Cats

The 404 852: Where it's always bummy in Philadelphia (podcast)

It's our last show before the three-day weekend, so we're wrapping up with a review of the movie box office, and some new services that'll help with the cost of tickets. We're also exploring the idea of 4D movie theaters, and quizzing Wilson on another episode of Tang that Tune. Also, be sure to tune into the second half of the show for the debut of Jeff's new recurring segment, Squishy Moments with Jeff Bakalar!

The 404 Digest for Episode 852

MoviePass: See unlimited movies in the theater for $50 a month. 4D movies: what the heckbeans is that? Do something cat! 2/5 stars for Transformers: Dark of the Moon.

Episode 852 Subscribe in iTunes (audio) | Subscribe in iTunes (video) | Subscribe in RSS Audio | Subscribe in RSS Video… Read more

Sensor setup stalks wandering house cats for study

You might wonder where Mr. Whiskerpuffs goes after he's let out the back door. You may imagine that he lounges around in the sun and swats at butterflies in the neighbor's yard. He may actually be holding down a 5-acre territory.

A master's thesis study, led by former University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign graduate student Jeff Horn, tracked 42 feral and pet cats as they collectively roamed more than 6,000 acres over the course of two years.

Radio telemetry and movement sensors gave the researchers a pile of interesting data. The largest range for a single cat belonged to a feral male that claimed 1,351 acres of room to roam. Pet cats tended to keep things much closer to home.

One unsurprising (at least to cat owners) finding was that the pet cats were lazy little fluffballs. They were asleep or in a low-activity mode for 97 percent of the time. The feral cats didn't have such cushy situations. They were in high activity mode for 14 percent of the time. It takes extra effort to make a living when you don't have a bowl of Friskies waiting at home.… Read more

This Day in Tech: First look at new Nook, Windows Phone update

Too busy to keep up with the tech news? Here are some of the more interesting stories from CNET for Tuesday, May 24.

Exclusive hands-on: Windows Phone update to integrate apps into hubs CNET gets a close look at four big changes that pertain to apps in Windows Phone 7's next update, code-named Mango. More

B&N's new Nook: Better than Kindle? Barnes & Noble has officially unveiled the second-generation Nook, a touch-screen e-ink e-reader that the company is branding as the "Simple Touch eReader." CNET's David Carnoy gets up close and personal with … Read more

Tablet games for cats are touch-screen catnip

Once humanity surrendered control of all online media to cats, it was just a matter of time until they started pawing at our tablets, too. And now Friskies is taking a leadership role in the emerging feline-gaming market with three new games made just for cats. Cat Fishing, Tasty Treasures Hunt, and Party Mix-Up are all available for the iPad and Android tablets.

The three titles basically play like a tablet version of the old arcade whack-a-mole, tempting kitties to paw at floating treats and fish on the touch screen. They're free, were created with HTML5 and CSS3, and can theoretically be played on just about anything with a modern browser, though they were designed with the iPad in mind. In my own hands-on tests of the Web version, the responsiveness of the fishing game was particularly cool--which is perhaps the most embarrassing product endorsement of my career.

Friskies claims the games are based on research into cats' senses and their reaction to different stimuli. In other words, someone was paid to do what our parents always scolded us for--tease the cat.

"To develop these games for cats, we learned what truly appealed to them. Now we know their favorite colors, types of movement and their general game-play attitudes. We also found out that they cannot play pinball," Ryan Gass, assistant brand manager for Friskies, said in a release.

Even without pinball, these cats seem to be having a great time:… Read more

Paint for Cats: Your cat is an iPad Picasso

All of us crazy cat owners secretly believe our felines are the most charming and talented creatures on the planet. Now we can prove it to skeptics and dog owners everywhere with Paint for Cats, an iPad painting app from the same nutty people that brought you Game for Cats, a laser pointer and mouse chase game for those of the four-legged, long-tailed persuasion.

Paint for Cats features a rainbow-striped mouse dancing around and off the screen in a manner designed to tantalize cats into smacking your iPad around. Every time a paw lands, a splash of paint gets added to the faux canvas.

We all know how fickle cats are about toys that are bought for them. I spent $1.99 on Paint for Cats and decided to test it out with some highly scientific experiments.

Test subject No. 1: Delia

Notes: Small black domestic short-hair shows immediate engagement with app. Rapid-fire pawing results in great depth of color. Resulting painting is reminiscent of Motherwell with an obvious Jackson Pollock influence. Makes a bold statement about the plight of polydactyls in an uncaring world.… Read more

Digital City 110: Last-minute gifts; game company holiday cards; and the best iPad app for cats

It's the final new show of 2010, and we use it to host a relaxed roundtable discussion about last-minute holiday shopping; check out some holiday cards sent by video game companies; and tune into the perfect iPad app for cats.

It's also a perfect time for an end-of-year office clean out, so there are tons of video game goodies to give away. Leave a comment on our Facebook page and we'll randomly pick some stocking-stuffer recipients this week.

Bonus: You can download the show's theme song as a free MP3 here for a limited time!

Woman puts cat in bin, Web strikes back

As the history of the world over the last year or two has shown, it is not easy to work in a bank. It places special, even unique, pressures on individuals, so that some make the occasional "split second of misjudgment."

Such a split second occurred for the clearly stressed British bank worker Mary Bale, who tried to bring a little levity to her day by putting a cat in a trash bin, where it remained unrescued for 15 hours.

There will be some who will say: "Well, at least it wasn't a baby." Yet … Read more

Meet Oscar, the adorable bionic pet cat

This is Oscar. The cute little feline from Jersey in the U.K. had an accident about nine months ago when a combine harvester ran him over while he napped in a field, severing the bottom part of his two back legs.

But Oscar is plucky. His local vet, Peter Haworth, consulted another vet, Noel Fitzpatrick of Surrey, England, who has an advanced practice. They discussed Oscar's case via phone and e-mail, and after viewing X-rays and photos, they reasoned that Oscar was a good candidate for a cutting-edge new procedure Fitzpatrick had been developing: bionic cat legs.

They'… Read more

Feline Physics

Cat Physics is a puzzle game that challenges you to pass a ball from one cat to another past obstacles and items that effect the trajectory of the ball. It has cute cartoon-like graphics and easy touch-screen controls that make this puzzler a fun diversion that's easy to pick-up and play. Though Cat Physics is very easy to understand initially, it gets challenging quickly. It has levels that require you to use a number of tools to get the ball past complex obstacles and land right at the feet of the receiving cat. There are 50 levels to play … Read more