Satellite that will Harpoon Space Junk Begins Test Flight

space

The RemoveDEBRIS satellite was deployed from the International Space Station on June 20, 2018. This was the third major micro satellite deployment for NanoRacks (a Houston-based company coordinating RemoveDEBRIS’ deployment) and the largest satellite that has been deployed from the ISS.

RemoveDEBRIS is one of the world’s first attempts to address the build-up of space debris orbiting Earth.

Space.com reported that RemoveDEBRIS will demonstrate active space debris-removal technologies, including a harpoon, a net, and a drag sail.

The ground controllers will spend the next two months switching on all the satellite’s subsystems and checking that they work as designed, according to Guglielmo Aglietti, director of the Surrey Space Centre at the University of Surrey and principal investigator of the European Union-funded, 5.2-million- euro ($18.7 million) mission.

Experiments are expected to start in September. The debris-catching net equipment, which was developed by Airbus in Germany, will be conducted in October. The satellite will release a cubesat, let it drift away a small distance, and then eject the net to capture the cubesat.

In December, RemoveDEBRIS will test vision-based navigation technologies developed by Airbus in France. The satellite will use a set of 2D cameras and a 3D lidar technology to track a second cubesat as it floats away from the main satellite.

In February of 2019, RemoveDEBRIS will fire a harpoon into a panel that will deploy from the main spacecraft attached to a boom. Sometime in March 2019, RemoveDEBRIS will deploy a sail, which will speed up its deorbiting ability.

Facebook Introduced Groups for Admins

Facebook

Facebook has introduced a new feature to support group admins. Right now, Facebook is piloting subscriptions with a small number of groups.

Facebook says that group admins have said they are looking for ways to help them earn money to deepen engagement with their members and to continue to support their communities. Facebook states that many admins do this by creating an additional subscribers-only group alongside their existing group. Then, they rely on additional tools to track and collect payments.

Subscription groups were created to make it easier for admins to provide these experiences with built-in tools, and to save them time so they can focus on offering members-only content. For members, they’re now able to sign-up and manage their subscription through the Facebook app for iOS and Android.

Subscription groups align with the experience that Facebook made available to support video creators earlier this year, and is part of Facebook’s overall approach to helping creators and leaders to financially support the work they do to engage their fans and communities.

The subscription groups pilot is testing with a small number of groups across a range of interests who will share input and feedback along the way. They include: Grown and Flown Parents: College Admissions and Affordability (a dedicated college preparation group), and Meal Planning Central Premium (that includes weekly meal plans, shopping lists by preferred grocery store), and more.

World of Warcraft Welcome Back Weekend

Gaming,

Blizzard Entertainment is doing a World of Warcraft Welcome Back Weekend. Players who have inactive accounts can play World of Warcraft for free for a limited time. It’s a nice way to get players back into the game before the new Battle for Azeroth expansion arrives in August.

Battle for Azeroth is approaching fast, and everyone is needed back on the front lines. This weekend, we’re upgrading all inactive World of Warcraft accounts to grant returning players full access to the game and all of their characters – without a subscription – through June 24.

In the blog post, there is an asterisk next to the word “game”. Players are responsible for any online connection fees. Game access will be granted at the last expansion the player purchased, or the Warlords of Draenor expansion, whichever is greater.

This is interesting, because Warlords of Draenor is not the newest expansion. The most recent one is Legion, which will not be provided for players who have inactive accounts and who play for free this weekend.

This might be problematic for players whose old friends and guildmates stayed active and who finished the Warlords of Draenor content quite a while ago. They could still play together, but would have to do it in what some would consider old content.

In addition, Blizzard Entertainment is offering 25% off select game services. This includes:

  • Appearance Change
  • Character Transfer
  • Faction Change
  • Name Change
  • Race Change
  • Character Transfer / Faction Change Combo

The offer does not include a discount on Guild Services, WoW Token, Character Boost, pets, mounts, or transmog items.

Discord has Added the Games Tab

Gaming

Discord is used by a whole lot of people who enjoy playing video games. Pop into Discord, and you might see the name of the video game that a friend of yours is playing at that moment. Discord has added a new feature that lets you see what games all your friends are playing. It is called the Games tab.

The Games tab is your new home. It’s warm, cozy, and has all your Discord happenings in one place.

The Games tab will show you:

  • News about games you play
  • Launcher for games you play
  • What your friends are playing right now
  • What your friends recently played
  • Your friends’ Spotify listening parties, Twitch streams, and Xbox status

The Quick Launcher feature allows you quickly launch any game that has recently been played on your PC. The Quick Launcher feature does not appear in the Games tab if you are playing on a Mac (like me). It also is not designed to quickly launch console games.

The Now Playing feature will give you a quick view of what your friends are currently playing. Discord will automatically add anyone on your friends list who you chat with. Discord will also add users who you have talked to in voice chat recently, along with others from servers you chat on. You can also add friends.

Depending on the game being played you’ll get a quick view into who is taking part. If they are a member of one of your servers and in a voice channel, you’ll be able to quick jump over to the server so you can join in the conversation. If the game being played supports direct invites through Rich Presence, you can even join into the game right from that screen.

The Games tab will show you news about your favorite games, including the latest updates, patch notes, and clips.

If you are a Discord user who is located in the European Union, Discord will not automatically populate the Games tab for you. Instead, you will be asked via a pop up if you would like to add these features.

Discord users located anywhere else will automatically have these features enabled. The Discord blog post shows how to opt-out of them if you want to.

Google-Palooza! #1292

Podcast

Hello everyone, Todd is still away on vacation and will be back in the studio next week. On today’s episode on what’s going in the world of tech; the AT&T/Time Warner merger is a done deal and while Verizon recently has introduced another unlimited plan, AT&T is offering their latest unlimited plans.

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Pokémon GO will Include Trading and Gifting

Gaming

Pokémon GO will be adding three features that I think will make many players very happy. The new features are: Friends, Trading, and Gifting. The Trading feature seemed to be in the video that was released when Pokémon GO first launched. Soon, players will actually get to make trades with their friends.

We’re excited to share brand-new ways to interact with your friends on Pokémon GO! The Friends feature will start rolling out to Trainers later this week, allowing you to connect with your real-life friends and keep track of their adventures in Pokémon GO. You’ll be able to send them items, earn bonuses – and even trade Pokémon!

The way to add someone as a friend in-game is to ask them to share their Trainer Code with you. Enter that Trainer Code and then send the person a friend request. If they hit “accept”, they will appear on your Friend List.

Spin a Photo Disc at a Pokéstop or Gym and you have a chance of receiving a special Gift. You cannot open the gift yourself, though. Instead, you must sent that Gift to a friend who is on your Friend List. He or she will be able to open it.

The Gift comes with a postcard showing where you picked it up. It will contain helpful items. Some Gifts might contain an Egg that, when hatched, will contain an Alolan form of a Pokémon originally discovered in the Kanto region.

Trading can happen between two players who are on each other’s Friends List and who each are Trainer Level 10 or higher. You can trade a Pokémon you caught for a Pokémon your friend caught. Completing a trade earns you a bonus Candy for the Pokémon you traded away. That bonus can increase if the Pokémon you traded were caught in locations far apart from each other.

Trades are powered by Stardust. Build your Friendship Level with the friend you want to trade with, and you can complete the trade with much less Stardust.

E3 2018 #1291

Information

Hi everyone, Kirk here filling in for Todd while he is on a well deserved vacation for the next week and a half. He will back on Thursday June 28th.I got lot of tech news today to share and now my audio levels is sounding a lot better and will be going forward.

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Uber Scams #1290

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Uber has been figuring out how cybercriminals are scamming their them using GPS spoofing and a huge number of techniques to launder money from stolen credit cards. It is quite a fascinating read on what the cybercriminals have been doing. Ok, folks, you’re in Kirks hands for the next three shows. I have him trained up on Audio leveling so his shows should be dialed in Audio wise.

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Nintendo Announced Super Smash Bros. Ultimate at E3

Gaming,

Nintendo announced a new Super Smash Bros. game with new fighters, stages, and more at E3 2018. It will be released on December 7, 2018.

Legendary game worlds and fighters collide in the ultimate showdown – a new entry in the Super Smash Bros. series for the Nintendo Switch system! New fighters, like Inkling from the Splatoon series and Ridley from the Metroid series, make their Super Smash Bros. series debut alongside every Super Smash Bros. fighter in the series…EVER! Faster combat, new items, new attacks, new defensive options, and more will keep the battle raging whether you’re at home or on the go.


Features include:

  • A new game in the Super Smash Bros. series
  • New fighters, new stages, and every fighter ever featured in the series…EVER!
  • Inkling from the Splatoon series joins the roster
  • Ridley from the Metroid series also joins the fight
  • Returning fighters include Wolf, Ice Climbers, Pokémon Trainer and more
  • Elevate the Super Smash Bros. experience to new heights with faster combat, new attacks, new items, and new defensive positions
  • Hold a 4-player-free-for-all, or kick it up to 8-player battles. (Additional accessories may be required for multiplayer mode. Game, system, amiibo and some accessories sold separately.)
  • All current Super Smash Bros. series amiibo figures are supported.

The retail edition of Super Smash Bros.Ultimate can be preordered now. Players in the United States can purchase it from GameStop, Best Buy, Amazon, Walmart or Target. Each one has priced it at $59.99. Canadian players can preorder the game from Walmart for $79.96. The digital edition of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is “coming soon”.

Blizzard Steps Up Abusive Chat Penalties in Heroes of the Storm

Gaming,

Blizzard Entertainment, creator of Heroes of the Storm, announced they will be rolling out improvements to their reporting system for abusive chat. They will be changing the way they penalize repeat offenders by increasing the severity of the actions they take against their accounts.

Currently, players in Heroes of the Storm who are regularly reported for abusive chat incur a silence penalty that restricts them from chatting in-game and prevents them from playing Hero League for the penalty’s duration. Additional offenses result in increasingly longer silence penalty durations.

Blizzard feels that, in some cases, “silence penalties alone aren’t enough for repeat offenders to see the error in their ways and correct their behavior.”

As a result, we’re going to greatly reduce the number of silence penalties we apply to repeat offenders’ accounts. Instead, a player who returns to abusive behavior after their initial silences expire will begin incurring account suspensions. These suspensions will quickly ramp-up in duration and prevent them from playing Heroes of the Storm entirely. Players who prove they are incapable of – or unwilling to – improve their behavior after being warned, silenced, and suspended enough times will be permanently banned from the game.

In addition, Blizzard has already started implementing machine learning technology that further enhances their ability to validate and empower accurate player reports. They believe it has proven successful so far, and they plan to continue leveling-up and expanding their report validation process going forward.