Month: November 2022

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images | NurPhoto)

Twitter won't restore banned accounts until after next week's midterm election, Elon Musk wrote in a tweet early on Wednesday. That means former President Donald Trump and others banned by the pre-Musk Twitter won't be allowed back just yet.

"Twitter will not allow anyone who was de-platformed for violating Twitter rules back on platform until we have a clear process for doing so, which will take at least a few more weeks," Musk wrote. "Twitter's content moderation council will include representatives with widely divergent views, which will certainly include the civil rights community and groups who face hate-fueled violence."

Twitter banned Trump after the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol, explaining that "we have permanently suspended the account due to the risk of further incitement of violence." Musk said in May that Twitter's decision to ban Trump was "morally wrong and flat-out stupid" and that he would reverse the ban if he completed his then-pending acquisition of Twitter. He also said that "permanent bans should be extremely rare and really reserved for accounts that are bots or spam."

Enlarge / Say so long to the original PSVR's glowing blue lights. (credit: PlayStation Blog)

Sony's PlayStation VR2 headset will cost $550 in the US when it launches on February 22, 2023, almost exactly two years after the headset was first announced.

The $550 package will come bundled with two tracked, handheld "PS VR2 Sense" controllers and stereo headphones, Sony announced in a blog post Wednesday morning. A $600 bundle will include the VR-exclusive Horizon Call of the Mountain.

On the surface, $550 seems like a sizable increase over the $400 asking price for the original PlayStation VR back in late 2016. But that comparison is a bit misleading. First, $400 in October of 2016 is worth the same as about $490 in today's dollars when accounting for inflation. Second, the original PlayStation VR required a tracking camera and two PlayStation Move controllers to control many games.

A multiplicity of Raptor rocket engines installed on a Super Heavy booster. (credit: Elon Musk/Twitter)

A senior NASA official said this week that SpaceX has done "very well" in working toward the development of a vehicle to land humans on the surface of the Moon, taking steps to address two of the space agency's biggest concerns.

NASA selected SpaceX and Starship for its Human Landing System in April 2021. In some ways, this was the riskiest choice of NASA's options because Starship is a very large and technically advanced vehicle. However, because of the company's self-investment of billions of dollars into the project, SpaceX submitted the lowest bid, and from its previous work with SpaceX, NASA had confidence that the company would ultimately deliver.

Two of NASA's biggest technological development concerns were the new Raptor rocket engine and the transfer and storage of liquid oxygen and methane propellant in orbit, said Mark Kirasich, NASA's deputy associate administrator who oversees the development of Artemis missions to the Moon. During a subcommittee meeting of NASA's Advisory Council on Monday, however, Kirasich said SpaceX has made substantial progress in both areas.

A multiplicity of Raptor rocket engines installed on a Super Heavy booster. (credit: Elon Musk/Twitter)

A senior NASA official said this week that SpaceX has done "very well" in working toward the development of a vehicle to land humans on the surface of the Moon, taking steps to address two of the space agency's biggest concerns.

NASA selected SpaceX and Starship for its Human Landing System in April 2021. In some ways, this was the riskiest choice of NASA's options because Starship is a very large and technically advanced vehicle. However, because of the company's self-investment of billions of dollars into the project, SpaceX submitted the lowest bid, and from its previous work with SpaceX, NASA had confidence that the company would ultimately deliver.

Two of NASA's biggest technological development concerns were the new Raptor rocket engine and the transfer and storage of liquid oxygen and methane propellant in orbit, said Mark Kirasich, NASA's deputy associate administrator who oversees the development of Artemis missions to the Moon. During a subcommittee meeting of NASA's Advisory Council on Monday, however, Kirasich said SpaceX has made substantial progress in both areas.