Month: October 2016

Enlarge / A home with a Tesla solar roof. (credit: Tesla)

UNIVERSAL STUDIOS, CA—On Friday evening Tesla officially announced an integrated solar roof and Powerwall product for individual use, which is most likely contingent on Tesla and SolarCity investors voting to approve Tesla's offer to buy the company in a $2.6 billion all-stock deal on November 17.

The company set up an elaborate "neighborhood" display on the Universal Studios lot in Los Angeles, unveiling several model homes with Tesla Powerwalls mounted on the side and a variety of custom roofs with tiles disguising photovoltaic cells.

"You really need to make solar panels as appealing as electric cars have become," Tesla CEO Elon Musk told a crowd of several hundred people as the sun set on the fake neighborhood. "The goal is to have a roof that’s less than the installed cost of a roof plus electricity."

Recently we got a peek at what the Army secretly thinks is coming next for humanity. This short, untitled film was leaked to The Intercept after being screened as part of an “Advanced Special Operations Combating Terrorism” course convened by Joint Special Operations University (JSOU). Originally made by the Army, it's about how troops will deal with megacities in the year 2030. What's surprising is that it acknowledges social problems that the US government usually ignores or denies.

Over at The Intercept, Nick Turse explains the film's provenance:

The video was used... for a lesson on “The Emerging Terrorism Threat.” JSOU is operated by U.S. Special Operations Command, the umbrella organization for America’s most elite troops... Lacking opening and closing credits, the provenance of “Megacities” was initially unclear, with SOCOM claiming the video was produced by JSOU, before indicating it was actually created by the Army. “It was made for an internal military audience to illuminate the challenges of operating in megacity environments,” Army spokesperson William Layer told The Intercept in an e-mail. “The video was privately produced pro bono in spring of 2014 based on ‘Megacities and the United States Army’... The producer of the film wishes to remain anonymous.”

Turse goes on to make fun of the film’s hyperbolic narrative and cheesy stock photos, which admittedly feel like a propaganda snippet from Starship Troopers. Despite the terrible delivery, however, the movie does some good science fiction world-building. The premise is that we’ve mastered urban warfare, but our tactics only work in late 20th-century cities. Megacities, which are usually defined as urban areas with more than 15 million people, will change the game. The movie explores what social life will be like in such places, especially after climate change has made them more dangerous and the separation between rich and poor has been magnified beyond belief.

Enlarge / The launch and landing of a SpaceX rocket on July 18, 2016. (credit: SpaceX)

Nearly two months after a September 1 accident on the launch pad, SpaceX says it is nearing the conclusion of its investigation. Although the company has yet to identify the "exact root cause" of the accident that occurred during a static fire test just prior to a planned launch of a communications satellite, the investigation has reached an "advanced state."

Shortly after the fiery incident, the company focused on a breach in the cryogenic helium system of the rocket's upper stage liquid oxygen tank. "Attention has continued to narrow to one of the three composite overwrapped pressure vessels (COPVs) inside the LOX tank," the company stated in an update released Friday afternoon. "Through extensive testing in Texas, SpaceX has shown that it can re-create a COPV failure entirely through helium loading conditions. These conditions are mainly affected by the temperature and pressure of the helium being loaded."

SpaceX intends to continue work to identify the precise cause of the accident and to improve its method of loading helium onto the rocket to prevent a repeat failure. The company also plans to resume testing Falcon 9 rocket stages at its facility in McGregor, Texas, soon. By taking this step in early November, SpaceX maintains that it is on track to resume flight operations of its Falcon 9 rocket before the end of 2016.

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Authorities said they arrested an 18-year-old iPhone app developer on charges of felony computer tampering after he unleashed code that threatened to take down emergency 911 systems in a large swath of Arizona and possibly other states.

Meetkumar Hiteshbhai Desai stands accused of publishing Web links that caused iPhones to repeatedly dial 911, according to a release published Thursday by Arizona's Maricopa County Sheriff's Office. On Tuesday night, officials alleged, the 911 system operated by the Surprise, Arizona, police department received more than 100 hang-up calls in a matter of minutes. The volume allegedly put authorities "in immediate danger of losing service to their switches." The emergency systems for nearby Peoria Police Department and the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office also received a large number of repeated calls. Agencies in California and Texas were also affected, authorities said.

(credit: @meetheindiankid)

The release said the 911-dialing code was hosted on a site with the name "Meet Desai." A link posted on the TheHackSpot YouTube channel and one or more Twitter accounts then encouraged people to click on the link. Authorities said they found evidence it had been clicked 1,849 times. In an e-mail, the operator of the YouTube channel said: "The link does not contain anything harmful, and I am not associated with any type of personal hacking. Just a fun prank that many other big YouTube channels covered as well."

Enlarge (credit: Kaléo)

Pharmaceutical company Kaléo will offer up an alternative epinephrine auto-injector to Mylan’s EpiPen starting in 2017, the company announced this week. Desire for such a rival has been high and widespread as patients and lawmakers have thoroughly lambasted Mylan for dramatically hiking the price of its life-saving device. But those seeking solace from the apparent greed of the pharmaceutical industry may not find it in Kaléo or its auto-injector, Auvi-Q.

Auvi-Q has been on the market before and, at times, actually had a higher price tag than Mylan’s EpiPen. Though Auvi-Q’s 2017 price has yet to be set, Kaléo’s drug-pricing track record is similar to Mylan’s. In the past few years, Kaléo has increased the price of a device used to reverse deadly opioid overdoses by more than 650 percent, in fact. And, just like Mylan, Turing, and others, Kaléo claimed that costumer assistance programs and discounts would keep high list prices from affecting patients—even though those high list prices can still help drive up overall costs of healthcare.

In an e-mail exchange with Ars, Mark Herzog, vice president of corporate affairs for Kaléo, would not answer direct questions about whether the company would help bring down the inflated costs of epinephrine auto-injectors. Instead, Herzog noted that the company is “working to engage with various stakeholders, including wholesalers, insurance companies, and pharmacy benefit managers, to implement a comprehensive access program for Auvi-Q.” The company’s intention, he added, is that “any patient who needs an epinephrine auto-injector, regardless of insurance coverage, should have affordable access to Auvi-Q.”

CEO of Comma.ai George “Geohot” Hotz speaks onstage during TechCrunch Disrupt SF 2016 at Pier 48 on September 13, 2016 in San Francisco, California. (Photo by Steve Jennings/Getty Images for TechCrunch) (credit: TechCrunch)

Autonomous driving company Comma.ai announced via its Twitter feed this morning that it would be canceling its forthcoming Comma One product. Comma One was supposed to bring after-market autonomy to third-party vehicles. The company was founded by hacker George Hotz (aka Geohot), who is credited as the first person to hack the iPhone. In his tweets under the Comma.ai account, Hotz said that he decided to discontinue production after he received a stern letter from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) requesting more information about how the product works and safety precautions built into the technology.

“First time I hear from them and they open with threats. No attempt at a dialog,” Hotz tweeted with a link to the NHTSA’s 10-page letter. “Would much rather spend my life building amazing tech than dealing with regulators and lawyers. It isn't worth it,” he added.

Finally, Hotz tweeted, “The comma one is cancelled. comma.ai will be exploring other products and markets. Hello from Shenzhen, China.”