This week, Mailbag answers the burning question of when HD podcasts are coming, and discusses the burning hotness of Mark Licea.
preGAME 06: God of War III
We shall call the iPhone 4 little smudgy (because Rafe calls his iPad big smudgy). Kent German drops by the show to let us get a look at the shiny new toy that comprises, basically, the first half of our broadcast. Then, though, tune in for an update on the Droid X announcement that happened today, Android app privacy concerns, and Facebooks inexorable cruising toward 1 billion users.
The 404 458: Where daylight comes and we want to go home
This week on preGAME, hosts Jeff Bakalar and Mark Licea take a sneak peek at the online multiplayer component of Battlefield: Bad Company 2. Watch as Mark hops into a game on Xbox Live during the show!
preGAME 05: MLB 2K10 & MLB 10: The Show
Ep. 1207: Where we learned it by watching you
This week on preGAME, hosts Jeff Bakalar and Mark Licea take a sneak peek at God of War III! Join us as we play it live on the show and talk to the games lead designer Todd Papy. We chat with Todd about wrapping up Kratos epic saga, some of the new elements found in the game, and pushing the PlayStation 3 to its limits.
CNET to the Rescue Ep. 31 Streaming media around your house
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Created: 04/23/2013 Mark Liceas helping us out on the engineering board for the week, and today hell help us answer two questions: has anyone ever taken a good photo of a live band, and is it possible to lose weight playing video games?
This week on preGAME, hosts Jeff Bakalar and Mark Licea welcome special guest Russ Frushtick (MTV Multiplayer) as they take a first look at the Nintendo DSi XL! Weve got two units in the studio today with tons of comparisons, first impressions, and live questions from our chat room.
CNETs Donald Bell helps us get our audio and video files out of our computers and iPods and into our living rooms, where the good speakers are. Also, your questions answered, including how to stream audio from your phone over Bluetooth into your car.
Ep. 1255: Hands-on with the iPhone 4
Jeff didnt get the memo about daylight-saving time and misses todays episode of The 404 Podcast, but luckily our good buddy Mark Licea of The Green Show set his clock back and helps us out with todays Halloween recap, as well as a few stories from around the Internet.
-Its Tuesday, April 23rd, 2013. This is The 404 Show on CNET. Im Jeff Bakalar. -Im Justin Yu. -Im Mark Licea. -Yeah! -You certainly are Mark Licea. Guys, everyone, lets give Mark Licea a round of applause. Hes filling in Ariel Nunezs shoes this week. -Oh gosh. -Seriously man, take a bow. Actually, dont move. I dont want you to break anything. -Oh, were messing around with you. Thanks for being here. -Tease me. -Oh, no problem. -Were such a tease with you. We got a great-- We got a great show lined up for everyone listening out there today. Emails, voice mails, and a bunch of nonsensical stories curated from around the internet by Justin Yu. -Justin Yu. -Justin Yu. -First-- -The first one actually interests both of us. I cant believe it. -It-- -One story that combines our love for video games ends altogether on one-- -[unk], man. -at Polygon. Polygons reporting that Pizza Hut just partnered with Microsoft for a new Xbox Kinect app that lets you order a slice or whole boxes. -Why [unk] man? -Pizza-- -Yeah. -from your Kinect, from your Xbox. And you can use motion controls and voice-activated codes to order whatever toppings you want, whatever crust you want. -So, does that mean youre gonna start playing video games just for the-- -I think so. -ordering with Pizza Hut. -I guess I have to. -Oh stop. -Its kind of a game in itself. -I guess its not a game. Theres no-- Theres nothing fun about this. The Pizza Hut for Xbox app makes the chains entire menu accessible to users who can then build their own customized pizzas-- -Right. -and place orders via Kinect motion controls,-- -Uh-huh. -voice commands, or the controller. -Pizza. -Its kinda like a smooth moves game. -I guess-- -Its like a-- Its like a five 1-minute mini game. -Its-- Im sorry. If you are ordering pizza-- -Uh-huh. -using motion controls on your Xbox, you just drop what youre doing, go to the bathroom, take a long look at yourself in the mirror, and say to yourself, What the F am I doing with my life? -Worse is that you can then use your Pizza Hut account and link that with your Facebook account and post and let all your friends know exactly what toppings you just ordered-- Right. -on the nasty pizza youre about to eat. -Hopefully you dont do that after youve self-reflected-- -Im trying to think of-- -in the bathroom like that. -Im trying to think of a scenario where this could work. Maybe if youre like a dad that plays video games all the time and youre like hogging up the Xbox and your kids wanna watch TV and youre trying to like,-- -Yeah. -I dunno, maybe show them like I dunno. -The Xbox is fun and that they can-- -I dont-- -If they can have a part in the Xbox experience by ordering food,-- -Yeah. I dunno, dude. -you know. -Do you guys eat a lot when youre play video games though? -What? -I mean I was gonna say do you guys eat a lot when you play video games? Id imagine that holding a controller would require both hands. How are you gonna play a video game and eat pizza at the same time? It doesnt make sense. Right? -Dude, thats not. -Am I thinking about this too much? -Yeah. -Or I mean-- I have 2 gamers in the room. I have never played video games. Do you guys, you know, snack-- -Thats the short answer. Thats the short answer. -Well, its a good point because-- -You are over thinking it. -What I always do is Ill-- I dont play video games when I eat. -Yeah. -I always switch to-- I always switch to a movie or a TV show-- -Yeah. -or something [unk] then-- -Yeah. -then. -Right. -and then when I finish. -You dont wanna get grease all over the controller too. -Yeah. -Im-- Call me what you will, man. I am very protective of my equipment. -Yeah. Yeah. -I dont leave discs out. I dont do anything like that. I put discs away. I take the controller and I put em at least on the coffee table, you know,-- -Right. -out of harms way. I dont want any freaking pizza grease ll in all over that. Its disgusting. -Yeah. Just pause the game. -Just pause that game. Dont worry. It will be back when youre done eating the worst food in the world. -I kind of wanna try this though. Can you put this up on the screen? This is Pizza Huts new crazy cheesy crust pizza. Have you seen this? -This is an Obama Nation. -This is a regular pizza. -What the hell is that? -But the crust has 16 different dough pockets. -Lots of cheese. Oh. -Each one filled with a mixture of 5 hot cheeses. -This is why the rest of the world hates us. -Thats ridiculous. That looks really good. Its like cheesy bread with pizza. embedded. -They look like potato skins. -Yeah. -Mixed-- -Oh my god. -Im kinda getting a trypophobia from this too like its too uniformed. -Well, you guys eat pizza, you know. Just in general youll have pizza, what, how often? A week. -Once a month. -Once a month. -Yeah. -So, how was that so different from-- I mean-- -You see that pizza? -I mean the presentation is-- -That looks really good. -No, it doesnt. -This doesnt look appetizing to you? -No. It looks-- It looks ographic. -The presentation is different, but is it that different from a pizza? -Yeah dude. -No. -It is. -The corners are rounded. -Have you tried it? -I would-- Look, what am I gonna say? Im sure it tastes okay. -Yeah. -You know how-- Were not going down this road again. Were just not doing the pizza talk anymore. -Okay. -All right. -You know what I mean? -Youre a pizza snub. -This is-- Damn straight Im a pizza snub. Im a beer snub too. -Turn your nose out of my pizza. -I shall. I shall. Okay. What I dont-- So okay. So, you got this Xbox 360 Pizza Hut app, right? -Uh-huh. -And youre including all of these motion controls and stuff like that. Where-- What I wanna know is like where along the line were the like you know what-- you know what, this is great. Dont ignore Pizza Hut from your Xbox, which is fine. I dont think theres a problem ordering pizza. You order online. Whats the freaking difference? -But didnt you just say you needed to take a long look at yourself in the mirror? -No, if you use the Kinect control,-- -I always use the Kinect. -which that is where Im just like when did they say-- like when were they like, you know, you dont really make this pop. -Yeah. -Is it people can flail their arms around and then order it. That to me is gonna really sell some pieces. I dunno. -Is it motion controls? -Yeah dude! -Or is it just-- -It says Kinect. -Yeah, but it could just be the-- the audio. -Its voice and motion. -What is motion? Is that just pointing your finger at your screen? -No, its like waving. You wave-- -Does that-- Does that count as exercise if you do that? -No. -Will that burn any of the calories you eat from the pizza youve got ordered? -I dont think you really-- youre gonna burn any-- -No. -of the calories from a Pizza Hut pizza especially one you just showed us. -Yeah. -All right. Well, speaking of losing weight while playing video games, Kotaku, another video game website, theyre kind of documenting this guys experience trying to lose weight by playing video games specifically DDR, right. So, I wanted to ask you guys about this, but let me tell you the story really quick. So, this is about Kotaku writer Richard Eisenbeis. So basically, he started gaining weight after, you know, getting a little bit older. His metabolism slowed down a little bit and so he decided to break out his old DDR set with the pad, his old CRT TV, and PS2. And he decided to start playing that every single morning. And he actually lost weight doing it. He started at 180 pounds. After a few weeks, he got down to 167. This is by waking up every morning and doing 5 songs on the medium hard-- on medium difficulty level and that was just a warmup and then he went on to 15 more songs on the hard difficulty level after that. One is able to lose,-- -How-- Okay. -you know, 13 pounds. -How tall is he? -He is-- I dunno. Im not sure. -Cause 180 is-- -Hes 4 feet 5. -I was gonna say like 180 is-- sounds like an average sort of weight if hes like 510 to 6 foot. -Well, he used to be a skinny guy all his life and he said that one day when he looked down he couldnt see his parts when he was taking a shower. -Yeah. -He decided it was time to go and lose the weight. -Right. -So, what do you guys think about this? I mean, Mark obviously youre in well physical condition. Youre in great-- -Well, if youre-- if youre sedentary for, you know, months, years and then all of a sudden you decide to exercise, Im sure it makes a huge difference. -Yeah. -Yeah. -I mean whatever it takes its supposed to be, what, 60 minutes a day on average. -Right. Right. -Youre supposed to be active-- -Active. -And if youre doing nothing, you go from 0 to a little bit at-- -Its a huge difference. -Uh-huh. -For sure. I-- When I got back from college, I was-- I was like a mess. You could see-- You could see that photo from the license I showed everyone. When I-- I was-- I was definitely overweight. -You look younger now. -Yeah. -You look much younger now than you do in your drivers license. -Wedding photo, but yes, I understand what youre saying. And I was like-- What was I? I was like 210 when I got to college. And I was like just eating crap. And you just-- You know, you just start feeling like Im not gonna drink soda anymore. -Uh-huh. -Im not going to Taco Bell 4 times a week and I started playing a lot more hockey. And after a while, I was like, Oh my god, Im gonna lose 20 pounds real quick. -Going from 0 to 60 will do that. Hes playing, you know, a few games every morning. Its not-- Its like-- Its not that its the game. Its that youre actually moving your freaking body, man,-- -Yeah. -you know. -Cause like wee sports isnt gonna do it for you. -I also dont think its like a sustainable thing like hes not gonna be able to play the same games every single day for,-- -Well, no. -you know, years. -Right. Cause it plateaus. -Playing hockey is always a different kind of game, so its always exciting. -Woah. -I think that would be a better thing for him to get out of the house. -Right. -I think the idea is though-- its a stepping stone, I guess, into being more active-- -Right. -probably for him. -Its like a crawl before. -Yeah. He likes to play video games. He wants to find a middle ground-- -Right. -and hope you transition into it before you just go straight into like running outside. -Yeah. -But for me, its like DDR is a very big exception-- -Yeah. -as r as Im concerned. Just because-- -You-- Youre a n of DDR. You approve DDR. -I think-- Yeah. I think DDR is cool. Interesting. -Just because its-- Like I said, it really is super active. -Uh-huh. -And its the only game, you know, that is like staying around, Online Higher Education not going extinct in arcades and stuff like that. Like theyre still there. -Because its still. -And people-- -Its still-- -The last arcade I was at, it was still there. -My sister, cause I went to Australia for my sisters wedding, and her husband, he for, I think, 3 months, he was doing Kinect Sports-- -Uh-huh. -or I forget exactly which game it was, but it was some sort of Kinect fitness game. -Yeah. -And he looked great. It made a huge difference. I think he lost like 15 pounds. -Wow. -It was only 3 months, but he did it every morning for an hour. -You know, my thing is I dont wanna say, you know, empirically like games can help you lose weight. It can. But its like-- its how much-- its how much effort you put into it. -Exactly. -But if you-- if you, you know, if you play DDR and you put it on hard and you play I, for an hour and youre really sweating, its gonna make a difference. -Right. -If you just expect like to play, I dunno, any Kinect game and you think, Oh, because Im moving around-- -Uh-huh. -but youre not sweating or youre not getting your heart rate up, its not really gonna make a difference. You have to-- You have to push yourself. You have to actually feel like this is difficult. Im not comfortable doing this-- -Uh-huh. -and you have to be, you know, okay with that and be willing to like go back the next day and do it again. -Right. -And I think thats tougher-- -Pushing yourself like-- -You hit a certain-- You know, its really easy to just like-- Im gonna say Im gonna go to the gym, you know, twice a week. -Yeah. -But actually doing it and following through, thats like the real hard part. Youll do it like the first week. Youll do it like the first 2 weeks, but once like a month comes, youre like, Oh man, I just wanna play video games again. -For sure, but then when you get used to a certain routine,-- -Right. Appreciate-- -you have to say, Im used to this. I need to try to do something else. -Yup. Absolutely. -You know, doing like 10 minutes on level 15 on-- -Yeah. -StairMasters easy for me, so gotta switch it up. -Right. -My problem is that there are certain games that are inaccurately marketed as the, you know, solving-- of solving your weight issue. You know what I mean? Like this will let-- make you lose weight, but no, its like a two-sided equation. You have to be able to be willing to make that effort. -Yeah. People expect that the effort, the motivation is just gonna come. -It was like Wii Fit, you know. -Of course. -Like Wii Fit would probably work if you really went at it,-- -Yeah. -you know, 100%. In the chat room, Flutterguy says I lost 40 pounds in 2 months with Wii Fit. Thats too much weight to lose in 2 months, isnt it? -Thats a lot. -Its a lot of weight. -Thats a lot. -Did you-- -I mean, it was probably-- but I think on top of that if youre exercising then youre thinking, Well, Im exercising. I might as well eat better and, you know,-- -Right. -other healthy practices. -For sure. -It kinda reinforces itself. -See, Im not like that. I go, All right, hey, I play hockey once or twice a week. Im gonna eat whatever I want. -Yeah. -Hockey is like what keeps me balanced. Cause if I didnt play, I would be 230 probably, but Im like 190 now. -Plus your body chemistry. You know, people get away-- -Oh, its genes too man. You know, some people get away with that. -Your genes have a lot to do with your-- -For sure. -with what you look like. -Thats a huge percentage. -Well, Flutterguy said he went from 260 to 220, damn, thats a lot of weight to drop. Thats a lot of weight. All right, as long as you do it safely and healthily, youre good. -Yeah. -All right. Lets move along. What else we got, dude? -Lets see. Lets talk about going to shows. Lets talk about complaining at live shows cause we do this a lot at like venues and musical shows and things like that and there seems to be a trend with bands recently. In particular, theres 2 bands called Savages and then theres the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Theyve taken to posting notes at their shows that say please dont use a smartphone to take a camera-- take a picture while youre at shows. -This is like--- This made a lot of headlines a couple of weeks ago-- -Yeah. -with the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. -Because they dont want you to record video and post it. -No, no, they dont want you to disturb other people. -Yeah. Those are basically the 2 reasons. One, its a huge distraction to everyone behind you when youre holding up a tiny bright screen and then the other thing is that, yeah, its a copyright issue because if youre taking video and posting it online, maybe theres some legality issues there. -And do you guys-- -What do you guys think about it? -Do you think its a passive-aggressive way to stop like the bootlegging or-- -I dont think theygirls school uniform Ep 1255 Where we dont know what to do with our hands really care about the bootlegging because everyone can record-- -Exactly. -an audio clip and you dont even have to take a phone-- -Thats what I hope. I hope the case is that they just want the concern experience to be as good as it can be for the attending audience. -Right. Right. And the other thing is that no one has ever really taken a great photo of a band at a show just by holding it above their head and snapping a picture. -Yeah. -Right? Like have you ever seen-- -And you know what else is really annoying is people taking pictures with the iPad. -Yeah, at shows. -Have you seen in that in concerts? -No. No. [unk] -I went to-- Yeah. I went to a CBS concert and this person in the front-- in the front row or maybe they were a row back,-- -Uh-huh. -they were taking-- the entire show, they had the iPad up in front of them taking video. -Yeah. -It was just annoying. I feel like if youre gonna go to a concert and if you really enjoy that artist, just--Right. -be present and just watch the concert. -Yeah, I agree. -And you know, I guess sometimes its kinda cool to capture that moment, but I feel like if youre focused on that,-- -Uh-huh. -it just cheapens the experience for you while youre there-- -Right. -experiencing the concert. -Yeah, I agree. -Just be there and just enjoy the show and dont worry about like capturing it for later on. Its never gonna be as good. -Yeah. -Its never gonna be as good and youre never gonna freaking watch it. Youre just-- -No. -And if youre going to watch it, theres a million other videos that you can just go on to Youtube. -Right. -Only 1 person really needs to record it. Everyone else just pay attention. I would make the argument that, you know, going to see a live band, its more expensive and it lasts longer than going to see a lot of movies, right. And youre not allowed to just take your camera out and take photos during the movie-- -True. -and disturb people. So, why should you be able to do that in a live audience? It doesnt make sense. -Would you-- Would you say something if someone in front of you had the iPad or a phone up the entire time and its bothering you? -If some jerko in front of me is filming a concert with a freaking book like an ipad,-- -Yeah. -yeah, somethings gonna be said for sure. -What about the phone? Cause this happened to one of my buddies. -The phone is a different thing. -Thats only like 2 seconds. -If hes taking photos, thats fine. If hes filming the whole freaking show,-- -Yeah. -words will be said. -My buddy, yeah, he was filming this entire concert maybe like an hour and one of the ladies behind him was like-- -Your buddy was filming-- -Yeah, my buddy was filming. -The whole time? -He was-- He was about 10 rows behind me. If we were sitting together,-- -If youre the last person in the house, do whatever you want. -Yeah, theres no one behind you. -Do whatever you want. -He wasnt in the very back, but he was in the middle of the sitting-- -Uh-huh. -and this lady was like, Are you gonna keep that on the whole time? -Yeah, youre right. Youre right. You know what I mean. -Shes right though. -And then he turned off? -Oh yeah, for sure. -Dude, theres no-- -That would annoy me. -Its just where are your brains? Where are you brains? -You know, if bands were smart, they would just hire a videographer to come along with them. -And sell it. -Yeah, and then sell it afterward for $5 and thered be a well-produced-- the audio would sound 10x better. -And can we talk about something else that really annoys me? And Im not entirely sure why. But okay, you know how-- you see these viral videos on Youtube or whatever where people pretend that theyre like gonna propose to each other or-- -Uh-huh. -that, you know, if somethings gonna happen and then everyone comes and pulls their phone out. Why do you care if youre a stranger and you dont know these people? Why do you care if the strangers are gonna-- -Yeah. -propose to each other? -Its weird. -And everyone does it. Its like-- -You dont even know them. -You dont even know them. You dont know their situation and then-- and then you see them, you know, doing something thats kinda private. I mean, not really private because youre doing it in a public place. -Uh-huh. -But still, you pull out your phone, youre like, Oh my god, I have to capture this moment. -Yeah. -Im gonna-- Im-- -I wonder if its because like I dont know. You-- Youre thinking is you consume YouTube media so you wanna contribute to that-- -Yeah. -even though it doesnt-- I mean, are you gonna even put the effort-- -I think theyre hoping that-- -of posting it? -hopefully their video will capture something so viral that will make -Yeah. -a million hits off of it and potentially make money and get like-- -Thats why-- -Is that what theyre thinking? -I honestly think thats the mindset-- -Thats what I think too and I think thats annoying. -Yeah. -Im not from that school of thought. -No. -Like I dont-- I almost never-- You know, people like reach for their phones first now. -Yeah. -You know what I mean? -Thats not-- -Its like theyre in a-- theyre in like a, you know, standoff. -Yeah. -And they reach for their phone like theyre in some sort of like old Western, you know, duel or something like that. -I do that-- -Its weird. -when I feel insecure about like if Im waiting for a buddy and people walk by then Im like, Oh, what am I gonna do with my time?-- -Yeah. -I have 2 minutes to kill. So, I just pull out my phone and I dont even-- I dont even do anything. I literally just go into apps. I just-- -Scroll for it. -I just swiped. I swipe like 10 times and I put it down. -A weirdo. -Is that weird? -Or youre like pretending to be a phone call. -Well, no. Its weird because I dunno-- I think Im probably too self conscious. I dunno. Ive weird like social anxiety issues. -Woah! -Thats a different thing. -Lets-- Can we dig a little deeper in this? -No. -I dont think he wants to dig a little deeper. -No, were good. This is gonna be therapy right now. -No, its like a weird social anxiety thing that-- -A lot of people do that. When youre at a party or something and you dont wanna feel like-- -Yeah, I just get nervous and its-- -creepy because youre by yourself. -And Im not focused-- -You bring out your phone. -Yeah, Im not focused on whats going on with the phone. Im focused on like-- -But thats different though. -myself too much. -How about this-- -Thats disrespect though. -It used to be smoke a cigarette. People like you did that. -Yeah. -You know what I mean? People would be like, Oh, I have nothing to do right now. Im gonna smoke a cigarette. Right? -Yeah. -Hey, if youre looking at your phone instead of smoking a cigarette. -Its healthier. -Thats okay. -Yeah. -That is okay. -I wanna continue this conversation after the break. -Lets do that right now. When we come back, more 404 for your listening pleasure. E-mails, voice mails, and the like. Keep it here. Well see you on the other side. -Were getting better. -Yes! -I can see that, Michelle. Im through playing games. Its time to end the square dance once and for all. -What about the girl? She can throw. -Simply have to woo Kate a bit sooner than nature intended and rest assured Michelle, theres no resisting when White Goodman put on his shiny shoes. -All right. Welcome back to The 404 Show. Got some e-mails to get to. Some voice mails. This just came in over the wire, Im gonna say. -Okay. -I dont know what-- I havent read it, but its on The Escapist and its Michael Bay saying hes sorry. Im trying to get in the-- in the rundown here for you. Its Michael Bay saying hes sorry for Armageddon, but not the reasons you think. -What? -Yeah, I dont understand. The Hollywood director who never met an explosion he didnt like says hes sorry in a Miami Herald interview about his upcoming Pain and Again, which is apparently cut in a much slower pace than his usual hyperkinetic style. Michael Bay acknowledged that some people have always given him a hard time about his editing style, but also insists that hes actually slowed down over the years and then amazingly he said he was sorry for Armageddon. I will-- This is quote. I will apologize for Armageddon because we have to do the whole movie in 16 weeks. It will-- They shot that movie in-- -Wow. -4 months. -Thats pretty impressive. -Thats an achievement. It was a massive undertaking thats not ir to the movie. I would redo the entire third act if I could, but the studio literally took the movie away from us. It was terrible. -What? -Wow. -Dont-- -He said-- He said it was terrible at the end-- at the end of the quote. -Yeah. Its the last thing he says. It was terrible. He could be talking about the-- it was terrible that the studio took the movie away. -Yeah. -Thats amazing. I cant believe they shot that in only 4 months. -I feel like he should be apologizing for Transformers-- -I was gonna say-- -and not-- -apologize for that. -Armageddon. I liked Armageddon. That one was a piece of crap. -Who. Everyone loves Armageddon. Who didnt like Armageddon? -I didnt like Armageddon. -You didnt like? -No. -Its kind of funny. I mean his best movie ever is True Lies. Theres no-- Theres no-- -The Rock. -Im sorry-- Im sorry he did not-- he did not do it. James Cameron did. -Yeah. -The Rock is his best movie. -The Rock is his best movie. -Yeah. -Youre right. I take that back. Im sorry movie buffs. So weird. All these years later comes out and says, yeah, we got shafted on Armageddon. -Breaking news. -Breaking news how about that. -All right. Lets switch gears a little bit, get to some e-mails that you have for me. I wanna hear-- -Yes. So, we got one more e-mail about where he listens-- where our ns listen to The 404. -And we do have voice mails about that too well get to. -Okay. Cool. So, the first one is from Dwayne. He says Im currently deployed to Kuwait with the USAF and you guys get me through my hurry up and wait times in our vehicles. -Oh wow. -He says he works protocol or he get general officers where they need to go on time. Without us, theyd be late wherever they go. They usually have so much to think about. They have no concept of time. Anyway, while waiting in my vehicle on the flight line for their planes or vehicle or arrive, you guys keep me sane and engaged, meaning awake. -Wow. -Thanks for all you do. Love to hate the show. Yeah, thats Dwayne. -Dude, thats amazing. Thanks for-- Thanks for everything youre doing over there, man. -Yeah. We got one more from Esteban. He says, hey guys, just wanna say I love the show. Jeff with his incisive sarcasm and Justin with his gulch mining. Just wanna say I listen to you guys in the shower with a Jambox regularly, but recently he says he was at a tattoo convention. And while I was trying to forget the pain, I was listening to you guys and the artist asked me what I was listening to, I told them it was The 404 and he said he loved the show, the tattoo artist. We finished off the work-- -Was it our friend Jo? Like was it her? -Could be. It could be. Although he refers to the tattoo artist as a he. -Okay. Yeah. -Its probably not. We finished off the work with his speaker dock and it was a soothing relief that the machine was buzzing and the show was going at the same time. Love it. Keep up the good work. And by the way, whats up? Richard Esteban from Texas. -Thats so cool. -Thats really cool. -Yeah. -Man, uh, whats worse? Getting tattooed or getting tattooed listening to our show? -I dunno. -Ooh. -I wanna know who the artist is. -Yeah, me too. -I actually sent him some e-mail, but he hasnt replied yet. -All right. Well-- -Did he get a 404 tat? Probably. Right? -Hopefully. -They probably changed the whole plan. -You think thats gonna-- -Were both interested, are both ns of the show. -Yeah. -What do you get on the show if you-- -404. -You get the logo, man. -No. -Or tattoos of your ces. -But like what do we give you-- Theres gotta be an incentive. -Oh. -If you do something like that, well like spend the-- well like spend-- -Spend the weekend with you. -Yeah. Well like take you out to dinner in New York or something. I mean I would advice against doing it. -I would do that though. -Do you guys get a lot of hate mail? Im just curious. -I mean the-- -Not you guys as much as Jeff. -Its not a-- and even that, its like minor like seriously. Id say its like 2%. -Thats good. -I dunno what it is. Either people are like scared to say they hate us or they literally dont. Not on the internet. Im pretty sure-- -Right. -theyre pretty shortcoming with their feelings so thats good. -So now were gonna get a bunch of e-mails. -There was like-- there was an issue a couple of months ago, but that was all resolved. -Thats the one you showed me. -Inappropriately as it were. -Yeah. -But nevertheless-- -Just curious. -Yeah, you know. Its cool. -Its good to not have hate mails. Thats a good thing. -People-- -Yeah. -I think thats rare. If people dig our show, thats awesome. If they dont like our show, thats great too. Youre allowed to do whatever the hell you want, but like change the channel if you dont like it,-- -Yeah. -you know. Dont be like [unk], you know. -It takes a lot for people to give a podcast like a bad review. You know what I mean? Like if youre somewhere and the foods bad, then yeah like youre gonna advice people not to go there. -Yeah. -For podcasts, if you dont like it, you just change channels to a different one. -Thats all. -Yeah. -True story. -Thats true story. -True story. -Lets get to some calls from the public. Are you ready for this, Mark? -So ready. -Im gonna-- Im gonna play this. Im gonna play this. -I cant wait. -Im gonna play this. Im gonna hear it, right? -Okay. Thats a good point. -Calls from the public. -Lets do it. -Here we go. -Time to show your love. -Call me. -866-404-cnet. -404. -Calls from the public time. Way to go, Mark. -What? With the quick switch to Justins computer that had nothing to do at all with calls from the public. -Keep the-- -Its a work in progress, man. Ill be better tomorrow. -Youll be fine. Keep the audio up cause you have to hear this now. So, a buddy gets a vasectomy, listens to the show, calls in, says its all real. -Hey 404, this is Ted the guy who e-mailed about the strangest place. Im pretty sure you guys remember. The strangest place to listen to the 404 and yes Im real and yes the story is real. I have been in bed all day since Wednesday healing shall we call it. -Uh! -And yes, Jeff, you stay awake for the whole thing. Lets just say there are needles inserted in places to give you anesthetic where you dont ever want them to go again. It makes you be awake for the whole thing. It really happened. Im not exactly sure how you want me to prove Im real. -Prove it. Prove it. -Ill take a picture of the sample bottles if you want. -No. -Yeah, yeah, yeah. -You wanna know what the sample bottle is for, but theyre empty, you know. So, thats safe. Anyways, good listening to you guys all the time. Thank god you carried me through that horrible moment in man life and have a good one. Bye. -Man life. -Not anymore. -I cant even-- I cant even imagine, you know. Ive self groomed and I remember there was one time where I like-- it was like a slight nick-- -Oh my god. -and that was the end of the world. -Yeah. -So, I cant even imagine having a vasectomy. -Needles and,info on insurance. yes, scalpels. -Just chop it off by that point, man. -Just sounds horrible. -And Im kidding. Im kidding. -Uh but what a trooper. -Yeah. -What a trooper and I-- I mean, anyone who does that you gotta respect the hell out of them. -And really not want kids. -Yeah. -Clear. But they are reversible. -Oh, thats true. Yeah. -Yeah. -I dunno if they take-- -Thats true. I have seen at Seinfeld episode. -You have and? -Its proof. Ive learned-- Everything I learned in life I learned by watching Seinfeld. -Yeah, thats-- Wow. -More power to him. -I-- Yeah. But you know when you get that like weird tickle in your stomach? -Yeah. -Im getting that right now-- -I love it. -just thinking about it. -You love it, dont you? -I dont love it. It aint exactly a-- -Youre gonna get a vasectomy tomorrow. Youre gonna-- Youre gonna call in sick. -Whats to say I havent even had one? Oh, breaking news. Kidding. Kidding. Next call. Listen to what this guy does while listening to the 404. -Hi, this is Chicago for Matt. So, Im calling to tell you guys where I listen to. I build electric bass guitars here in Chicago. Company called Lakland Basses. Believe it or not, it does get a little tedious and your show helps me get through the day. Been listening since the DW and I gotta say Im enjoying the AW much more. Ariels music is there. Definite plus for the show. I really hated those other songs. Take it easy. -Wow. You know, I just-- Im always like blown away cause the reason I love this theme and the reason like we just havent thrown down the axe on it is because this is one of the first, you know, topics of conversation where were hearing from people weve never heard from before. -Uh-huh. -And thats what I love about it. -Yeah. -So, very cool, dude. Im impressed with your bass guitar building abilities and thanks for calling in. -Yeah. Impressive. -I wanna hear more. I wanna hear from people all over the planet. What do you do? What do you do is what I wanna know. All right. One more e-mail about the weird listening. Theyre really not-- Its not weird anymore. Its just like what people do-- -Yeah. -and where they listen. -Interesting. -It doesnt have to be weird. Nevertheless, this is weird. -Hey 404 guys, its Rhode Island here from Kirlan and Im calling in regards to the weird places you listen to the 404 conversation. -Im currently calling from my daily unicycle garage because when you live around, theres not much else to do other than listen to the 404 and going to unicycle garage. So, thats what I do everyday. I plug in the iPod iTunes, download your podcast, and go for an hour of a ride. So, I just want to let you guys know you fuel my rides everyday. And for that, Im very grateful because if it werent for The 404, I probably just sit in the household and not get exercise. I know [unk] keep up the good work. -Dude-- -Unicycle? -Unicycle? -Wow. -Is that offensive to you? -Why? -cause you ride a bicycle. -Theyre taking 1 wheel away. -Yeah. -No, its great. I mean, have you ever tried to unicycle before? -Yeah. But imagine its very tough. -Yeah. I used to have one in my apartment like-- -You used to-- You used to unicycle? -No. Ive tried to before cause I found a unicycle in the street back in San Francisco. -Oh wow. -I was like ride it to my apartment. -Yeah. -Then I broke a lot of stuff in that house. -It could have been broken. Maybe thats why they ditched it. -Maybe. Yeah. Maybe it was like weighted on one side or something. -I love that you just found it on the street-- -Yeah. -and brought it home with you. -Of course. What am I gonna do? Throw away a perfectly good unicycle? -Someone else did. -Yeah. -Chatum doesnt believe it. Chatum is calling-- -No, they wanna see a video. -I mean you call up, you say youre a unicyclist, you gotta freaking prove it. -Its gotta be freaking dangerous to ride a unicycle with earbuds in. You cant hear the outside world-- -I was gonna say-- -unicycling down the street. -What the hell-- What the hell else are you gonna do? You cant use your hands for anything else. -I dunno. You can put a speaker up or something. You shouldnt be-- -I wanna see this. I believe him. I believe him. -Yeah. -Because why the hell-- -Unicycle is hard thing. -Yeah, unicycle is a hard thing. -He said it almost too casually to make it seem like-- -Yeah because in Rhode Island unicycling is the norm. You know, everyone does it. So-- -Im saying youre so casual about it that I cant imagine, you know, if you were lying about it-- -Right. -unless you were like a sociopath. -Yeah. For sure. -Itd be like, I ride a unicycle. -Right. So-- -Youre just your stuff up. -Im gonna-- Im gonna freaking give him the benefit of the doubt there. -Okay. I believe him too. -Last voicemail of the day and well end the show on this. Were talking about unfortunate situations in technology where you may have sent someone an inappropriate text message, which you meant to send to someone else. -Yeah. -Here is a story about a gentleman from Brooklyn that had the ultimate F up. The one thing you never want to happen. -Oh no. -The one thing in your wildest nightmares you would never wish upon anyone, but he did it and lived to tell the tale. So, lets hear what happened to this guy. -Hey 404, its a call from Brooklyn. So, I was listening to Fridays show about the unfortunate voicemails or text messages turn out for other people. So anyway, a copy of years ago, I had in my phone, just before I had the smartphone, I had a Samsung flip phone. I had Monica who is my wife and mom. M-O-M. M-O-M and M-O-N-- -Oh no. -unfortunately very close to each other-- -Oh no. -in my phonebook and one night I sent a very graphic and ual message to my Mom and not Monica. -Oh. -And yeah, so that didnt go so well and my mom actually still bust my chops to this day about it, but such is life. Anyway, thanks guys. Have a great-- have a great day. -Oh man. -At least his moms a good sport about it. -Yeah. Sure. -At last she brings it up and its not awkward. -Right. -Its the worst thing when you dont talk about it. -Yeah. -When something happens and then you see each other and youre like, Oh, hi-- -Yeah. -mom. -Right. Like what did his mom do that would bust his chops like you still wanna do that? Like what did she do to bust his chops? -Yeah. Yeah. -Oh man. -Obviously youre all in joking. All in joking. -Yeah, at least it wasnt a dick pic, right? Like that would have been way worse. -It probably would have-- It probably-- cause I feel like most parents will-- at least my parents dont have any type of data. And if they do-- My mom has a smartphone, but she shuts-- -Right. -off the data. -Yeah. -So-- That wouldnt even-- That wouldnt even get to her. So, I feel like-- -They were just like-- -Oh god, could you like-- the worst-- the worst, I would have to imagine, is writing the message-- -Oh no. -and then not even realizing what the-- what like the to field says and then you send it and like you catch-- you see that bar sending and youre like no and you just like break your phone in half. -Yeah. -What do you do, right? -Oh man. -Oh man. -I feel like that wouldnt be the worst scenario though because, you know, your mily is your mily and youve already been through, Im sure, a lot of more embarrassing stuff. -Yeah. -I feel like its more-- maybe if it was like your boss or you coworker-- -Right. -that you dont have a good relationship with,-- -Right. -Yeah. -that would probably be the worst scenario. -Who would you rather send that to if you had it like sent it to somebody. -Right. -Oh definitely-- -Is it like your boss, your mom, or like whats that other third? -I dunno. -You know like-- -Yeah. -your boss, your mom, or your like-- I feel like even like your aunt would be worse. -Yeah. -Because your aunt-- -Yeah. -will have this very, Free legal information you know,-- -She thinks youre an angel. -whatever it is. Like I would almost be-- -And that would all change. -Right? -Yup. -And the worst part about that cause if its your mom, you know, if its your mom, shes not gonna tell your aunts, you know. -Yeah. -Shes not gonna tell your aunts. If its your aunt, your aunts gonna tell-- -Tell your mom. -your grandma or you know. -Maybe in your mily, dude. -Well no, Im just saying they talk at least in my mily. -Yeah. -Theres a lot of gossip-- -Yeah. -with my mily here-- -Yeah. -in New York and they would-- it would just spread like crazy. -It would make the rounds, yeah. -Oh yeah. -Yeah. -You could always say that you got hacked too, right? Is there any way to recover after-- -Yeah. -youve sent a message like that? You can just be like, Oh man, someone stole my phone and just randomly text messaging people. -But thats always like the deult excuse now when you hear that. -Right. -Youre like, Oh really?-- -Yeah. -You got hacked. -Yeah. -Oh okay. Really youre gonna go with that one? -Deception. -Are you sure you wanna go with that one? -Yeah, thats true. -Yeah. -Thats so funny. Oh my god, I would just-- I dunno what I would do, man. Its just-- Im lucky enough it hasnt happened. -Yeah. -And hopefully it never does. -Dont send messages like that. -Yeah. -It just make-- Make like-- You know what you should do just to play it super safe? -Uh-huh. -Make your mom like Zzzzz in your-- in your contacts. -Right. -You know just eliminate any possible accident. -I feel bad for him. -I know. I do. -But it sounds like hes moving on with his life. -I kinda-- -After years of therapy and everything, Im sure hes fine. -I kinda want him to e-mail us to let us know exactly-- -Yeah. -He also-- He also gotta call right away and be like, Mom, do me a vor and just dont. Cause if youre mom-- If you tell your mom that and she kind of has an idea of what youre talking about-- -Yeah. -shes not gonna open it. -Yeah. -So, he could have been preemptive instead. -Youre right. -No, she would definitely open it. -Mom-- No. -Anyone would open. If someone told you that, would you open it? -Yeah, but its-- -Shes gotta look at her phone sometimes. -But its like-- No, she doesnt necessarily. -What? Did she leave her phone to someone else? -Or be like, Mom, dont move. -Give me your phone. -Give me your phone. -Dont move. Your phone is-- -Mom, where is your phone? -its gonna explode. -Yeah. -Dont you dare-- -But youre calling her on the phone that she has used to pick up. -You gotta navigate that situation. -Call the house phone. All moms have a house phone. -I guess. They do now. Not for much longer. -Thats gonna do it for us today, guys. Hope you enjoyed the program. If you have a similar story you wanna share with us, 866-404-cnet. Call us up or leave us an e-mail, . -Yeah. -And well talk about your unpleasantness. -Oh no. -And we will enjoy every freaking second of it cause theres nothing better than taking joy in other peoples misfortunes. Right? -Of course. -Of course. -Especially when theyre harmless like that. Thats gonna do it for us. Were back here tomorrow. Again, Peter Hoff Friday and Mark Licea all freaking week. -Yeah. -Well see you tomorrow. Im Jeff Bakalar. -Im Justin Yu. -Im Mark Licea. -Its The 404 Show, high tech low brow. Back here tomorrow. Well see you then.
Mailbag: Coming soon: HD podcasts!
With both of our backup engineers missing in action, Mark Licea takes up his old post and helps run the board. Well try to defend Las Vegas in spite of the Heart Attack Grill, weigh the possibility of Apple releasing their own smartwatch, and question the role of Twitter in crime coverage.
This week on preGAME, hosts Jeff Bakalar and Mark Licea take a sneak peek at the action-thriller Metro 2033! Join us as we play it live on the show and talk to the games executive producer, Luis Gigliotti live in the studio. We chat with Luis about how the title made the jump from novel to video game and how the PC version was built in 3D from the ground up.
This week on preGAME, hosts Jeff Bakalar and Mark Licea take a sneak peek at both MLB games releasing today! Live on the show well play a full inning from each title as well as talk to some of the developers behind the games. Its two games in one show for the first time ever!
preGAME 04: Battlefield: Bad Company 2
preGAME 08: Nintendo DSi XL, Just Cause 2
preGAME 07: Metro 2033
