or classes, and the ability to keep you awake during the day. With 9.9 million Likes on Facebook, it probably not just because the Austrian company is your sweet savior from the long hours of the day, but rather because it offers a really cool and interactive Facebook Page that appeals to it’s core audience. The Procrastination Station, featured on their Games page, offers high quality, engaging and interactive procrastination, like a soapbox car racing game, rock, paper, scissors, and fans can listen to “Drunkish Dials” — drunk recordings of Red Bull drinkers who called the company’s toll free number. Yep, that’s what happens if you leave them a ridiculous drunken message, they’ll put it online.

Plus, they’ve run creative contests like 2009’s Red Bull Stash, where the company hid Energy Shots all over the country, and posted clues on their Facebook wall. It was the company’s way of saying thank you to fans when they hit the 1 million mark. Currently the company has teamed up with an San Francisco Giants player Tim Lincecum, to create an ongoing scavenger hunt for 11 autographed baseballs hidden in the street of San Fran. A picture of each baseball has been uploaded at a specific location and the first fan to arrive and check in with Facebook Places and the password “San Francisco’s Got Wings” wins the coveted ball.

And as the sponsor of a ton of sporting events and athletes Red Bull’s website is the place for fans to see exactly what they are sponsoring. With videos, interviews, photos, games and a feature called “Holy Shit” featuring short, extremely high quality videos of amazing moments in extreme sports.

The company has also done an impressive job on the mobile front with motor-sports game Red Bull X-Fighters, access to their web TV channel with behind-the-scenes footage of daring stunts, with the Red Bull TV app, and Red Bull BPM an app that turns your iPhone into a complete DJ set-up. All these apps are great extensions of the brands core product, creating apps that compliment the consumer’s lifestyle goes a long way.

The Social Media for Business Leaders Series is supported by The Awareness Social Marketing Hub, which builds social marketing software for marketers leveraging multiple social channels to engage with customers, build their brand, and increase revenues. Built upon Awareness’ expertise deploying more than 200 communities and social media projects for the world’s biggest brands including Sony, JetBlue, Kodak, ASOS.com and AIRMiles, The Awareness Social Marketing Hub is a leading enterprise-grade application for marketers struggling with the social media chaos of managing multiple social channels. With the Awareness Social Marketing Hub, marketers are now able to publish, manage and measure across all their social channels from one central location using advanced built-in permissioning, workflow and audit controls.

eBay Now Highlights Groupon Daily Deals

eBay Now Highlights Groupon Daily Deals: "

Group-buying service Groupon and online auction house eBay just agreed to a business relationship that will place Groupon’s regional daily deals on the pages that eBay users visit. The site will determine each user’s location and show the deals available in his or her area.

Furthermore, members of eBay’s rewards program will earn 5% of each Groupon purchase amount in eBay Bucks, which members can use to buy other things on eBay.

The deal makes sense for both companies. Groupon will gain additional exposure, and in exchange eBay will get opportunities to give its users more incentives to buy things in eBay auctions. It’s a win-win for consumers too, as long as they don’t mind having Groupon deals pitched to them when they visit eBay.

Rumor has it that Groupon is working on similar deals with Yahoo and Citysearch, but those rumors are unconfirmed and the specifics are fuzzy. We’ll keep you posted.

Google Finally Upgrades Feedburner

Google Finally Upgrades Feedburner: "

Believe it or not, Google hasn’t forgotten about Feedburner. The RSS feed service has received an experimental new interface that better matches Google Analytics and looks like it might actually integrate into other Google AdSense and Webmaster tools.

The interface doesn’t work for every component of Feedburner — if you need to access feed management or change certain settings, you can continue to use the old interface. The new interface — which is accessible via feedburner.google.com/gfb/ — shows real-time stats for clicks, views and podcast downloads from across your feeds.

This is really powerful, especially if you use the Feedburner Socialize service to auto-ping Twitter when you publish a post. This can let you track how users are referred and what RSS clients are being used to access feeds.

The stats take a lot of the information that used to be spread across multiple panels and put it into one interface. You can also view the last two hours of activity for a feed to see different waves of traffic and click-throughs.

The new Feedburner dashboard also has a new message center that displays notices if there are any problems with a feed or other things that you need to know.

We hope these new real-time tools and the improved interface are the start of some real momentum behind the Feedburner product. RSS might be going out of favor in a world of Facebook, Twitter and mobile apps, but publishers still need a central place to control and manage their content streams. Feedburner no longer does everything publishers need it to do, but there just aren’t a lot of alternatives.

What do you think of the new Feedburner interface? Let us know.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, angelhell

Watch Videos on your PC without any Interruption

Watch Videos on your PC without any Interruption: "

When watching web videos or DVD movies on your computer, your video playback may be interrupted in many different ways.

For instance, the screen saver can activate itself or the computer screen may enter sleep mode if you don’t touch the mouse or the keyboard for a long period (because you are busy watching the video). Sometimes, pop-up notifications from IMs and other programs, that are running in the background, can also interrupt playback.

You can easily turn-off these distractions through Windows Settings but the problem with this approach is that the changes will stay even when you are done watching the video. To give you an example, if you disable the screensaver before hitting play, it will stay in the disabled state forever unless you re-enable it manually.

Therefore, instead of fiddling with your existing configuration, you may consider using utilities that will also disable all these distracting elements, but only temporarily.

Some media players are start enough and will automatically turn off the screen saver during video playback. If you are using VLC, go to Video settings and check the option that says “Disable screensaver.” In Windows Media Player, go to Player options and uncheck the box that says “Allow screen saver during playback.”

If your media player doesn’t have such a feature, you can use this excellent utility called Mouse Jiggler to prevent the screensaver from becoming active. It moves the mouse pointer back and forth periodically so Windows will never go into an idle state and therefore the screensaver won’t show up.

The next task is keep your monitor awake during the video playback. Mouse Jiggler should care of this part as well or you may try Caffeine – it’s like Jiggler but simulates keystrokes instead of mouse movements.

There’s nothing to install or configure – just download and run Caffeine and your system will stay awake as long as you like. Double-click the Caffeine icon in the task bar and it will disable itself – all this without making any changes to your system register or power plan.

Related tip: How to Skip Trailers on DVDs

If you have too many apps running on your system, they are consuming system resources and some of them, especially the chat clients, may surprise you during playback with notifications. You can either right click-click in the task bar to selectively close these apps or get a utility like CloseAll that will automatically close all running applications with a click.

CloseAll closes all running apps by default (including itself) but you can also configure it to ignore certain applications by adding a simple exclusion list to the CloseAll.exe command line. Here’s an example:

CloseAll.exe -x='explorer.exe|firefox.exe|outlook.exe|dropbox.exe'

An excellent alternative to CloseAll is SmartClose – it will not only close all the running programs with a click but can also restore all these the programs once you are done watching the video.

It does this by capturing a snapshot of all the running process and services. If there’s a particular program or Windows Service that you would not like the utility to close, just add it to the protected list. The default settings are good enough though you can always choose the location where these system snapshots should be stored.

Finally, if you like watching videos while simultaneously working on other windows /tasks, check out Always on Top – this is again a free utility that will help you stick your media player window on top of other program windows. Launch the program, select the media player window and press Alt+Space bar to put it on top.

Convert and open multiple links with a single click: Linkrr

Convert and open multiple links with a single click: Linkrr: "

If you are using file-hosting websites like Rapidshare or Megaupload to download files you might come across many files which are split or sometimes the links to download these files are multiple.

Linkrr is useful for converting text into links and opening them with a single click.

How Linkrr works?

• Simply copy the text into the box. I could also copy and past multiple lines of text which needed to be converted into HTML links.
• Once done, click on “Make clickable!” and a list of links that will be opened are displayed.

• All the links converted from text will being can be opened using at the same time. It does need you to disable pop-up blocker in some cases. This applies to Internet Explorer users.

Even though I tried creating links of our blogs in our network, I think Linkrr is more useful when downloading a big file that is split in parts and the link is posted or shared as text rather than a link which we can click on.

Do try out Linkrr and drop in your comments if you know of similar tools which makes managing multiple links easy.

Link: Linkrr

-- This Post Convert and open multiple links with a single click: Linkrr is Published on Devils Workshop .

Corp India against rate hikes, conveys to RBI

Corp India against rate hikes, conveys to RBI: "Corporate India today urged the Reserve Bank not to further tighten its key rates during its monetary policy review next month, on the ground that interest rates are already very high."

Wal-Mart CEO sees progress in opening up of retail in India

Wal-Mart CEO sees progress in opening up of retail in India: "Wal-Mart CEO sees progress in opening up of retail in IndiaWal-Mart, in an equal partnership with Bharti group, operates four cash-and-carry outlets in India and supplies to retail stores run by Bharti."

How to write a professional Resume in 2 minutes?

How to write a professional Resume in 2 minutes?: "

Almost 3 months ago when I had just given my engineering exams and was waiting for the results to be out, I thought of searching for a job. To get a job you need to have a resume, and that’s where I got stuck. With all sort of different views around me, and different people it all just added to confusion. Some suggested resume building services but they were charging money for it. So, I was kind of searching for something like a resume builder but free and I found one.

It asks you to login using your email account and password. Once given your email id and password you have to confirm it.

There are mainly three sections:

• Compose: Here you can add the sections or remove them from your résumé.
• Design: You can decide on the format or design of the résumé.
• Preview: You can see how your résumé looks.

Why should you use this service?

• You can add or remove any field any time.
• Once the résumé is made, you can save it.
• You can download it under Publish as a PDF or as a Docx file.

How to use it?

• Go here.
• Start writing your résumé.

The only thing that can be wrong here is that Jobspice can spam you with job mails that you do not want, in that case I will suggest you to make an email id for login purpose that is gone in only 60 minutes.

The usage is very simple and good. Do you know any other such free resume service? Feel free to share it with me through the comments below.

-- This Post How to write a professional Resume in 2 minutes? is Published on Devils Workshop .

How To Protect Your Login Information From Firesheep

How To Protect Your Login Information From Firesheep: "

TechCrunch reader Steve Manuel claims to have found a workaround to Firesheep, the controversial Firefox extension that allows anyone on an insecure open Wifi network to access user login info for almost every single social network in existence.

Firesheep banks on the fact that most social sites default to the HTTP protocol because it’s quicker. The already existing Firefox extension Force-TLS attempts to circumvent this by forcing those sites to use the HTTPS protocol, therefore making user cookies invisible to Firesheep.

Like the alternative option HTTP Everywhere, the Force-TLS Firefox extension allows your browser to change HTTP to HTTPS on sites that you indicate in the Firefox Add On “Preferences” menu, protecting your login information and ensuring a secure connection when you access social sites.

HTTPS encrypts user data, so if a script like Firesheep’s like tries to pull it, it can’t be read. Force-TLS forces a number of sites to make all of their requests over an SSL secured channel and while some sites, like Amazon, don’t currently have the secure option, the majors like Facebook, Twitter, Google, etc all allow a HTTPS connection.

How to configure:

1. Download the plugin here and install into Firefox.

2. Open “Preferences” and add the domains you want to force the HTTPS connection with.

3. Restart Firefox.

Note: Unlike HTTPS Everywhere, Force-TLS relies on the user defining the sites they want to access through a secure HTTPS connection.

And while everyone should have learned by now that there’s always some privacy risk when interacting online, hopefully the installation of Force-TLS will at least put less of a damper on today’s stint at your local “free Wifi!” boasting cafe.

Thanks: Steve Manuel

Skype Demands Mobile App Nimbuzz Remove Support, Effective October 31st

Skype Demands Mobile App Nimbuzz Remove Support, Effective October 31st: "

Exclusive: Nimbuzz, a popular mobile communication service provider, has been asked by Skype to remove support for all Skype services as from October 31st.

The startup will be announcing the news to its 30 million or so registered users later today.

Nimbuzz sees the decision to ask for the removal of support for Skype services in line with the communication software giant’s “mandate to disconnect with all third-party VoIP services ahead of its impending IPO“.

Skype, in turn, calls bullshit and claims Nimbuzz simply stopped communicating with them quite recently, following several months of discussions about Nimbuzz’ compliance with its API Terms of Use and End User Licence Agreement.

You may remember that the exact same thing happened between Skype and Nimbuzz rival fring back in July. Skype at the time also stated that it tried to resolve a dispute with fring amicably for a considerable amount of time, only to arrive at a point where they saw themselves forced to threaten legal action over “misuse of Skype software”.

From October 31st onwards, Skype users will also find themselves unable to chat, send messages or call their contacts on Nimbuzz, and vice versa. Nimbuzz points out users will remain free to communicate with their contacts using other VoIP/SIP, instant messaging services and social networks, including Facebook, Yahoo, Windows Live Messenger, AIM, Google Talk, Twitter, MySpace, ICQ and others.

In both the Nimbuzz and fring case, of course, it’s their millions of users who also use Skype that are the ones getting screwed over here. It’s also telling that Skype has started requesting the bigger third-party service providers to remove support for Skype services very recently, while both fring and Nimbuzz have offered Skype support for many years …

Said Evert Jaap Lugt, CEO of Nimbuzz:

Skype’s decision is unfair to its own and our users. People want to choose how they communicate and to be able to make calls and send messages, regardless of service, social network, device or operator network. Nimbuzz gives them the freedom to do so, Skype does not.

For what it’s worth, Skype responded with this canned statement:

“Skype has been in discussions with Nimbuzz regarding our concern and belief they were using Skype’s software in ways which it was not designed for, in a breach of our API Terms of Use and End User Licence Agreement.

Skype offered to meet Nimbuzz and discuss the issue however we have not heard back from them since our last correspondence to them in early August. As we have said before, Skype encourages openness and supports developers to build products that work with the Skype platform.”

Coincidentally, both Nimbuzz and fring recently started offering their own paid VoIP services to users (NimbuzzOut and fringOut, respectively), so my educated guess is that that’s the real reason why Skype is singling out these companies in particular (for now).

For all its popularity, competitor eBuddy does not offer support for Skype services and, as far as I know, never has.

Nimbuzz is not a small player in the mobile messenger / VoIP space either, any way you look at it. The startup recently announced that it has surpassed 150 million downloads and has 30 million registered users across all major mobile operating systems. Moreover, Nimbuzz claims 3.65 billion mobile voice minutes have been logged over the past year.

The company has raised $25 million to date, and one of its shareholders is Naspers / MIH Group, the multinational media group which boasts investments in Tencent, Mail.ru, Facebook investor DST and other notable industry players.

Time will tell if both fring and Nimbuzz have strong enough offerings, and loyal enough users, to stand their ground against the many alternatives, no longer bearing in-app Skype support. It will also be interesting to see if Skype will move to demand more third-party clients to remove support for its services in the future.