Month: November 2017

Enlarge / An effigy of Laika inside a replica of satellite Sputnik II at the Central House of Aviation and Cosmonautics in Moscow. (credit: MLADEN ANTONOV/AFP/Getty Images)

After the Soviet rocket genius Sergei Korolev led that nation's space program masterfully in the 1950s, culminating with the launch of Sputnik 1 on October 4, 1957, one might have expected that the country would have taken time to celebrate his achievements. Thanks to Korolev, with that small, 60cm spherical satellite, the Soviet Union had just won the opening salvo of the Space Race.

But no. After Sputnik 1, when Korolev met with the Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, the premier wanted to press his advantage over the United States. "We never thought that you would launch a Sputnik before the Americans," Khrushchev told Korolev, according to cosmonaut Georgy Grechko. "But you did it. Now please launch something new in space for the next anniversary of our revolution."

That "something" would be a dog, a female dog. And she was very, very unlikely to survive the ordeal.

Enlarge / Kim Dotcom accompanied by his girlfriend Elizabeth-Donnelly appears in New Zealand's High Court on August 29, 2016 in Auckland, New Zealand. Dotcom and his law team are now challenging the extradition ruling against him. (credit: Dave Rowland/Getty Images)

Kim Dotcom and his ex-wife, Mona Dotcom, have settled an ongoing civil lawsuit filed against the New Zealand Police over the infamous January 2012 "military-style raid" of their Auckland-area mansion, according to Kim Dotcom’s attorney, Ira Rothken.

The California-based lawyer, who posted a two-page statement on his own website Thursday evening, Pacific Time, told Ars that the terms of the settlement were confidential. The raid was conducted just as American prosecutors unsealed criminal charges in January 2012 against Dotcom and his associates related to alleged copyright infringement against Dotcom and his now-shuttered company, Megaupload.

The Dotcoms had alleged "unreasonable conduct" during the raid, where New Zealand authorities, acting on the orders of American prosecutors, swept in to arrest him. The operation was replete with two police helicopters and was conducted the same day that an American criminal complaint was unsealed against Dotcom and his colleagues.

Enlarge / You wouldn't like Thor when he's electric. (credit: Marvel Studios)

For nearly a decade, the Marvel comic universe has flourished in film by striking a very gentle balance between serious and silly. Heart and sarcasm appear in equal measure between Marvel's many epic superhero fistfights. These films take no shame in laughing at their odd, over-serious origins—and do so with obvious love and reverence for their source material.

Yet there comes a time when even that kind of solid filmmaking starts to feel rote, and that's the unfortunate place Thor: Ragnarok lands. It's by no means a bad film, and it's more nimble, entertaining, and likable than Marvel's lesser-but-still-fine films of late (Ant Man, Avengers: Age of Ultron). In spite of solid performances, appreciably kooky content, and a few scene-stealers, this third Thor film ultimately feels disposable, as opposed to a full-of-stakes entry like Captain America: Civil War or a wow-that-was-fun blast like Spider-man: Homecoming.

Not just the god of hammers

Marvel Studios

Enlarge (credit: EFF)

Even spookier than a Halloween costume is a patent that just won't die.

But it looks like a once-scary patent—Personal Audio LLC's ridiculous claim to own podcasting—is finally gone. Personal Audio has been making headlines for years now, especially after it started threatening podcasters, and became the target of an EFF crowdfunding campaign to raise funds and knock it out.

EFF used that money to file an "inter partes review" at the US Patent Office, which knocked out the patent in 2015.