kenley

Apple teased the media earlier this week about an important announcement about iTunes, and after several hours of tech pundits forecasting the news, The Wall Street Journal reported that Apple has finally come to an agreement to offer the works of The Beatles for sale in iTunes. Yes, that's it. No cloud-based content, no 90-second previews, and definitely no new hardware.

The iconic band's entire catalog is available for purchase, however, for $149 and it comes with exclusive video of the band's first U.S. concert, "live at the Washington Coliseum, 1964."  You can also purchase single albums for $12.99, double albums for $19.99, and individual songs for $1.29 each, ending the long litigation between Apple Inc. and Apple Corps, The Beatles' record company

Did you know that Apple will also refund your money if you're unhappy with the purchase of an app in the iTunes Store? We didn't know either, but Apple lets you do just that in a few simple steps: just log into your iTunes account, click on "purchase history," "report a problem" with the lackluster app, and Apple will refund your purchase price. You do need to fill out a form detailing the reason for the refund, and "this app blows" won't fly, so get creative!

If you're as much of an Apple fanboy as Wilson is, then you should probably buy a ticket for London ASAP, because an original Apple-1 computer hand-built by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak will be auctioned off at Christie's in London on November 23. It's one of 200 original computers sold out of Steve's garage in 1976, and even includes an invoice from the salesman and a typed letter from Jobs to the original owner.

The bill for the sale reads $666.66, although the Apple-1 motherboard, 8KB of RAM, and a series of interfaces is expected to grab anywhere from $160,000 to $250,000 and beyond.

Thanksgiving is a week and a half away, which means some bargain hunters are already packing their sleeping bags to camp out for Black Friday, the infamous day after Thanksgiving when retailers advertise heavily discounted prices on a variety of products. Wal-Mart has already posted its list of Black Friday items on sale, but you can also get free shipping through December 20, if waking up at 3 a.m. and standing next to Wilson for four hours doesn't sound like fun to you.

Join us after the break for Kenley's rant on the Wiimedia Foundation's plea for public donations, and don't forget to leave us a call-back at 1-866-404-CNET. Jeff's back on the show tomorrow, so we can't guarantee yours will sift through his filter of hate, but your chances will definitely increase if you send a video voice mail instead! Use this one as an example, and send yours to the404(at)cnet(dot)com when you're finished!

Today on The 404, we use Justin's absence as a way to introduce a new friend of the show, "Stoopid" Andy. Ironically enough, Andy isn't as dumb as his name implies as we all learn the man is quite the nerd. Andy shares some geek secrets on hacking DVR boxes and spending weekends reprogramming drivers.

Also joining us today is longtime 404 friend and guest Kenley, aka "Flow." We'll chat about Apple's initiative to trademark "There's an app for that," and other commonly used phrases countless people utter every single day. Then it's off to a discussion about the iPad hitting other carriers, which leads to a heated conversation about the inevitable fallout resulting from the iPhone's migration to Verizon.

Finally, we all try to come up with ways we'd take advantage of Taskrabbit.com, the service that allows customers to outsource common tasks. Of course, we can't think of anything that wouldn't be illegal, so if you've got ideas, feel free to send them our way.

We're back! Jeff and Wilson are joined in the studio today with "Kenri," and Justin chimes in from San Francisco via phone. It's back to our usual shenanigans again, and we recount our holiday break. Plus, we have an apology to make to James Cameron.

Jeff tells us about his near-death experience on the ski slopes. Listen to how a patch of ice almost did away with our favorite CNET emcee. Wilson recounts his Christmas vacation to visit his dear ole Ma. Finally, Justin tells us about how he's currently sunbathing in California, while we all freeze to death here in NYC.

With the exception of "Kenri," we all caught James Cameron's "Avatar," and boy was it mind-blowing! The film is just incredible to watch, and we're pleasantly surprised to see it bring in more than $1 billion at the box office worldwide. Wilson is not sure though that the movie is any good in 2D. The clips and trailers still look silly, so we're still recommending people catch it in IMAX 3D or Real3D. (Editors' note: please catch "Up in the Air." Two words: Vera Farmiga.)

Tomorrow is the first day of CNET's annual International CES coverage. There won't be a show tomorrow because we'll be en route to Las Vegas. We'll be hosting a live show Wednesday at 5 p.m., Thursday at 4 p.m., and Friday at 4 p.m. PST. We have some surprises up our sleeves, but honestly, we're just trying not to kill ourselves while partying it up in Vegas. If you're there, come by the CNET booth in the North Hall at the Convention Center.

They said it would never happen, but the day has finally come for Justin to get some much-needed tail....as he dons a skunk costume and becomes Justin Le Pieu for today's very unspooky Halloween episode of The 404! Be sure to check out today's video for all the details. Since Jeff is out today and this coming Monday for who-knows-what, the guys ask everyone's favorite Kenley and Alli to help co-host the show.

Unfortunately, with the Swine Flu hitting New York at full force, nobody in the office is feeling too hot for the holiday, but they do their best and don some shades as they recall last night's CNET's Client Halloween Party. Kenley chooses her top picks for the Best Costume Award and Alli tells everyone a horrifying story that happened on her way to work this morning...trust me folks, NOTHING is scarier than a mouthful of New York trash water.

As October slowly fades away, and with great reluctance and tears, we must say goodbye to Beck's Beer and the Semi-Weekly Audio Draft, but not before Wilson debuts our last pick. Continuing in our tradition of introducing new and different genres of music, Fool's Gold plays a unique blend of South African, Ethiopian, and Eritrean influenced music with a twist--lead vocalist Luke Top was born and raised in Israel and sings the majority of the lyrics (although many of the tracks, including our first pick, are instrumental) in Hebrew.

The two featured tracks on today's episode are called "Surprise Hotel" and "Ha Dvash." If you're into the band, you can even win a date with Alli and Kenley to go see the band perform on November 17 at the Bowery Ballroom here in New York! All interested parties should submit a photo, general interests, date ideas, and a brief cover letter to the404(at)cnet(dot)com.

Have a great Halloween folks, and be safe!

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Kenley Bradstreet and Mark Licea join the show today because Justin Yu is still battling with SARS. We wish him a speedy recovery, but in the mean time, we welcome the presence of two beautiful people. Plus, it's just fun to watch Kenley rock out to today's Audio Draft pick.

On today's show, we recant what we said about Sony yesterday. The company managed to botch up a feature that would have leveled the playing field with the Xbox 360. For those of you who didn't listen, Sony and Netflix announced the arrival of streaming on the console. Sounds great? Not so fast. Apparently, you'll need to plug in a BD-Live disc every time you want to watch Netflix. We know it's only temporary, but come on! It's accessible from the dashboard on the Xbox 360, and you don't need no stinkin' disc.

It's Jeff's pick today for the Audio Draft, and while traditionally we usually pick smaller bands or unknown acts, Jeff has decided to go the other way and picked Rancid. They've been around for a while, and released a couple of albums. According to Mr. Bakalar, their latest is turning heads. We play "The Bravest Kids" and "L.A. River" from their latest album. Stay tuned for the last Audio Draft pick of the month on Friday from Wilson! It won't be country music this time.

To round out the show, we talk talk a little bit about Droid from Verizon, the company's first Google Android phone. Wilson still thinks the phone is a pretty ugly design, but that it may change the market around considering it's the first non-BlackBerry-Storm smartphone on the network. Still, Apple seems to be the one still innovating in the smart phone market.

In other news today, Kenley tells us that it's the 15th anniversary of the birth of Internet advertising. That's right on October 27th, 1994, Hot Wired ran the world's first banner ad, and surprisingly, it was pretty effective! Mark gets excited about the Tekken 6, while Wilson can't really tell the difference between Tekken 5 or Tekken 6. Jeff adds snidely, "Tekken 4." Think it's hot that Kenley likes to watch guys play videogames? Well send her a message as usual through voice mail at 1-866-404-CNET (2638).

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Kenley Bradstreet joins the show to fill in Justin's shoes, after he has an unfortunate accident with a missing bike seat. On today's show, Jeff rants about Digg's new ads while he gets new Hoboken Twitter followers. Wilson doesn't feel too hot about James Cameron's new movie "Avatar." Violet Blue starts her own URL shortner. And Kenley brings us a story about a murderous Brazilian talk show host. Yes, it is yet another episode of The 404.

Before we get too ahead of ourselves, let's explain today's show title. Apparently, there is a blog called "Skanks in NYC," and someone called a Vogue cover model, Liskula Cohen, a skank. Using words like "psychotic," "lying" and "whoring" to describe Ms. Cohen, a judge ruled that the model has a right to know who was defaming her. Beyond the First Amendment questions that this ruling raises, Kenley wonders if this undermines the whole point of the Internet?

James Cameron has been on hiatus for the last couple of years after his massive success with "Titanic." Turns out, he's been working on "Avatar" for the last 10 years, inventing all sorts of new technology to bring his vision to the big screen. While the project has been hyped in Hollywood, The 404 gang remains unimpressed with the blue people with tails. Kind of looks like a cross between a PS3 game and Halo, doesn't it?

Before we leave, we mention the new URL shortening service from Violet Blue, sex educator and columnist. At first, we were a bit confused as to why one would need another URL shortening service, but after a few hints from the chat room, we figured out that it's a warning that the link you're about to click on might be a bit NSFW. Bravo! Finally, Kenley alerts us to Wallace Souza, a Brazilian television host. On his top rated show, he features crime busts. Turns out, he was calling hits on people to get the ratings in the first place. We think the police were tipped off when a Steadicam operator, crane and lapel mic were found on scene.

Everyone have a great weekend! Wilson will be out for most of the week next week, so expect more awesome guests to keep his seat warm. In the mean time, please, please, please call in and leave a message at 1-866-404-CNET (2638) or write to us at the404 [at] cnet [dot] com.

Today we get a very pleasant--yet fattening--surprise! A special fan of The 404 sent us some amazing cupcakes from Magnolia Bakery here in Manhattan. Fortunately for you, the sugar rush was captured on tape, so now you can listen to what it sounds like when you eat dessert for breakfast.

Kenley is back on the first half of the show, and we discuss the reasons why a Radio Shack employee might want to punch a customer square in the face. We've all been in situations before where this is probably warranted, so we side with the disgruntled man in red.

Next, we chat about a story Justin posted the other day that involves a clearly delusional man who thinks he's a fictional superhero. He's already hurt himself once trying to save a woman, so we think maybe our masked friend needs a new hobby.

Everyone enjoy the weekend and make sure to call us up and leave a voice mail @ 866-404-CNET or e-mail us the404 [at] cnet [dot] com!

With Wilson at the auto expo in town, our good friend Kenley Bradstreet from "Heavy & Flow" joins us today on the show. We chat about Gore Verbinski's decision to make BioShock over another pirates movie and how that'll either be the best or worst thing he's ever done.

Justin then enlightens us about the logistical issues with sending feces through the United States Postal Service and how it isn't exactly a crime. First thing you'll want to do with the new OnStar system in the event of a car accident is Twitter about it as the service has found its way to the on-board vehicle communication system.

Next Kenley tells us about The Transcendent Man, Ray Kurzweil, and how he used to come visit the Bradstreet home on major holidays. Finally, we touch on some tech no-nos, a few tech-inspired faux pas (can you even pluralize that?) that we're all guilty of.

Make sure you keep sending in those stories of survival for a chance to win Tom Avery's incredible book, "To the End of the Earth". Leave us an email (the404 [at] cnet [dot] com or call in @ 866-404-CNET).

Welcome to "Reality TV meets Tech In A Nasty Head-On Collision Week."

After the hard-shoe conspiracy shuffle danced by Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak this week, I now bring you Kenley Collins, a finalist in season 5 of "Project Runway."

Kenley was arrested early Tuesday morning after allegedly assaulting her ex-fiance with, among other things, a laptop.

You will all collectively breathe again when I tell you that the laptop was not, apparently, her first weapon of choice. No, that was the cat.

She allegedly threw poor Tiddles (yes, name made up by me) in her ex'… Read more