Innholdsfortegnelse for #524 i Techlife News

Shares of Rivian Automotive jumped in their debut Wednesday, rising as much as 53% as investors look for the next big winner in the electric vehicle market. The closing price of $100.73 gave Rivian a market value of about $85.9 billion, greater than that of Ford and just below General Motors. That’s noteworthy because Rivian has so far delivered about 150 of its electric pickup trucks to customers, mostly employees, whereas Ford and GM sell millions of cars globally each year. Ford is one of Rivian’s high-profile backers, having invested a half-billion dollars into the company in 2019. The other is Amazon, which held a 20% stake in Rivian ahead of the IPO. Rivian is aiming to take advantage of a growing appetite among consumers and investors for electric vehicles.…

A SpaceX rocket carried four astronauts into orbit Wednesday night, including the 600th person to reach space in 60 years. The repeatedly delayed flight occurred just two days after SpaceX brought four other astronauts home from the International Space Station. They should have been up there to welcome the newcomers, but NASA and SpaceX decided to switch the order based on Monday’s ideal recovery weather in the Gulf of Mexico and pulled it off. “It was a great ride, better than we imagined,” mission commander Raja Chari said shortly after the spacecraft reached orbit. The launch was just as riveting for spectators at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, as well as along the East Coast, as the Falcon rocket thundered through clouds on its way to space, turning night into day.…

When Mark Zuckerberg announced ambitious plans to build the “metaverse” — a virtual reality construct intended to supplant the internet, merge virtual life with real life and create endless new playgrounds for everyone — he promised that “you’re going to able to do almost anything you can imagine.” That might not be such a great idea. Zuckerberg, CEO of the company formerly known as Facebook, even renamed it Meta to underscore the significance of the effort. During his late October presentation, he effused about going to virtual concerts with your friends, fencing with holograms of Olympic athletes and — best of all — joining mixed-reality business meetings where some participants are physically present while others beam in from the metaverse as cartoony avatars. But it’s just as easy to imagine…

What would it be like to walk around the ancient religious sanctuary of Olympia when the Olympic Games were held? An unusual partnership between Microsoft and Greece’s Ministry of Culture and Sport is offering visitors the answer, launching an immersive tour Wednesday at one of the world’s major archaeological sites. The program at ancient Olympia harnesses augmented reality technology that designers say has the potential to transform education, business and entertainment. Critics warn it will extend the invasive power of U.S. tech giants. The culture ministry helped Microsoft map and build virtual representations at Olympia, a site used for nearly a thousand years to host the games in ancient Greece that served as the inspiration for the modern Olympics. “It’s a milestone ... that helped us bring technology and culture…

Introduced for 2021, the Volkswagen ID.4 is the German automaker’s first all-electric SUV and part of a new wave of electric vehicles for American consumers. It boasts a spacious interior and styling that’s futuristic but not too futuristic. The ID.4 is the upstart against two established rivals: the Tesla Model 3 and Model Y. The Model Y is an SUV but it’s considerably more expensive than the ID.4. As such, the popular Model 3 sedan, which is versatile in its own right, is an excellent yardstick to measure against. Experts compared the ID.4 and Model 3 to find out which one is the better buy. RANGE AND CHARGING On a full charge, the 2021 Volkswagen ID.4 delivers an EPA-estimated range of 240-260 miles depending on trim level. The base Tesla…

NASA is delaying putting astronauts back on the moon until 2025 at the earliest, missing the deadline set by the Trump administration. The space agency had been aiming for 2024 for the first moon landing by astronauts in a half-century. In announcing the delay Tuesday, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said Congress did not provide enough money to develop a landing system for its Artemis moon program. In addition, a legal challenge by Jeff Bezos’ rocket company, Blue Origin, stalled work on the Starship lunar lander under development by Elon Musk’s SpaceX. NASA is still targeting next February for the first test flight of its moon rocket, the Space Launch System, or SLS, with an Orion capsule. No one will be on board. Instead, astronauts will strap in for the second…

It’s official, the Netflix TV series “Squid Game” will be back for a season two, even though most TV shows in South Korea run for just one season. But due to the show’s global success, its creator and director said, “I almost feel like you leave us no choice.” “There’s been so much pressure, so much demand and so much love for a second season,” Hwang Dong-hyuk said at a red-carpet celebration for the show Monday night. “It’s in my head right now. I’m in the planning process currently. But I do think it’s too early to say when and how that’s going to happen. So I will promise you this, Gi-hun will be back and he’ll do something for the world,” explained Hwang. The series, starring Lee Jung-jae as…

For Erin Tridle and her boyfriend, it was love at first sight. They met while the American was traveling in France in the summer of 2019. They said, “I love you,” on day two. “People tell us it’s like something from a movie,” she said. When Tridle returned home to Los Angeles, they began a long-distance relationship, spending time together when they could. Then the pandemic hit, separating them indefinitely as countries locked down travel. “The uncertainty of not knowing when we would be together again was one of the hardest things I’ve even been through,”Tridle said. Travel restrictions that have upended lives will relax Monday, when new rules go into effect allowing air travel from previously restricted countries as long as the traveler has proof of vaccination and a…

On a field ringed by rolling green hills in Iceland, fans attached to metal structures that look like an industrial-sized Lego project are spinning. Their mission is to scrub the atmosphere by sucking carbon dioxide from the air and storing it safely underground. Just a few years ago, this technology, known as “direct air capture,” was seen by many as an unrealistic fantasy. But the technology has evolved to where people consider it a serious tool in fighting climate change. The Iceland plant, called Orca, is the largest such facility in the world, capturing about 4,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide per year. But compared to what the planet needs, the amount is tiny. Experts say 10 billion tons of carbon dioxide must be removed annually by mid-century. “Effectively, in…

After making a promise on Twitter, Tesla CEO Elon Musk has sold about 4.5 million shares of the electric car maker’s stock, raising over $5 billion. The sales, disclosed in 10 regulatory filings late Wednesday, amount to about 3% of Musk’s stake in the company. About $1.1 billion will go toward paying tax obligations for stock options granted to Musk in September. Last weekend, Musk said he would sell 10% of his holdings in the company, worth more than $20 billion, based on the results of a poll he conducted on Twitter. The sale tweets caused a sell off of the stock Monday and Tuesday, but it recovered some on Wednesday. The shares were up 2.6% to $1,096 in extended trading Wednesday, and they have risen more than 50% this…

The personal luxury market of high-end accessories, leather goods and apparel has snapped back to pre-pandemic levels as U.S. shoppers outspent those in China in pursuit of the latest fashion trends, according to a study released by the Bain consultancy. Global consumer spending on personal luxury goods, including the latest sneaker trend or design collaboration, is forecast to spike by 29% this year, to 283 billion euros ($325 billion). That’s a return to 2019 levels and a turnaround from the gloom of the 2020 pandemic lockdowns that shuttered stores and halted international travel. The recovery is expected to be supported by a strong holiday shopping season, Bain said. “We are pretty positive, even if the growth rate in particular in China has been slowing down since mid-August. But they are…

Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen warned that the “metaverse,” the all-encompassing virtual reality world at the heart of the social media giant’s growth strategy, will be addictive and rob people of yet more personal information while giving the embattled company another monopoly online. In an interview, Haugen said her former employer rushed to trumpet the metaverse recently because of the intense pressure it is facing after she revealed deep-seated problems at the company, in disclosures that have energized legislative and regulatory efforts around the world to crack down on Big Tech. “If you don’t like the conversation, you try to change the conversation,” the former productmanager-turned-whistleblower said. The documents she has turned over to authorities and her testimony to lawmakers have drawn global attention for providing insight into what Facebook may…

Congress has created a new requirement for automakers: Find a high-tech way to keep drunken people from driving cars. It’s one of the mandates along with a burst of new spending aimed at improving auto safety amid escalating road fatalities in the $1 trillion infrastructure package that President Joe Biden is expected to sign soon. Under the legislation, monitoring systems to stop intoxicated drivers would roll out in all new vehicles as early as 2026, after the Transportation Department assesses the best form of technology to install in millions of vehicles and automakers are given time to comply. In all, about $17 billion is allotted to road safety programs, the biggest increase in such funding in decades, according to the Eno Center for Transportation. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg says that…

Washington Gov. Jay Inslee has signed an executive order that seeks to move state government to an all-electric fleet of vehicles by 2035. The order, signed Nov. 3, requires the 24 executive branch agencies under Inslee’s control — including the Washington State Patrol and Department of Transportation — to buy battery-powered electric vehicles to replace passenger vehicles and light-duty trucks with internal combustion engines once they need to be replaced. The Herald of Everett reports that the order requires at least 40% of the fleet to be electric by 2025, 75% by 2030 and 100% by 2035. For medium and heavy-duty vehicles and trucks, Inslee wants to see 30% of those be electric by 2030 and 100% by 2040. When a battery-powered model is not available, agencies must acquire “the…

Look no further than TikTok and its pandemic-expanded ranks for unique holiday gifts, from the hot Halara athleisure dress to a miracle cleaning paste called The Pink Stuff, worthy of any neat freak’s Christmas stocking. The short-form video platform was a hit for millions during quarantine times, and the hashtag TikTokMadeMeBuyIt endures. The hashtag has been viewed more than 5.6 billion times, driving TikTok to boost its direct shopping tools. There’s something for everybody down that yellow brick road for the holidays. Try one of these: THE HALARA Nothing says viral quite like the sporty, ultra-popular Halara dress, specifically the tank-top version that comes in a range of colors and sizes up to 3X. It’s called the In My Feels Everyday Dress-Wannabe, and it includes attached shorts and handy pockets.…

The $1 trillion infrastructure plan that now goes to President Joe Biden to sign into law has money for roads, bridges, ports, rail transit, safe water, the power grid, broadband internet and more. The House passed the bipartisan plan and Biden said he will hold a signing ceremony when lawmakers return from a week’s recess. The new law promises to reach almost every corner of the country. It’s a historic investment that the president has compared to the building of the transcontinental railroad and Interstate Highway System. The White House is projecting that the investments will add, on average, about 2 million jobs per year over the coming decade. The bill cleared the House on a 228-206 vote, ending weeks of intraparty negotiations in which liberal Democrats insisted the legislation…

A top European Union court on Wednesday rejected Google’s appeal of a 2.4 billion euro ($2.8 billion) fine from regulators who found the tech giant abused its massive online reach by giving its own shopping recommendations an illegal advantage in search results. The European Commission, the 27-nation bloc’s top competition watchdog, punished Google in 2017 for unfairly directing visitors to its own shopping service, Google Shopping, to the detriment of competitors. The EU’s General Court dismissed Google’s appeal of that antitrust penalty and upheld the fine. “The General Court thus rules that, in reality, Google favors its own comparison shopping service over competing services, rather than a better result over another result,” it said in a press release. Google said it made changes in 2017 to comply with the European…

The federal government is suing Uber saying it discriminates against disabled people by charging fees when drivers have to wait for passengers to board their vehicles. Uber’s “wait time” fees kick in two minutes after a driver arrives, and are charged until the car begins its trip. According to the Department of Justice, Uber added the fees in a few cities in April 2016. Eventually, they spread nationwide. In its lawsuit, filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Northern California, the Justice Department says Uber is violating the Americans with Disabilities Act for failing to modify its fees for those who may need extra time to get into an Uber car. The lawsuit alleges that Uber charged the fees even when it was aware that a delay was disability-based. Uber…

Some world leaders and internet giants are expected to issue a global call to better protect children online during a Paris summit of about 30 heads of state and government, including U.S. Vice-President Kamala Harris, the French presidency said on Thursday. “Protecting our children and teenagers online means taking them away from inappropriate or dangerous content, from violence, hatred and pornography,”French President Emmanuel Macron tweeted. He called on states, organizations and companies to“make concrete commitments for 2022”on the occasion of the Paris Peace Forum. The Elysee said about 450 participants are expected at the three-day summit that opens Thursday, while 15,000 others will attend online. The summit brings together world leaders, CEOs, NGOs and others to discuss global issues such as climate, the COVID-19 pandemic and the digital transition. Macron…

Although our smartphones were already transforming the way we shopped and consumed, the COVID-19 pandemic undoubtedly served as rocket fuel for the delivery industry. Whether you want dinner or a brand new car delivered to your home address, there’s an app for that. OPERATION DELIVERY Most of us depended on apps like DoorDash and Amazon Prime to have dinner and goods delivered to our homes pre-pandemic, but 2020 changed the way we think about spending for good. At a time when consumers were asked to stay at home and avoid socializing, food delivery became a treat during huge uncertainty. The global food delivery market has grown to $150 billion and counting, tripling since 2017. And according to McKinsey & Company, the market more than doubled during the pandemic as more…

Cryptocurrency, the blockchain-based digital currency that has captured the interest of investors and financial service firms alike, has a challenging problem. It can be hard to actually spend this currency like you would regular money. But there are new services on the horizon that could help people use bitcoin and other digital coins in more mainstream ways for their day-to-day finances. Here’s a look at how to use these banking-style services for cryptocurrency, as well as their benefits and barriers. WHAT IS CRYPTOCURRENCY BANKING? The term cryptocurrency banking could be considered a misnomer, since the exchange companies and firms that offer these services aren’t technically banks, but it generally refers to the ways in which consumers can manage their cryptocurrency balances. At this stage, this kind of banking mostly just…

A U.S. survey of astronomers puts the search for extraterrestrial life at the top of their to-do list for the next 10 years. In a report by the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, astronomers stressed the need to continue the hunt for potentially habitable planets circling other stars, building on the “extraordinary progress” already made. The ultimate goal, they noted, is to capture pictures of any Earth-like worlds that might be out there. “Life on Earth may be the result of a common process, or it may require such an unusual set of circumstances that we are the only living beings within our part of the galaxy, or even in the universe. Either answer is profound,” the report stated. “The coming decades will set humanity down a path…

Tom Hanks doesn’t need a human or even a sentient acting partner to make a film or a scene sing. Think Wilson the volleyball, Hooch and even that laptop from “You’ve Got Mail.” So it’s not at all surprising if he’s the first guy on the list for your post-apocalyptic film about a man, a robot and a dog. Even less surprising is that Hanks delivers in “ Finch,” playing a robotics engineer who is dying from radiation exposure and desperately trying to make sure his dog will be taken care of when he’s gone. It’s the kind of premise that’s been designed to pull at your heartstrings. Dying Tom Hanks and a cute pup? It’s impossible to resist. And yet somehow it doesn’t work as the epic it would…

More than a year and a half after COVID-19 concerns prompted the U.S. to close its borders to international travelers from countries including Brazil, China, India, South Africa, the United Kingdom and much of Europe, restrictions are shifting to focus on vaccine status. Bans on travel from specific countries are over. The U.S. will allow in international travelers, but they must be vaccinated — with a few exceptions. The U.S. is also reopening the land borders with Canada and Mexico for vaccinated people. Most trips from Canada and Mexico to the U.S. are by land rather than air. Here are some questions and answers about the changes: WHY ARE THESE CHANGES HAPPENING? The goal is to restore more normal travel while limiting the spread of COVID-19, the government says. The…

European lawmakers have pioneered efforts to rein in big technology companies and are working to strengthen those rules, putting them ahead of the United States and other parts of world that have been slower to regulate Facebook and other social media giants facing increasing blowback over misinformation and other harmful content that can proliferate on their platforms. While Europe shares Western democratic values with the U.S., none of the big tech companies — Facebook, Twitter, Google — that dominate online life are based on the continent, which some say allowed European officials to make a more clear-eyed assessment of the risks posed by tech companies largely headquartered in Silicon Valley or elsewhere in the U.S. But that’s only part of the explanation, said Jan Penfrat, senior policy adviser at digital…