Month: December 2018

Enlarge (credit: CBS)

If anyone thought that Elon Musk had turned over a new leaf following a settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission over illegally manipulating Tesla's stock price, think again. On Sunday, CBS' 60 Minutes interviewed the Tesla CEO, which gave Musk an opportunity to let the world know exactly what he thinks about SEC. Spoiler alert: not much.

As you may recall, this all started in August, when Musk took to Twitter to tell his 23.6 million followers that he had secured funding to return Tesla to private ownership via way of an oblique drug reference.

Despite adding "Funding secured," it turned out there was in fact no such commitment. The resulting yo-yo effect on Tesla's stock price led to a deluge of complaints with the SEC from investors both short and long who lost money as a result, and it caused us to question whether or not Musk's presence at Tesla was actually a good thing for the company.

Enlarge / China launches Chang'e-4 lunar probe in the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in southwest China's Sichuan Province, Dec. 8, 2018. (credit: Xinhua/Jiang Hongjing via Getty Images)

Late last week, China launched an ambitious mission that will send a lander and rover to the far side of the Moon. This Chang'e-4 spacecraft represents a significant achievement for China, as no other nation has ever softly landed a rover on the side of the Moon facing away from Earth.

If successful, this mission will carry out several lines of important scientific research on the still somewhat unknown far side of the Moon. However, the launch and landing of Chang'e-4 also helps to reveal the full scope of China's spaceflight ambitions and how the space program furthers the country's ambitious geopolitical goals. In this post, we try to unpack some of the implications.

What happened?

On Saturday morning (local time in China) a Long March 3B rocket sent a 4-ton lander and a 140kg rover into space, and then this Chang'e-4 spacecraft performed a trans-lunar injection to send it flying toward the Moon. The spacecraft should reach lunar orbit on Wednesday.

As 2018 comes to a close, Stranger Things fans continue to wait (somewhat) patiently for season three. Netflix has a bunch of new hints about next season's adventures with a new teaser trailer that dropped Sunday and includes episode titles for the forthcoming season:

• Suzie, Do You Copy?
• The Mall Rats
• The Case of the Missing Lifeguard
• The Sauna Test
• The Source
• The Birthday
• The Bite
• The Battle of Starcourt

The episode titles play over the show's recognizable intro sequence, featuring that foreboding, electronic theme song that many have come to associate with the antics of Mike, Eleven, Steve, Nancy, and the rest of the gang in Hawkins, Indiana.

The final lines of the teaser tell us that "the adventure continues" in the summer of 1985, the time period in which most of the third season will likely take place. The teaser also confirms what has been rumored for some time: the third season will debut sometime in 2019.