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The discussion of how to create a "seems more random than actually random" shuffle is a good one.
What worked out well for me for simple mp3 player I wrote once (in the desktop world) was to create a random running list, then loop through it looking for "dupicates". When I found one I'd move the offending song a fixed number of spaces away from the first one. Yes, this did end up clustering dense artists at the end, but with a mix of thousands of songs I rarely get there anyway. What this doesn't do is force artists you have only a few songs from to always show up near the beginning (in an effort to evenly space things). For something like the Karma where you pick the "entertain me for X minutes", you could improve this idea by creating a full running list, REMOVING the duplicates, and then choping off the playlist at the perscribed time. Then you wouldn't get the clustering at the end.
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-Jeff
Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings; they did it by killing all those who opposed them.