Technology

New images from the James Webb Space Telescope show the latest big milestone for the space observatory: its 18 mirrors are now aligned enough to act as one massive mirror. The new images released by NASA today include a “selfie” from JWST showing the mirrors’ progress along with updated images of a single star. Since reaching its final orbit, the telescope’s combined 18 mirrors have been focused on the isolated star HD 84406, which the researchers are using as a target to align the mirrors. Images presented last month showed 18 images of the star that were captured individually on each mirror segment. NASA’s latest image of HD 84406 shows what it looks like when all 18 mirrors work together with the Near-Infrared Camera or NIRCam. They were able to capture not only an image of the star — b...

Mike Myers is making a return to comedy in a new, six-episode Netflix show called The Pentaverate, after years of rare movie appearances. If the trailer that premiered on Wednesday is anything to go by, it’ll be the type of project where Myers makes up almost half the cast — he’s playing eight different characters, according to Deadline. The show, which will start streaming on May 5th, also stars comedians like Ken Jeong, Keegan-Michael Key, and Jennifer Saunders. It centers on a shadowy, and possibly world-controlling, secret society called the Pentaverate. According to the voice-over in the trailer, which you can watch below, it was started by five people who were labeled as heretics after discovering that the Black Plague was caused by fleas and rats (which explains all the plague docto...

Tonight the Brooklyn Nets and the Dallas Mavericks game is notable for reasons other than the basketball genius of Kevin Durant and Luka Doncic, it’s the first opportunity for us to watch a full game broadcast live with new technology. This season the Nets local broadcasts on Yes Network have used volumetric video capabilities for “Netaverse” highlight clips, replays, and in-arena video, but this time ESPN is using it to broadcast an entire game start to finish. Built with Canon’s Free-Viewpoint Video tech, it uses 110 data capturing cameras placed around the court to carefully track player movement. Then it combines that data in real-time with 3D models that have been built of each player, and renders it, very similar to how things would work while you’re playing NBA 2K. That creates the ...

Audi unveiled its latest concept car, the A6 Avant E-tron, a luxury executive car that appears to be relatively close to production-ready. Audi surprised us last year with a concept version of an all-electric A6 sedan, which will be built on a new EV platform the company is co-developing with sister company Porsche. The two Volkswagen group companies are calling the new EV architecture Premium Platform Electric, or PPE. They first started talking about it a few years ago, and it’s slated to power the larger vehicles in Audi’s and Porsche’s forthcoming electric stables. It’s also at least Audi’s fourth distinct platform for its EVs It’s also at least Audi’s fourth distinct platform for its EVs. Audi adapted one of its internal combustion platforms to include batteries and electric motors fo...

The latest Android Auto update adds a diagnostic feature that checks if your USB cable or port isn’t working as expected, as shown by former XDA Developers editor-in-chief Mishaal Rahman on Twitter. If your phone isn’t connecting to your car, the diagnostic tool might be able to help pinpoint if the USB connection is where the issue lies. In images shown by Rahman, the tool, seemingly called “USB Startup Diagnostics,” will check if a USB cable connects and checks the cable quality. On a support page, Google recommends using connecting to your car with the cable that came with your phone or one that’s less than three feet long and doesn’t “use USB hubs or cable extensions.” The tool checks if Android is able to send data through USB, which might not be possible if the cable is connected to ...

The Google Home app is getting a fresh design that should make it a lot more intuitive, according to a report from 9to5Google. The upcoming 2.49 update will let you interact with your devices from a single screen, resembling the device control panel on phones with Android 11 and up. Judging by the update’s release notes on the App Store, it seems Google is hoping to make the app a lot more user-friendly than what it is right now, saying it should help you “quickly find what you’re looking for, dim your compatible lights, and change the music volume in a snap.” More specifically, you’ll be able to tap on a device to turn it on or off, slide left or right on certain elements, like lights or speakers to make adjustments to brightness and volume, as well as long press on a device to see more o...

Yuga Labs took its next step toward trying to build a broader media empire around the Bored Ape Yacht Club non-fungible token (NFT) series today with the announcement of a cryptocurrency called ApeCoin that will be the “primary token for all new products and services” from the company. That includes a newly announced play-to-earn blockchain game that the company plans to release later this year in partnership with the developer nWay. ApeCoin’s initial use will be as in-game currency, but it’s being pitched as something that can be used beyond the confines of Yuga Labs’ titles. Starting tomorrow, it’ll be supported in Benji Bananas, a game from Animoca Brands, which also owns nWay. And the hope seems to be that it could be adopted in even more titles or even used as a more general-purpose d...

In 2018, Ireland’s Data Protection Commission (DPC) was alarmed when Facebook notified the commission, between June and December, of 12 separate data breaches that affected up to 30 million users, TechCrunch reports. The DPC began to investigate and now Meta, Facebook’s parent company, has been fined 17 million euros ($18.6 million USD). The DPC concluded from its investigation into the breaches that Meta violated Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). According to its press release, the DPC identified 12 data breach notifications that occurred between June and December 2018. “As a result of its inquiry, the DPC found that Meta Platforms failed to have in place appropriate technical and organisational measures which would enable it to readily demonstrate the security measures ...

With this week’s launch of the next-gen versions of GTA Online for the Xbox Series X and PS5, Rockstar has made it easier and faster to jumpstart your life of crime in the best-looking and best-playing version of its online open-world mode. All of the same graphical and quality-of-life changes that recently arrived in GTA V, which my colleague Andrew Webster reported on here, can also be found in GTA Online. Whether you’re a new player, or you’re migrating a character from a previous console, one of my favorite improvements is that it’s easier to be funneled into the kind of content you want to play. From the main menu, you can enter heists, free mode (where you can just roam about with no immediate objective), or be directed to new content, like “The Contract” missions featuring Dr. Dre a...

Early Wednesday morning, Amazon workers staged a walkout in two states, quitting work and even shutting off a machine to demand a $3 raise. The workers also demanded that Amazon bring back 20-minute breaks — a “perk” introduced during COVID that the company has since replaced with 15-minute breaks, according to Vice. The actions are part of a wave of labor activism at Amazon as more employees band together to demand better working conditions, compensation, and representation. The roughly 60 workers were employees at three different warehouses in New York and Maryland, working the night shifts. The walkout was organized by Amazonians United, a group that includes workers from at least nine warehouses nationwide, according to Vice. In December, AU led a multi-warehouse walkout in Chicago to ...

Winamp will sell a non-fungible token (NFT) linked to its media player’s original 1997 graphical skin, becoming the latest company to blend nostalgia and crypto. Winamp will put the NFT up for auction through OpenSea between May 16th and May 22nd, followed by a separate sale of 1997 total NFTs based on 20 artworks derived from the original skin. The proceeds will go to the Winamp Foundation, which promises to donate them to charity projects, starting with the Belgian nonprofit Music Fund. The NFT sale appears to be a combination of a publicity move and a fundraising effort. Winamp is sourcing the derivative art NFTs by asking artists to submit Winamp-based works between now and April 15th, then giving selected artists 20 percent of the proceeds from each sale of their image as an NFT. Nine...