Tech
NASA video shows spacecraft’s wild ride around ocean world
NASA’s Europa Clipper spacecraft is in for a wild ride.
The launch of this mission to explore the ocean world Europa — a Jupiter moon that harbors an ocean perhaps twice the volume of all Earth’s seas — was interrupted by the imposing Hurricane Milton, but its 1.8-billion-mile journey is imminent. The craft will make nearly 50 close flybys of Europa’s cracked, icy shell, using a number of high-resolution cameras, a ground-penetrating radar, and even a device that will literally sample particles of Europa that have been ejected into space by tiny meteorites.
The mission will gather copious amounts of information, enough to discern whether or not Europa harbors conditions that could host life beneath its ice shell.
“It’s perhaps one of the best places beyond Earth to look for life in our solar system,” Cynthia Phillips, a NASA planetary geologist and project staff scientist for the space agency’s Europa Clipper mission, told Mashable.
The repeated reconnaissance will require the craft to make perfectly timed loops around Jupiter as it intersects Europa’s orbit, which NASA shows in the animation below.
Here’s what you’re watching (a short ad plays first):
– Center orange dot: Jupiter
Mashable Light Speed
– Blue dot: Europa
– Gray, red, and yellow dots: Respectively Jupiter’s other three large moons — Io, Ganymede, and Callisto
– Magenta: That’s Europa Clipper “lopping in and out,” NASA explained.
There’s also a timestamp on the top right showing the mission’s planned flight between April and July 2032.
“The relative intensity of Jupiter’s radiation bands is illustrated in this diagram,” NASA explains, with darker reds depicting more radiation. Both Europa and Europa Clipper’s orbits are depicted in the graphic.
Credit: NASA
This looping trajectory is also designed to limit the spacecraft’s exposure to extreme radiation. “The charged particle environment at Europa’s location is immense,” Phillips said.
That’s because Jupiter, a gas giant planet 317 times more massive than Earth, generates a massive magnetic field shooting out between 600,000 to 2 million miles (1 to 3 million kilometers) toward the sun. It’s created by the planet’s liquid metal core, which spins and creates electrical currents (moving electric charges make magnetic fields). Crucially, this magnetic field grabs and then accelerates particles from the relentless solar wind — a stream of rapidly traveling charged particles emitted by the sun — which creates potent radiation belts around Jupiter, as depicted above.
“You get out of there.”
(Decades ago, during the Voyager mission, NASA’s engineers were worried about the craft passing by Jupiter. A person hypothetically riding aboard Voyager as it passed Jupiter would have gotten hit with a radiation dose 1,000 times the lethal level.)
Not all of Europa Clipper’s electronics and software can be housed in a metal vault, so looping by the moon for relatively brief periods will limit impacts from charged particles, which can damage computer chips and electronics. During each orbit around Jupiter, the craft will spend under a day in an irradiated zone before swooping out. It won’t return for between two to three weeks.
“You get out of there,” Phillips said.
After journeying through the solar system, the craft is expected to reach Jupiter in 2030, and soon after begin its orbital dance through the Jovian system. If it appears habitable, NASA plans to return to Europa and land a robot on the icy crust. Such an endeavor would drill into the ice, looking to see if the moon is inhabited.
Tech
The other election night winner: Perplexity
On Tuesday, two AI startups tried convincing the world their AI chatbots were good enough to be an accurate, real-time source of information during a high-stakes presidential election: xAI and Perplexity.
Elon Musk’s Grok failed almost instantly, offering wrong answers about races’ outcomes before the polls had even closed.
On the other hand, Perplexity offered helpful, real-time election insights and maps throughout the night, linking to reliable resources and offering historical context where appropriate.
Perplexity took a risky bet, and it paid off.
Late last week, the startup announced the launch of its election information hub, featuring real-time maps populated with voting data from Democracy Works and the Associated Press, the same information sources that power Google’s election map. This approach was different from most other AI chatbots, such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT or Google’s Gemini, which simply refused to answer questions related to the election.
It’s understandable why most AI labs sat this election out. It was the safe and responsible choice for many of them, as they’ve been plagued by embarrassing hallucinations at some point or another in the last year.
In particular, OpenAI recently released its Google competitor, ChatGPT Search. But the Sam Altman-led startup didn’t trust the feature to answer questions about this election, directing users to Vote.org instead. ChatGPT Search is still an early product, which is too unreliable for people to use in everyday scenarios, and OpenAI seems to have recognized that.
In contrast, Perplexity has been testing its Google competitor out in the real world since December 2022 and clearly felt it had enough data to give this election a shot.
Perplexity’s election night success could set it back in its ongoing fight with media companies; specifically, Dow Jones’ recent lawsuit claiming the startup competes with media companies for the same audiences. Despite the many outbound links within the AI chatbot’s answers, Perplexity’s election hub was itself a destination on election night, and it didn’t require users to venture off the app to get all their information. It certainly seems like Perplexity was competing with media companies, who were also vying for eyeballs on election night, even though Perplexity collects its information from those outlets. Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas even claimed “record traffic” the day before and clearly hoped to maintain that momentum.
While Perplexity had deals with Democracy Works, the AP, and a few other media companies to power election features, the startup also indiscriminately used live election coverage from other media outlets such as CBS, CNN, and the BBC. Sure, Perplexity offered attribution, but the company hasn’t announced any revenue-sharing partnerships with these outlets and it’s unclear if any money changed hands.
How Perplexity fared on Election Night
First, let’s start with Perplexity’s election features that had nothing to do with generative AI: the charts.
People typically love visual election charts, clicking into them and seeing granular data on a state-by-state level. It was a smart move for Perplexity to build these out and ensured their AI systems were not the sole source of information in the app.
When visiting Perplexity’s election hub, users were met with a familiar-looking electoral map of the United States, with some states blue for Kamala Harris and others red for Donald Trump. Obviously, Perplexity didn’t reinvent the wheel with this feature — copying the display Google and every TV network shows — but they didn’t need to. Throughout the night, this map appeared to update every minute or so, reflecting the information on the Associated Press’ website. It was a good way to follow the election.
There were bugs in Perplexity’s map periodically throughout the night. Srinivas responded to users on X that were reporting flaws, such as Perplexity not reporting the percentage of votes that had been counted, and quickly addressed them.
Perplexity offered another familiar feature, a state-by-state tracker, giving real-time information about swing states.
Now for the AI part. When asked questions about the current state of the presidential race, Perplexity answered with hedged responses that still gave mostly accurate information. These answers weren’t as insightful as a commentator on CNN, nor as entertaining as The New York Times’ election needle (which made a comeback this year). However, Perplexity only showed a few small hallucinations and largely produced relevant facts in a timely manner. That’s more than I can say for any other AI chatbot on the market.
When trying to answer follow-up questions about Harris’ lead in “Blue Wall” states, Perplexity did hallucinate slightly. It was referencing polling data, when it should have been referencing real-time votes at this point in the night. However, the general information here was in the right ballpark, and other AI chatbots just wouldn’t answer this question.
Here’s another follow-up question we tried: What ballots have yet to be counted in swing states? It was hard to find an answer to this question elsewhere. Granted, the only useful answers here were for Pennsylvania and North Carolina, but at least Perplexity didn’t hallucinate for the other states.
This election was the first to feature AI chatbots as a source of information around our democratic processes. However, this will not be the last election where that’s the case. Well-funded AI startups are fighting to deliver information to people in new, faster, more concise ways. Accuracy will be key to success here moving forward. So far, Perplexity has the early lead.
Tech
Apple iOS 18.2 public beta arrives with new AI features, but some remain waitlisted
Apple has released the AI-powered version of its latest mobile operating system, iOS 18.2, to its public beta users. The update includes new features like an AI emoji generator app called Genmoji, an Image Playground AI image app, ChatGPT integration with Siri, and visual search using the iPhone 16 cameras, among other things. Previously, these features were only available to developers.
Though consumers can now get in line to try out the new AI features, there is a caveat to be aware of: some of them will require joining a waitlist for access.
Collectively, the AI features and tools coming to the new iPhone 16 and other supported devices are known as Apple Intelligence, which can be cleverly abbreviated as “AI” for short. The large language model-driven technologies promise users a smarter Siri, writing and proofreading assistance across apps, and image generation capabilities, among other things. Third-party developers will also be able to take advantage of Apple Intelligence features in their own apps — something that could ultimately prove to be Apple Intelligence’s most useful offering, if widely adopted.
For instance, users could ask Siri to show them information from inside their apps, or take action on something that appears on their screen. At Apple’s developer conference in June, the company said its AI technology would first be made available to specific categories of apps, including Books, Browsers, Cameras, Document readers, File management, Journals, Mail, Photos, Presentations, Spreadsheets, Whiteboards, and Word processors.
In the meantime, users will most likely want to try the features involving ChatGPT and image creation.
Image Playground introduces a standalone image-generation app where you can create new images via prompts. Genmoji offers a similar system for creating custom emojis. And Image Wand will be able to transform your rough sketches in your notes into AI-generated images.
With Siri, users can enable a new ChatGPT extension that gives Apple’s virtual assistant an expanded set of capabilities. For instance, you’ll be able to ask ChatGPT to help you write text, answer questions, create images, and more. If signed in, it can keep a history of your requests, too. Paid subscribers will also be able to use ChatGPT’s advanced capabilities their membership provides — a mutually beneficial deal for the companies where ChatGPT gets massive exposure via the iPhone installed base, while Apple gets a smarter Siri.
iPhone 16 users can also press the new Camera Control button to launch Visual Intelligence, a way to search and identify real-world objects and places through the camera lens.
Unfortunately for those who were itching to try Apple Intelligence, a waitlist for some features is still required. Apple Intelligence has to first be enabled (as it’s not turned on by default), then users will have to sign up for other image-creation features before access is granted. Apple has not said how long users will have to wait before gaining access, but it could be days or even weeks during this beta period.
In part, that’s due to AI safety concerns — already, users are designing NSFW emoji with Genmoji, for example — but it also gives Apple time to safely scale the features to its users.
Ahead of the iOS 18.2 release, Apple launched AI features including Writing Tools and notification summaries powered by Apple Intelligence in iOS 18.1, as well as debuted the new look for Siri, where the edges of the screen glow.
Alongside the iOS 18.2 beta, Apple also released the first public betas of iPadOS 18.2, macOS Sequoia 15.2, and tvOS 18.2.
Tech
OpenAI acquired Chat.com | TechCrunch
OpenAI bought Chat.com, adding to its collection of high-profile domain names.
As of this morning, Chat.com now redirects to OpenAI’s AI-powered chatbot, ChatGPT. An OpenAI spokesperson confirmed the acquisition via email.
Chat.com is one of the older domains on the web, having been registered in September 1996. Last year, it was reported that Hubspot co-founder and CTO Dharmesh Shah acquired Chat.com for $15.5 million, making it one of the top two all-time publicly reported domain sales.
The domain name doesn’t appear to have changed hands since it sold last year, indicating that OpenAI isn’t hosting ChatGPT on Chat.com — so this probably doesn’t represent a brand change.
-
Politics11 months ago
‘Status Symbol’: As Splinter Faction Claims to Be ‘Real JD(S)’, Is Party Headed Shiv Sena, AIADMK, NCP Way?
-
Politics1 year ago
Prime Minister Narendra Modi To Launch Projects Worth ₹21,500 crore In Poll Bound Telangana | News18
-
Press Release11 months ago
Google Chrome Launches A New AI Tool Named ‘Help Me Write’
-
Tech12 months ago
Andreessen Horowitz backs Civitai, a generative AI content marketplace with millions of users
-
Cryptocurrency1 year ago
Recent Funding Rounds for Crypto Projects & Companies on October 19th💼🚀
-
Tech1 year ago
Character.AI introduces group chats where people and multiple AIs can talk to each other
-
Cryptocurrency1 year ago
Recent Funding Rounds for Crypto Projects & Companies on Oct 18th🚀💰
-
Entertainment6 months ago
Why Brenda Edwards is wearing an eye patch on Loose Women