Month: August 2019

A pizza delivery girl runs afoul of a wealthy socialite and her satanic cult in Satanic Panic, a new horror comedy from Director Chelsea Stardust. Yes, it's kind of a bonkers premise, but the trailer is a lot of fun, mining the same cheekily irreverent vein as the Happy Death Day films.

Samantha "Sam" Craft (Hayley Griffith) is a pizza delivery girl with regrets. She took this job for the tips, which turned out to be a bad business decision. "In four hours, my total earnings are an expired Applebees coupon and a sweater that smells like racism," she complains. But when an order comes in from the well-heeled enclave of Mill Basin, she takes on the job, even though its technically outside the joint's delivery zone—apparently on the assumption that she'll finally get a decent tip. What she gets instead is captured by a satanic cult in need of a virgin sacrifice so they can summon Baphomet, a demon from hell, thereby ensuring they stay rich and on top. "Death to the weak, wealth to the strong!" cult leader Danica Ross (Rebecca Romijn) declares.

Sam doesn't seem to be entirely without, er, allies. The skeevy, lecherous Samuel Ross (Jerry O'Connell) helpfully offers to deflower her to save her skin: "No virgin, no sacrifice. Let me protect you." Her best bet is Danica's rebellious daughter Judi (Ruby Modine), who warns, "My mom and her butt buddies are booty-calling Baphomet. And they're not gonna stop til you're strapped to a barbed wire altar." Sure, Danica and her acolytes have all the power, but Sam and Judi have youthful spunk and a keen desire to live. This being a comedy, I like their chances.

Enlarge / The Sega Genesis. (credit: Diego3336)

One of the great tech and gaming stories of a generation will be told on the small screen soon. Deadline reports that Blake Harris' 2014 non-fiction novel Console Wars will be adapted into a documentary and a short-run TV series, both of which will air on CBS All Access.

The book tells the behind-the-scenes story of the business and technological rivalry between the Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) video game consoles in the late '80s and early '90s. The story is told largely from Sega's perspective—specifically that of ex-Mattel CEO Tom Kalinske, who joined Sega's American division to lead pivotal moments in the Genesis' product lifecycle and rise to popularity.

The book is based on interviews with key players in the actual events, but it was written in a novel-like, narrative prose style. It proved popular with readers, though critics felt the author's prose writing style sometimes detracted from the story's impact.

Enlarge / An F/A-18 from VFA-151, "the Vigilantes." A similar aircraft from the squadron crashed on Wednesday flying through what aviation enthusiasts refer to as "Star Wars Canyon" in Death Valley, California. (credit: VFA-151, US Navy)

The US Navy has confirmed the death of a pilot in the crash of a Boeing F/A-18E Super Hornet in Death Valley National Park in California on Wednesday. The pilot, who has not yet been named, apparently crashed into the wall of what is known as "Star Wars Canyon"—an area frequently used by the Navy and other services for low-altitude flight training, adjacent to the Naval Air Weapons Station at China Lake. The area, called "Jedi Transition" by the military, is open to the public and is a hotspot for military aircraft photographers and enthusiasts because of how close aircraft pass when traversing the area. Seven onlookers suffered minor injuries as a result of the crash.

The Navy is waiting for notification of family members before releasing the pilot's name. Navy spokeswoman Lieutenant Commander Lydia Bock said in a press statement that the aircraft—from Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 151 ("the Vigilantes"), out of Naval Air Station Lemoore in California—crashed at about 10am PST on Wednesday. "The cause of the crash is under investigation," Bock said. At the time of the initial release, the status of the pilot was unknown, and search and rescue personnel were at the scene.

Star Wars Canyon, so named because of its proximity to an area used as the location for filming scenes on the fictional planet Tatooine in the original Star Wars film, has been used for low-level flight training by the services since the 1930s. When Death Valley became a national park in 1994, the military was given a waiver to continue to use the area for flight training. In 2010, the National Park Service installed railings along the canyon because of the popularity of the location for plane-watching. Like the Mach Loop in Wales, it is one of the few places where photographers can routinely take pictures of military aircraft from above as they fly past.

Enlarge / An Xfinity Mobile phone. (credit: Comcast)

Comcast's mobile division is now charging $20 a month extra to watch HD video on unlimited data plans.

Xfinity Mobile's unlimited data plan costs $45 per line per month, but video streams are generally limited to 480p resolution. Comcast yesterday announced a new $20-per-month HD Pass "for an upgrade to HD video resolution on Unlimited lines (720p on phone and 1080p on tablets)." That raises the monthly price to $65.

Xfinity Mobile does offer cheaper options with HD video if you don't need unlimited data. Comcast said it now allows HD streaming on its limited plans, which cost $12 a month for 1GB, $30 for 3GB, and $60 for 10GB. Comcast charges $12 for each additional gigabyte if you go over your limit. Comcast also now offers a "Data Saver" feature to limited-plan customers, which turns off HD streaming in order to reduce data usage.

Enlarge / Visually impaired consumers use screen readers, special input devices, and other technologies to access the internet—at least, on sites designed to accommodate it. (credit: zlikovec | Getty Images)

The shift toward using an app on your phone to place an order, instead of using your phone to call a place, has made life easier for millions of people. Unfortunately, that shift has the opposite effect on blind and visually impaired consumers, for whom thousands of websites and mobile apps are unusable. Domino's Pizza maintains one such site, and it's asking the Supreme Court to let the site stay that way.

Domino's made a legal filing called a writ of certiorari to the US Supreme Court last week—basically, an argument for why the nation's highest court should take its case. In the petition (PDF), Domino's asks the court to determine whether the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires a retailer's website or app to "satisfy discrete accessibility requirements with respect to individuals with disabilities."

"Websites and mobile apps do not become public accommodations simply by virtue of providing access to the goods and services of a brick-and-mortar enterprise," the pizza chain argues. The ADA "does not demand full accessibility for each and every means of accessing the goods or services a public accommodation provides to the public."

Enlarge / RIP, Amazon Dash. (credit: Amazon / Sam Machkovech)

Amazon's four-year dalliance with plastic "BUY! BUY! BUY!" buttons appears to finally be coming to a close.

The Amazon Dash line of physical, Internet-connected buttons, which allowed customers to purchase (usually for around $5 a pop) one-tap restocking of home staples like snacks, toiletries, and laundry supplies, will stop functioning altogether on August 31. This follows Amazon's decision to stop selling the buttons in February of this year, despite being so bullish about the concept that it was selling over 100 brands' worth of Dash buttons by 2016.

In a statement to Cnet, Amazon justified its plans by saying that consumer use of the devices "has significantly slowed" since the retailer stopped offering them as a buyable option. In addition, Amazon points to ways that consumers can exert even less energy to buy stuff, particularly via Internet-connected appliances that leverage Amazon's Dash Replenishment API to reup on supplies when a device suspects something is running low. (We're kind of sad that Amazon didn't just sell consumers a robot that would automatically trot up to your existing Dash buttons and tap them on your behalf, but, alas.) Meanwhile, if you really crave tapping a single, colorful button to get more boxes of macaroni and cheese, Amazon still offers a digital facsimile in the form of a virtual Dash Buttons interface from either Amazon's home page or shopping app.

• 

  This image was taken during the LightSail 2 sail deployment sequence on July 23, 2019 at 18:49 UTC. The sail is almost fully deployed here and appears warped near the edges due to the spacecraft's 185-degree fisheye camera lens.

For the last four decades, the Planetary Society has admirably sought to bring the people interested in space a little closer to the action, to give them a voice in space policy, and to advocate for more public spending on exploration. And the organization has also sought to become a part of the action—by flying its own missions. Now, it appears to have done just that.

On Wednesday, the organization co-founded by Carl Sagan in 1980 declared "mission success" for a small spacecraft launched on June 25 by a Falcon Heavy rocket, saying its small solar sail had raised the apogee of its orbit around Earth by 1.7km over the course of four days. "We completed its primary goal of demonstrating flight by light for CubeSats," said Bruce Betts, the LightSail 2 program manager and chief scientist at The Planetary Society.

A solar sail is a material in space with a bright, mirror like surface. When photons from the Sun hit the sail they do not have mass, but they do have momentum, which then transfers to the sail. If the sail is oriented properly, the continued bombardment by photons can move the sail. By changing the angle of the sail relative to the Sun, a solar sail can theoretically raise its orbit, and this was the test the Planetary Society set for itself with the LightSail 2 mission.