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Submission + - Trump pulls Isaacman nomination for space. (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by FallOutBoyTonto
FallOutBoyTonto writes: The Trump administration has confirmed that it is pulling the nomination of private astronaut Jared Isaacman to lead NASA.

First reported by Semafor, the decision appears to have been made because Isaacman was not politically loyal enough to the Trump Administration.

Submission + - Judge rejects claim AI chatbots protected by First Amendment (legalnewsline.com) 1

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: A federal judge has decided that First Amendment protections don’t shield an artificial intelligence company from a lawsuit accusing the firm and its founders of creating chatbots that figured prominently in an Orlando teen’s suicide.

Judge Anne C. Conway of the Middle District of Florida denied several motions by defendants Character Technologies and founders Daniel De Freitas and Noam Shazeer to dismiss the lawsuit brought by the mother of 14-year-old Sewell Setzer III. Setzer killed himself with a gun in February of last year after interacting for months with Character.AI chatbots imitating fictitious characters from the Game of Thrones franchise, according to the lawsuit filed by Sewell’s mother, Megan Garcia.

“ Defendants fail to articulate why words strung together by (Large Language Models, or LLMs, trained in engaging in open dialog with online users) are speech,” Conway said in her May 21 opinion. “ The court is not prepared to hold that Character.AI’s output is speech.”

Comment Populace reaction... (Score 1) 218

by FallOutBoyTonto (#65355917) Attached to: Trump Threatens 100% Tariff On Foreign-Made Films
I'm seeing a lot of discussion on how it might be calculated/applied, but not a lot of discussion on WHY it's being calculated/applied... Is everyone already resigned to accepting that it's happening and have to figure out how to implement it, that it isn't worth discussing on why or how to stop the madness (on this and various other items)?

Submission + - Trump nominates Jared Isaacman to become the next NASA administrator (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by FallOutBoyTonto
FallOutBoyTonto writes: President-elect Donald Trump announced Wednesday he has selected Jared Isaacman, a billionaire businessman and space enthusiast who twice flew to orbit with SpaceX, to become the next NASA administrator.

"I am delighted to nominate Jared Isaacman, an accomplished business leader, philanthropist, pilot, and astronaut, as Administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)," Trump posted on his social media platform, Truth Social. "Jared will drive NASA’s mission of discovery and inspiration, paving the way for groundbreaking achievements in space science, technology, and exploration."

In a post on X, Isaacman said he was "honored" to receive Trump's nomination.

"Having been fortunate to see our amazing planet from space, I am passionate about America leading the most incredible adventure in human history," Isaacman wrote. "On my last mission to space, my crew and I traveled farther from Earth than anyone in over half a century. I can confidently say this second space age has only just begun."

Submission + - Grok names Musk 'one of the most significant spreaders of misinformation on X' (fortune.com) 2

Submitted by fahrbot-bot
fahrbot-bot writes: Fortune reports that X user Gary Koepnick asked [Grok], "Who personally spreads the most disinformation on X?" and the service did not hesitate in pointing a finger at its creator.

"Based on various analyses, social media sentiment, and reports, Elon Musk has been identified as one of the most significant spreaders of misinformation on X since he acquired the platform," it wrote, later adding "Musk has made numerous posts that have been criticized for promoting or endorsing misinformation, especially related to political events, elections, health issues like COVID-19, and conspiracy theories. His endorsements or interactions with content from controversial figures or accounts with a history of spreading misinformation have also contributed to this perception."

The AI also pointed out that because of Musk's large number of followers and high visibility, any misinformation he posts is immediately amplified and gains legitimacy among his followers.

This, it said, "can have real-world consequences, especially during significant events like elections."

Grok did note that the definition of misinformation is somewhat subjective and often depends on the ideological stance of the reader. And it added, late in its answer, that there are many actors, bots and more that spread misinformation.

Comment Re:Not sure how this would help (Score 1) 72

by FallOutBoyTonto (#64893345) Attached to: Europe In Talks With SpaceX On Tackling Space Junk
While I agree SpaceX launches the majority of orbital missions and should be included, I don't know where those numbers came from. SpaceX hasn't even reached 500 launches in it's lifetime, let alone getting that in one quarter. They just now reached their 100th launch of 2024.

"The company reached its 400th orbital flight with the NROL-167 mission out of Vandenberg this week. Just as impressive, SpaceX launched a Falcon vehicle for the 100th time this year on the OneWeb mission, having already broken last year’s record of 98 launches." Source: https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nasaspaceflight.co...

Comment Re:Impressive. (Score 5, Informative) 203

One of the reasons why a catch was chosen rather than landing legs is due to the weight the landing legs would add. With the large amount of mass the booster has, the landing legs would have to be quite beefy and with that adds a lot more dry mass to the booster and reduces the amount of payload the booster has the ability to lift. By placing all the heavy beefy 'landing' infrastructure on the ground, the rocket can have less dry mass, more fuel capacity, and more payload capacity.

Comment Re:Hm (Score 3, Informative) 69

by FallOutBoyTonto (#64823899) Attached to: Starlink Surpasses 4 Million Subscribers

Yes they do. They made the claim, and now you're repeating the claim. Source it. I never saw the claim so I will continue to call out bullshit and will only retract it once you or the OP provide a source for the claim. That's how it works to make a claim.

Of course it's hardly a perfect service. I'm questioning the claim that it wouldn't work at all. The economics of it I can understand, Starlink relies heavily on its ability for SpaceX to make launches and bring down the cost of launches so it stands to reason that people would have thought that particular part of it was economically infeasible. But that story would have been laid to rest at the first launch.

Who claimed it would never work?

"Ookla reports, based on user-initiated speed tests, were cited by the Federal Communications Commission last month when it rejected Starlink's application to receive $885.51 million in broadband funding that had been tentatively awarded during then-Chairman Ajit Pai's tenure. The FCC said it doubts whether Starlink can provide the grant's required speeds of 100Mbps downloads and 20Mbps uploads." https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Farstechnica.com%2Ftech-p...

Comment Cursed or unlucky? (Score 1) 37

Seems to be the launch is cursed, and/or extremely unlucky... First attempt scrubbed because engine chill supposedly wasn't working but may have just been a faulty temperature reading, second attempt had human error in the loading procedure with pressure being applied too high for a few minutes. Now requesting a range extension for their FTS batteries; how long can the batteries last past their certified date without a recharge?

Submission + - Rocket Lab will self-fund a mission to search for life in the clouds of Venus (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by FallOutBoyTonto
FallOutBoyTonto writes: On Tuesday evening Rocket Lab announced that it will self-fund the development of a small spacecraft, and its launch, that will send a tiny probe flying through the clouds of Venus for about 5 minutes, at an altitude of 48 to 60 km. Beck has joined up with several noted planetary scientists, including Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Sara Seager, to design this mission.

Electron will deliver the spacecraft into a 165 km orbit above Earth, where the rocket's high-energy Photon upper stage will perform a number of burns to raise the spacecraft's orbit and reach escape velocity. Assuming a May 2023 launch—there is a backup opportunity in January 2025—the spacecraft would reach Venus in October 2023. Once there, Photon would deploy a small, approximately 20 kg probe into the Venusian atmosphere.

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