Month: January 2024

Enlarge / The LISA project will consist of three spacecraft in a triangular configuration, exchanging lasers. (credit: EADS Astrium)

On Thursday, the European Space Agency's Science Programme Committee gave the go-ahead to the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna, or LISA project. This would mean the construction of the mission's three spacecraft could begin as early as a year from now. While the interferometer would follow the same basic principles as the ground-based LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) experiment that first detected gravitational waves, the hardware would be placed 2.5 million kilometers apart, making it sensitive to an entirely new range of astronomical phenomena.

Proven tech

Existing gravitational wave detectors rely on bouncing lasers back and forth between distant mirrors before recombining them to produce an interference pattern. Anything that alters the position of the mirrors—from the rumble of a large truck to the passing of gravitational waves—will change the interference pattern. Having detectors at distant sites helps us eliminate cases of local noise, allowing us to detect astronomical events.

The detectors we've built on Earth have successfully picked up gravitational waves generated by the mergers of compact objects like neutron stars and black holes. But their relatively compact size means that they can only capture high-frequency gravitational waves, which are only produced in the last few seconds before a merger takes place.

Enlarge / Is this Super Mario Kart or Where's Waldo? (credit: MrL314 / YouTube)

Here at Ars, we're big fans of emulators and ROM hacks that actually improve on the limitations of classic games in some way or another. Today, though, we've found ourselves enamored with a Super Mario Kart ROM patch that easily makes the game much, much worse.

Longtime Super Mario Kart hacker MrL314 calls Resident Evil Kart "the worst thing I have ever created," and it's not hard to see why. As implied by the title, the ROM patch replaces Super Mario Kart's usual over-the-shoulder tracking camera with something more akin to the awkward fixed-angle "perspective shots" of the original PlayStation 1 Resident Evil games. The perspective automatically jumps between these fixed cameras around the track as your racer moves from section to section, forcing you to judge turns and obstacles from very skewed angles.

MrL314 writes that the idea for this hack arose from time spent "researching how the camera system in Super Mario Kart works" as part of the development of the impressive-looking Super Mario Kart Deluxe. He first posted a concept video of the fixed camera system in SMK last July, before sharing an early prototype with his Patreon supporters.

Enlarge / The iPhone 15 lineup.

To comply with European Union regulations, Apple has introduced sweeping changes that make iOS and Apple's other operating systems more open. The changes are far-reaching and touch many parts of the user experience on the iPhone. They'll be coming as part of iOS 17.4 in March.

Apple will introduce "new APIs and tools that enable developers to offer their iOS apps for download from alternative app marketplaces," as well as a new framework and set of APIs that allow third parties to set up and manage those stores—essentially new forms of apps that can download other apps without going through the App Store. That includes the ability to manage updates for other developers' apps that are distributed through the marketplaces.

The company will also offer APIs and a new framework for third-party web browsers to use browser engines other than Safari's WebKit. Until now, browsers like Chrome and Firefox were still built on top of Apple's tech. They essentially were mobile Safari, but with bookmarks and other features tied to alternative desktop browsers.

Enlarge (credit: Axelle/Bauer-Griffin / Contributor | FilmMagic)

Fake AI images sexualizing Taylor Swift spread to X, formerly known as Twitter, from a Telegram group dedicated to sharing "abusive images of women," 404 Media reported.

These images began circulating online this week, quickly sparking mass outrage that may finally force a mainstream reckoning with harms caused by the spread of non-consensual deepfake pornography.

At least one member of the Telegram group claimed to be the source of some of the Swift images, posting in the channel that they didn't know if they "should feel flattered or upset that some of these Twitter stolen pics are my gen."

Enlarge / Blizzard shared this image teasing a now-cancelled game in 2022. (credit: Blizzard Entertainment/Twitter)

The survival game that Blizzard announced it was working on in January 2022 has reportedly been cancelled. The cut comes as Microsoft is slashing jobs a little over four months after closing its $69 billion Activision Blizzard acquisition.

Blizzard's game didn't have a title yet, but Blizzard said it would be for PC and console and introduce new stories and characters. In January 2022, Blizzard put out a call for workers to help build the game.

The game's axing was revealed today in an internal memo from Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer seen by publications including The Verge and CNBC that said:

Enlarge / A close-up view of Ingenuity on Mars, as seen by the Perseverance rover. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU)

Something has gone wrong with NASA's Ingenuity helicopter on the surface of Mars. Although the US space agency has not made any public announcements yet, a source told Ars that the plucky flying vehicle had an accident on its last flight and broke one of its blades. It will not fly anymore. (Shortly after this article was published, NASA confirmed the end of Ingenuity's mission).

When it launched to Mars more than three years ago, the small Ingenuity helicopter was an experimental mission, a challenge to NASA engineers to see if they could devise and build a vehicle that could make a powered flight on another world.

This was especially difficulty on Mars, which has a very thin atmosphere, with a pressure of less than 1 percent that of Earth's. The solution they landed on was a very light 4-lb helicopter with four blades. It was hoped that Ingenuity would make a handful of flights and provide NASA with some valuable testing data.