blood

Recently, those in the television and advertising communities celebrated the "upfronts." For anyone unfamiliar with the term, it refers to the third week of May each year when the television networks host massive presentations in New York City to introduce their new shows and fall schedules to the advertising community.

Upfront presentations are so named because they kick off the upfront buying season, when advertisers can buy commercial time in advance for the new season, negotiating for the shows and the rates.

Just as geeks and analysts hold their breath to see what amazing new devices will be … Read more

Blood glucose monitoring has improved greatly in recent years, with devices getting smaller, cheaper, and faster--a good thing, since almost 8 percent of Americans are diabetic, according to some estimates, and are encouraged to monitor their blood glucose levels anywhere from one to a dozen times a day.

So it should come as no surprise that the next-gen device, introduced by Italian product developer Giulio Sbarigia, is even smaller and faster, and bears some resemblance to the iPhone.

Designed by Pelikan, Sbarigia describes his device as ergonomic, with 50 tiny needles that are easy to load, supposedly painless, and leave … Read more

Not everything in today's show is about the "lady parts." That doesn't stop it from being awkward for the gents who might be listening. Not to mention, the gent who helped produce the show.

Medicating menstrual cramps

Pok?mon Menstrual Pad (Thanks Erick!)

Wait, is this a shoe?

Blood Lamp — creepy

What the hell Robotic unicycle

Hey, baby Why cry baby crying analyzer

What a concept bheestie bag: get the wet out of your cell phone

Why didn’t I think of that? Yoke shopper

It’s about time 10 amazing modern watch designs of the future… Read more

Maybe we should have used "So bad, but so good" as our show motto instead of "High Tech, Low Brow!" Today's show is a good example of that, and we kick it off with Wilson's brief and spoiler-free review of Bruno. We also talk about the rise of the Twitterns, Apple breaking the Pre-iTunes lovefest, and Jeff meeting Tony Hawk!

Check it out! Jeff was invited to an Activision event last night to preview Tony Hawk's new game, but he was pretty surprised when Tony Hawk himself showed up to show him around! As you can see, the game comes with an actual "skateboard" controller to jump, ride, and pop up to do tricks within the game. Jeff tells us that the game is very realistic, but popping up the board feels more like a snowboard than skating. Check it out for yourself when it comes out on October 13 for $120.

In other news, The 404 has decided to hire a young Twittern to update our Twitter. Social media, whether it's in short or long form, is super time-consuming...anyone out there want to be our Twittern? We're only half-joking...

In more important news, Apple has finally broken up the love affair between iTunes and the Palm Pre: the smartphone no longer works with the popular desktop software. Jeff owns a Pre and figures that the only thing to do now is to refrain from upgrading to the latest software, lest some savvy developer use the latest SDK to somehow crack Apple's padlock.

Also, start getting amped for tomorrow's episode where I, Justin Yu, will debut yet another band in a segment we like to call...deep breath..."The 404 Semi-Weekly Audio Draft Sponsored by Beck's Beer in conjunction with Last.FM, a subsidiary of CBS Interactive and CNET News and Reviews." Jeez.

50 Cent is pimping the launch of his second video game, "50 Cent: Blood on the Sand," by giving fans the chance to play against him.

Xbox Live Gold members will be able to bump heads with Fif' and his buddies by sending a friend request to gamertags Fifty Cent GWF, Fifty GWF 2, Fifty GWF 3, and Fifty GWF 4 half an hour before the sessions kick off at 3 p.m. PST on Sunday.

"Blood on the Sand" lacks a deathmatch mode, so chances are you'll be required to play as a member … Read more

As much as you may miss it, you'll have to face the fact that donating blood may become obsolete someday soon.

The U.S. military is seeking an automated culture and packaging system that could produce a steady supply of universal donor red blood cells right on the battlefield, without resorting to needles and the human filling-stations (PDF).

DARPA has awarded a $1.95 million contract to Arteriocyte, a Cleveland company that's experimenting with a technology developed at Johns Hopkins that enables the rapid expansion of umbilical cord blood. The company wants to adapt it to a manufacturing … Read more

A new test to screen blood donors for hepatitis C (HCV) is showing promise, having scored the highest against five other systems during an evaluation by Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, according to developer OraSure Technologies.

When there's a shortage of blood for transfusions on the battlefield, medics turn to the Walking Blood Bank, i.e. any available soldier. However, short of prescreening every potential donor or using other time-consuming methods, there has been no way to be sure that a donor is disease free (PDF).

The company already offers a test for HIV, and now it looks … Read more

Hogwarts fans looking for something to do this holiday season will have to settle for the December release of J.K. Rowling's Tales of Beedle the Bard.

Warner Bros. announced Thursday that it is delaying the release date for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince until next summer. The film had been expected to be released later this year.

"Our reasons for shifting 'Half-Blood Prince' to summer are twofold: we know the summer season is an ideal window for a family tent pole release, as proven by the success of our last Harry Potter film, which is the … Read more

We think we've finally figured out the strategy behind this whole heated peripheral craze (we're a little slow on the uptake this time of year): The colder it gets outside, the more products are released inside.

That's the only explanation we can come up with for the proliferation of such products as the heated mouse by Brando--which, if you can believe it, has come with its second version in almost as many months. The "USB Warmer Mouse II" seems almost identical to its predecessor but is a bit more stylish, coming in colors like red … Read more