Saturday, December 13, 2008

TwitterGadget Adds Twitter to Gmail [Gmail]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/YyTwXMMGrIs/twittergadget-adds-twitter-to-gmail

The Gmail Twitter Gadget lets you tweet your heart out from directly inside Gmail, complete with saucy emoticons. Thanks Wyn!



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Best Sites for Finding Deals Online? [Hive Five Call For Contenders]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/vdRb4rWxmqQ/best-sites-for-finding-deals-online

Your holiday shopping budget may be smaller than usual this year, but that doesn't mean you can't afford great gifts for your friends and family. You just have to know where to look.

We already published our savvy shopper's guide to online deal finders, but now we want to know all about what you use to save money and find great deals online this holiday season. For this week's Hive Five, let's hear more about the web site(s) you use when you're looking to get the most bang for your buck.

Hive Five nominations take place in the comments, where you post your favorite tool for the job. We get hundreds of comments, so to make your nomination clear, please include it at the top of your comment like so: VOTE: Web Site Goes Here. Please don't include your vote in a reply to another commenter. Instead, make your vote and reply separate comments. If you don't follow this format, we may not count your vote. To prevent tampering with the results, votes from first-time commenters may not be counted. After you've made your nomination, let us know what makes it stand out from the competition.

About the Hive Five: The Hive Five feature series asks readers to answer the most frequently asked question we get—"Which tool is the best?" Once a week we'll put out a call for contenders looking for the best solution to a certain problem, then YOU tell us your favorite tools to get the job done. Every weekend, we'll report back with the top five recommendations and give you a chance to vote on which is best. For an example, check out last week's Hive Five Best Media Center Applications.



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SUMO Paint Puts Photoshop-Style Editing in Your Browser [Image Editing]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/So97CxE52U4/sumo-paint-puts-photoshop+style-editing-in-your-browser

Free, high-end image editor SUMO Paint is a fairly impressive clone of Photoshop's major features inside a browser window, for those who want more precision and tools than offered in most free Flash-based image editors.

Similar in style to previously mentioned Aviary Phoenix, but without the 50-use limit, SUMO Paint is up-front about its similarities to a certain Adobe-made editor, giving you a floating toolbox, side-stacked palette and color bars, and menus with familiar options. If you're without your favorite desktop editor and in need of photo-tweaking power, SUMO can load images from uploads, URLs, and do its own in-browser copy and paste. SUMO Paint is free to use, no sign-up required. Thanks SwetaButterfly!



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Ecofont Saves Your Ink [Printing]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/iMUP71TAuI8/ecofont-saves-your-ink

Ecofont is the brainchild of Colin Willems, a font with tiny circles placed within the characters to reduce the total ink/toner laid upon the paper. Much like you can purchase pocket knives with skeletonized handles to reduce weight, Ecofont reduces the volume of printing supplies consumed.

How much of a letter can be removed while maintaining readability? After extensive testing with all kinds of shapes, the best results were achieved using small circles. After lots of late hours (and coffee) this resulted in a font that uses up to 20% less ink.

While not intended to replace all fonts, for throw away printing that compromises the bulk of what most users print it's an ideal solution. Legible driving instructions for instance, with less waste.



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Forty Inspirational Speeches from the Movies in Two Minutes [Motivation]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/OMbtOVQTneU/forty-inspirational-speeches-from-the-movies-in-two-minutes

You must hit the play button on this: Video guy Matthew Belinkie has cut together 40 inspirational speeches from classic movies into a two-minute montage.



Kind of a nice way to end the workweek. Here it is:

Hit the link below to read the transcript of the whole vid. So? Whadja think?



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Hackers Help Loggers Smuggle 1.7 Million Cubic Meters of Wood Out of Brazil [Hax0rs]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/zRB_gLlsbro/hackers-help-loggers-smuggle-17-million-cubic-meters-of-wood-out-of-brazil

Hackers in Brazil have managed to break into the computerized system that tracks quotas for logging companies, allowing for the illegal logging and smuggling of nearly 1.7 million cubic meters of wood.

The haven't gotten away with it, however, as Brazil has been trying to crack down on illegal logging. Now there are 107 companies being sued for $833 million. In addition, 202 people are facing prosecution, including 30 "ringleaders" who brought the hackers and logging companies together.

Essentially what they did was falsify transportation permits. The Brazilian system is set up so that companies receive permits to transport their felled trees. The load is measured and that amount of wood is deducted from the total amount allowed. Once a company reaches its quota, it can't get more permits and therefore can't make more money by cutting down trees. However, hiring hackers got them around the system for long enough to do some big illegal damage.

We'll see if anything actually happens in court to stop this practice. [Greenpeace via Treehugger]



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Sony Claims They're Not Working on PSP2 [PSP]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/Uney2kZUPUo/sony-claims-theyre-not-working-on-psp2

I've always liked the PSP hardware, but iterations like the PSP-3000 are failing to excite me. I just need something new. Unfortunately, Sony claims to not be working on a PSP sequel at this time.

From SCEE President David Reeves:

No, there are currently no plans for a PSP2. I go to Tokyo quite a lot and no one has referred to it...We just launched the PSP-3000 so we are still focused on this generation of the platform.

Reeves goes on the discuss the platform's dichotic hardware success and software failure, admitting that even Sony's own development teams aren't creating titles for the PSP. Though, it's pretty hard to believe that not one person in all of Sony is doing ANYTHING toward a PSP2 development.

As much as I'd like to see a new PSP, the things I'd want (touchscreen, 3G media downloads and 100% remote play compatibility over a universal digital PS3/PSP library) are just outside the reach of anything currently affordable to consumers or implementable by Sony. [MCV via Kotaku]



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Hands On: Pastebud Copy and Paste Trick For iPhone's Safari and Mail [IPhone]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/f-lXPzGt_o8/hands-on-pastebud-copy-and-paste-trick-for-iphones-safari-and-mail

Pastebud—the Javascript-based copy and paste framework that lets you move text from Safari to an email or a form on a web page—is the cleverest solution yet, but still doesn't quite hit the mark.

As you saw in the demo video, Pastebud works via two Javascript bookmarklets that you save to your Safari browser (and edit slightly). The COPY bookmark translates whatever page you're currently looking at into a text-only version, where you can highlight your desired text. This can then be moved directly to an email, or saved to your virtual clipboard (stored on Pastebud's servers, but anonymously and only for five minutes, they claim).

Pasting text back into another web form via the PASTE bookmarklet is easy—after tapping it, a green box labeled PASTE HERE is overlaid onto any open form field. Tapping that drops in your clipboard's contents, preserving any HTML that was there if the form supports it.

But, of course, there are some drawbacks. While pasting to and from different Safari windows and emails covers a lot of one's copying and pasting needs, it's not anywhere close to the convenience a system-wide solution would bring. You still can't paste the URL to the cute kitten photo you're looking at onto your Wall via the Facebook app, for instance. For things like this, being able to access Safari's URL bar would be nice, since natively, you can only export your current URL via Mail.

Also, th! e free v ersion inserts a small one-line ad for Pastebud; $5 turns this off, and also eliminates the popup that appears whenever you paste. $5 isn't too bad though, for something that's ultimately pretty convenient. If you're betting on Apple's year-plus delay on coming up with a copy and paste solution carrying on, it's not a bad investment. Check out Lifehacker as well for more impressions: [Pastebud, Lifehacker]



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