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HUBBLE NETWORK MAKES BLUETOOTH CONNECTION WITH A SATELLITE FOR THE FIRST TIME

Hubble Network confirmed that it has received signals from the onboard 3.5mm Bluetooth chips on its satellites over 600 kilometers away.

HACKING ON POSTGRESQL IS REALLY HARD

It is extremely difficult to write reasonably correct patches for PostgreSQL.

STORING ENERGY WITH COMPRESSED AIR IS ABOUT TO HAVE ITS MOMENT OF TRUTH

Toronto-based Hydrostor Inc. makes systems that store energy underground in the form of compressed air, which can be released to produce electricity.

APPLE ADDS MORE CARVE-OUTS TO ITS EU CORE TECH FEE AFTER CRITICISM FROM DEVS

Apple is making changes to its Core Technology Fee in response to feedback from thousands of developers - this article looks at some of the changes.

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AIRBNB'S ICONS ALLOW YOU TO DRIFT OFF IN THE ‘UP' HOUSE OR REST IN PRINCE'S ‘PURPLE RAIN' MANSION

Airbnb's Icons is a new collection of experiences hosted by big names in music, film, television, arts, sports, and more. Current entertainment-focused Icons include a floating replica of the house from 'Up', a night in a VIP lounge with Kevin Hart, and a living room performance from Doja Cat. The experiences are all priced at under $100 per guest. Only a limited number of requests will be selected for each experience via a lottery. Airbnb also rolled out other new features this week, including the ability for groups of guests to more easily book trips together.

EMAIL MICROSOFT DIDN'T WANT SEEN REVEALS RUSHED DECISION TO INVEST IN OPENAI

An email sent to Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and CEO Satya Nadella by Kevin Scott, Microsoft's chief technology officer with the subject line 'Thoughts on OpenAI' in mid-June 2019 detailed Scott's concerns about Google's developments in AI and how it might take Microsoft multiple years to even attempt to compete with Google. Microsoft had tried to keep the email hidden, but it was made public as part of the US Justice Department's antitrust trial over Google's alleged search monopoly. Mere weeks after the email, Microsoft had invested $1 billion into OpenAI, and it has increased its investment significantly further since.

TWO GIANTS IN THE SATELLITE TELECOM INDUSTRY JOIN FORCES TO COUNTER STARLINK

Luxembourg-based SES is buying Intelsat for $3.1 billion. The acquisition will create a combined fleet of around 100 multi-ton satellites in geostationary orbit, more than twice the size of the next-largest commercial geostationary satellite operator. It is expected to close in the second half of 2025 and is pending regulatory approvals. Satellite operators are seeing an uptick in demand, and the US military's appetite for commercial satellite communications is going up. Both companies maintain hundreds of millions of dollars of business with the US government each year.

VIRTUAL POWER PLANTS AND SOFTWARE

Virtual Power Plants (VPPs) reduce the need for gas and oil-based power plants by aggregating distributed energy resources (DERs) such as rooftop solar and home/office batteries. These DERs help the grid by reducing or meeting demand through remote control so power plants can avoid having to burn dirty fuels during peak periods. They can also reduce the need for additional electricity grid transmission and distribution. VPPs provide a more predictable and easily managed way of helping the grid stay balanced. This article explains how VPPs work and discusses their future.

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WHAT'S COMING TO POSTGRESQL ? 🐘

PostgreSQL is undergoing a series of transformations that could redefine its role in the database landscape. This article explores some of the developments shaping the future of PostgreSQL. One of the most significant advancements coming to the PostgreSQL ecosystem is the separation of compute and storage. This will bring major benefits such as horizontal scalability, cost-effective scaling, seamless replication, high availability, and improved development experience.

SOFTWARE FRICTION

Friction is everywhere in software development. Two setbacks are more than twice as bad as one setback. Addressing friction can also create other sources of friction. Friction is inevitable and impossible to fully remove, but there are things that can be done to reduce it, and plans can be made more resilient to it. Things that can reduce friction include smaller scopes and shorter iterations, more autonomy, better planning, automation, and using checklists and runbooks.

GOOGLE LAYS OFF HUNDREDS OF 'CORE' EMPLOYEES, MOVES SOME POSITIONS TO INDIA AND MEXICO

Google has laid off at least 200 employees from its Core teams. The reorganization will involve moving some roles to India and Mexico. The Core unit is responsible for building the technical foundation behind Google's flagship products and for protecting users' online safety. The Core layoffs also include the governance and protected data group, which will be at the center of regulatory challenges facing the company. Affected employees have access to outplacement services and will be able to apply for open roles within Google.

MAGIC MACHINES

Programmers tend to assign more trust to computers run by anyone but themselves. It's a lack of confidence in their own abilities that leads programmers to think that the people operating their cloud computers are smarter or better than they are. There are no magic machines and no magic operators: all systems have the same kind of potentially faulty bits and brains. It's all just computers and people.

ANTHROPIC RELEASES CLAUDE AI CHATBOT IOS APP

Anthropic has launched an iOS mobile app for its Claude 3 AI language models and introduced a new subscription tier designed for group collaboration.

GOOGLE PULLS RISC-V SUPPORT FROM GENERIC ANDROID KERNEL

Google says due to the rapid rate of iteration, the company is not yet ready to provide a single supported image for all vendors.

CHROME'S NEW BUILT-IN AI IS THE BIGGEST UPDATE TO THE BROWSER IN OVER 15 YEARS

Gemini can now be accessed in the Chrome desktop browser by typing @gemini into the address bar.

THE FERMAT'S LAST THEOREM PROJECT

Fermat's Last Theorem is the claim that some abstract equations have no solutions in positive integers.

PLEASE DON'T SHARE OUR LINKS ON MASTODON: HERE'S WHY!

Mastodon is a federated platform, so requests to generate link previews are initiated across many connected instances, increasing the load on the website's server in a big way.

GOOGLE PAID APPLE $20 BILLION IN 2022 TO BE DEFAULT SAFARI SEARCH ENGINE

Court documents that Google provided in its antitrust dispute with the US Department of Justice show that the company was paying Apple 36% of the total revenue it earned from searches conducted on Safari.

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APPLE TO UNVEIL AI-ENABLED SAFARI BROWSER ALONGSIDE NEW OPERATING SYSTEMS

Apple is testing a version of its Safari web browser that includes an AI-powered tool called Intelligent Search. Intelligent Search leverages Apple's on-device AI technology to identify topics and key phrases within a web page to create summaries. The exact implementation of the feature is still unknown. The new Safari will also have a feature called Web Eraser that will allow users to remove specific portions of web pages. Apple is working on a powerful visual search feature that will allow users to obtain information on consumer products when browsing through images, scheduled for integration sometime in 2025.

TESLA TO LAY OFF EVERYONE WORKING ON SUPERCHARGERS, NEW VEHICLES

Tesla is laying off its director of EV charging Rebecca Tinucci, the head of new vehicle development Daniel Ho, as well as the teams that operated under the two executives. These layoffs are part of a larger effort by CEO Elon Musk to reduce costs and headcount within the company. Tesla plans to continue building out some new Supercharger locations and finish those currently under construction. Musk is also dissolving the company's public policy team in this latest cull.

ENZYMES OPEN NEW PATH TO UNIVERSAL DONOR BLOOD

Researchers have discovered enzymes that are able to remove specific sugars that make up the A and B antigens in the human ABO blood groups when mixed with medicine blood cells. The researchers are close to being able to produce universal blood from group B donors, but there is still more work to be done to convert the more complex group A blood type. There is now a higher need for donor blood due to a larger proportion of the population being elderly and more patients undergoing blood-intensive medical procedures. Successfully converting A or B blood types into universal donor blood would markedly reduce the logistics and costs currently associated with storing four different blood types and increase the supply of donor blood by reducing waste.

PORTAL SPACE SYSTEMS UNVEILS SUPERNOVA, AN ULTRA-MOBILE SPACECRAFT

Portal Space Systems' ultra-mobile Supernova satellite bus could propel transfers from low Earth orbit to geostationary orbit in a matter of hours. The 500 kg vehicle is designed to be payload agnostic and survive in orbit for at least five years while being continuously maneuvered. It uses a solar-thermal propulsion system that produces a delta-V of 6 kilometers per second. Portal aims to conduct an in-flight demonstration in late 2025 or early 2026. It is looking to scale up its team and grow manufacturing to support the production of multiple spacecraft per year.

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THE BORGO PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE

Borgo is a statically typed language that compiles to Go. It is more expressive than Go but less complex than Rust. Borgo's syntax is similar to Rust but with optional semicolons. It is fully compatible with existing Go packages. An online playground that provides a tour of the language is available.

"RUN0" AS A SUDO REPLACEMENT

run0 is a sudo replacement that will be part of the upcoming systemd 256 release. It avoids the use of setuid permissions entirely. Using setuid permissions results in an execution context for privileged code that is half under the control of unprivileged code and needs careful manual cleanup. This page contains the Mastodon stream that discusses replacing sudo with run0.

APPLE POACHES AI EXPERTS FROM GOOGLE, CREATES SECRETIVE EUROPEAN AI LAB

Apple's top AI team is made up of former key figures from Google. The company has bought about two dozen AI startups in the past decade. Apple is focusing on bringing on-device AI capabilities to the iPhone. The next iPhone could feature a voice-activated smart personal assistant that interacts with apps. More details about these AI features will likely be announced at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference in June.

🇪🇺 DEAR EUROPE, PLEASE WAKE UP – EU/ACC

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BINANCE FOUNDER CHANGPENG ZHAO SENTENCED TO FOUR MONTHS IN PRISON

Binance founder Changpeng Zhao has been sentenced to four months in prison for failing to establish adequate anti-money laundering protections on the crypto exchange.

APPLE MUST OPEN IPADOS TO SIDELOADING WITHIN 6 MONTHS, EU SAYS

Apple's iPadOS is now classified as a gatekeeper under the EU's DMA, meaning it will soon be subject to the same regulations as the iPhone.

HOW AN EMPTY S3 BUCKET CAN MAKE YOUR AWS BILL EXPLODE

AWS S3 charges for unauthorized incoming requests - anyone who knows the name of any S3 bucket can ramp up its owner's AWS bill as they like.

WHY SQLITE USES BYTECODE

SQLite uses bytecode because bytecode is easier to understand and debug, smaller than the corresponding AST coming out of the parser, faster because fewer decisions need to be made for each computation, and can be run incrementally.

THE BROWSER COMPANY RELEASES ARC FOR WINDOWS

Arc for Windows is now available to all users without a waitlist.

SCREENSHOTS SUGGEST TIKTOK IS CIRCUMVENTING APPLE APP STORE COMMISSIONS

TikTok is presenting some of its users with a link to its website to purchase coins used for tipping digital creators.

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CHATGPT'S AI ‘MEMORY' CAN REMEMBER THE PREFERENCES OF PAYING CUSTOMERS

OpenAI's Memory feature, which allows ChatGPT to store queries, prompts, and other customizations, is now available to ChatGPT Plus paying subscribers outside of Europe and Korea. Memory lets users tell ChatGPT to remember certain details and allows the chatbot to learn from conversations. Users have control over what ChatGPT retains and what is used for additional training. ChatGPT will tell users when memories are updated. The feature will eventually roll out ChatGPT Enterprise and Teams, but OpenAI has not specified when.

MUSK WINS CHINA'S BACKING FOR TESLA'S DRIVER-ASSISTANCE SERVICE

China's government has signaled its blessing for Tesla to roll out its advanced driver-assistance service in the country. Tesla will deploy its Full Self-Driving service based on mapping and navigation functions provided by Baidu. Being able to roll out FSD in China will help Tesla compete with major Chinese carmakers, some of which already provide higher-level driver-assistance features. Chinese officials have yet to respond to Elon Musk's request to transfer the data that Tesla cars collect in China to the US to further train the system.