Pandora ditches Flash, opens up the HTML5 box for redesign

Looks like Adobe has lost yet another ally to the silky smooth allure of HTML5. Internet radio service Pandora has traded in the once ubiquitous Flash for the increasingly adopted web standard, citing, among other things, the ability to lop precious seconds off the site's load time. The upgrade is part of a major redesign for the service, said to have been inspired by the company's own iPad app. The old features are largely intact, but many, like Twitter and Facebook integration, have been revamped. The update will be rolled out to Pandora One subscribers soon, in something of a limited testing mode, with other users following later. Those with browsers that aren't fully HTML5-friendly will still be able to access Flash features as backup.