kissing

If you've ever allowed yourself to be subjected to Kiss songs, you'll know that they are jolly, somewhat empty-headed, and entirely innocent.

If you've ever allowed yourself to be subjected to a reality show called "Gene Simmons' Family Jewels," you'll know that the Kiss frontman is a man with a lovely family, experience of plastic surgery, and opinions that suggest a slight smattering of oldy-worldy self-righteousness.

How entirely stunning, then, that this wealthy aging, platform-booted man seems to have encountered a little difficulty with those who are able to put the digital boot in … Read more

Would you pay $30 to screen a new-release movie on your television at home? Sony Pictures, Warner Brothers, and Walt Disney are all in talks with cable TV networks to offer wide-release movies streamed to your TV, so you won't have to wait the three months for titles to show up on demand or on Netflix.

Cable providers like Comcast are already testing this service, but Disney also has plans to stream films on Web-connected gaming devices like the Microsoft Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3, with movies ranging from $20 to $30, depending on consumer interest. The services look to solve Hollywood's recent decline in DVD movie purchases in the face of online piracy.

Last year, physical disc sales dropped 13 percent over the previous year's sales. Although there's no word yet on when companies will officially release the solution, won't this just open up self-pirating to anyone with a living room TV and a HD Flip video camera?

In case today's show title spawned dirty thoughts in your head, Pink Kisses is really just a paid service that helps newly single women get through a rough breakup. The Texas-based company offers clients a variety of chocolates, personalized text messages, e-mails, flowers, and even virtual gifts to help women set new goals for their lives and forget about the man (or woman) that broke their heart.

Prices range from affordable all the way up to an unbelievable $272 services that offers three days of encouraging text messages, two "life coaching session," flowers, and "better than sex" truffles. It sounds kind of depressing until you consider how simple the NSFW male equivalent of Pink Kisses would be.

We're running out of call backs and voice mails, so there's no Calls From the Public Segment today. Give us a ring at 1-866-404-CNET and say "This is ____ from ____, and you're listening to The 404, the show where ___insert random comment here___." If it meets Jeff's standards, he'll play it on the show, so make it good!

If you're a guy in the mood for Valentine's Day who doesn't know what to do, well, I don't have any dating or relationship advice.

I do have something you might want to try, however. It lets you literally blow kisses to that very special person, or persons, regardless of the distance. All you need is an iPhone (or iPod Touch) and, of course, the ability to blow a kiss properly.

The application is aptly called "Blow a Kiss" and can be downloaded for free at Apple's App Store. I tried it on … Read more

What's with all these old fools trying to make a name for themselves in the music business again by speaking out against piracy? First it was Metallica, who hated on bloggers, but came off its high horse only after we took the band to task. And now, it's Gene Simmons of the once-important KISS, who is blaming fans and peer-to-peer networks for the destruction of the poor music industry.

"The record industry is dead. It's six feet underground and unfortunately the fans have done this," Simmons said. "They've decided to download and file share. There is no record industry around so we're going to wait until everybody settles down and becomes civilized. As soon as the record industry pops its head up we'll record new material."

But it gets better. Not too long ago, the 58-year old, cool dude wannabe said that "Every little college kid, every freshly-scrubbed little kid's face, should have been sued off the face of the earth."

Oh, Gene. I know old age gets to you and sometimes it's easier to be cranky than apply logic to things you don't understand, but can't you try just this one time? You've not only made yourself look like a fool, but your gross misrepresentation of the facts shows us how little you know.

Here's a refresher:… Read more

We're dubious about the authenticity of this purported concept, but it may out of an overwhelming sense of denial. It's just too depressing--and disturbing--to think that someone would actually come up with this idea, let alone find a market for it.

The "KissPhone" is a device that supposedly does its best to duplicate the buss of an acquaintance with an "artificial mouth," according to its inventor, who happens to be based in Paris. (No comment.) "This KissPhone detects percussion speed, pressure, temperature, and sucking force of the lips, when you kiss it," … Read more

What an interesting launch party concocted by Tiger Electronics for their new Power Tour Electric Guitar, held Wednesday night at the Hard Rock Cafe in Times Square.

The $70-dollar toy is inspired by a real Gibson guitar, but it's much easier to jam out on. Twelve songs are built right in, letting you rock out to tunes including "Wild Thing" and "Smoke on the Water." All you have to do is follow the lighted touch sensors on the fret and strum bar.

To prove how easy it is, three groups of real rockers got on … Read more

It's not often we get so excited about a DVD player these days that we jump up and down when it arrives in the office. That wasn't always the case though--we remember when DVD was the most amazing thing we'd ever seen, and KiSS is keen to evoke such emotions in us once again with its funky new media-streaming DVD player, the KiSS 1600. We first saw it at CeBIT in March and were desperate to get our hands on it.

What the KiSS offers over other DVD players is the ability to stream media either over … Read more

Gaming laptop specialist WidowPC is gunning for Dell big time in an old-fashioned Texas shootout. Just a few miles down Interstate 35 from Dell's worldwide headquarters, Austin-based WidowPC just announced a new laptop that it claims is less expensive than comparable models from its gigantic competitor while performing just as well.

Fosfor Gadgets says the top-of-the-line Sting 517D features a 17-inch wide screen, Intel's latest Core 2 Duo Merom processor, up to 4GB of high-speed memory, a 200GB SATA hard drive, "the industry's fastest gaming video card" from Nvidia and "lifetime tech support from … Read more

Fabrik, which makes a complete if complex online storage service, has released a new, simplified file transfer and streaming product, MyFabrik Lite. It's a straightforward service that has two purposes: it helps you transfer large files (up to a gigabyte), and it lets you upload media files and easily insert a streaming player for the media into your site or blog.

The service is very basic, and yet it still supports several media types intelligently: you can use it to transfer files, stream video, play audio, and also to create slide shows and filmstrips. Here's a Fabrik Lite … Read more