Month: May 2022

Enlarge / Can AstroForge succeed where other space mining companies have failed? (credit: AstroForge)

Asteroid mining was all the rage nearly a decade ago. In 2012 several billionaire entrepreneurs founded a company called Planetary Resources with the goal of harvesting water from asteroids and selling it as propellant at in-space fuel depots. A year later, another group of investors founded Deep Space Industries to harvest rare metals from asteroids.

While it seemed like the era of space mining had dawned, these commercial efforts were soon eclipsed by a harsh reality—by 2019 both companies effectively no longer existed. Neither could overcome the significant obstacles of building spacecraft capable of traveling into deep space, let alone examining asteroids and mining them for materials. Beyond the technical challenges, each of these projects also required a huge outlay of funding ahead of any profit that lay years, if not decades, into the future.

Now, a new challenger, AstroForge, has entered the arena with the goal of mining platinum on asteroids and selling it on Earth. The founders of the company, Jose Acain and Matt Gialich, said in an interview they were well aware of the challenges of deep space mining when starting AstroForge earlier this year.

Enlarge / iRobot Roomba j7+ robot vacuum. (credit: iRobot)

Roomba launched the iRobot OS on Tuesday to signal its robotic household cleaners' advanced software capabilities. As of writing, it only rebrands the two-year-old Genius Home Intelligence AI platform, but the company aims for it to be a leading computer vision platform that differentiates its robot vacuums and mops and eventually moves to other products, like air purifiers.

iRobot OS doesn't include any new features yet but represents iRobot's focus on "superior software intelligence," Colin Angle, chairman and CEO of iRobot, said in a statement shared in Roomba's announcement.

As it stands, Roomba's iRobot OS-powered devices use computer vision to avoid, depending on the product, up to 80 "common objects," like cords, socks, and, oh so importantly, animal waste. The OS is pet-friendly by including features like "Keep Out Zones" so your dog doesn't start a fight with your robo vac when it's around the food bowl. It can also recommend cleaning schedules, including based on when your furry friend tends to shed. If you want to see all that iRobot OS offers, the strongest iteration is the Roomba J7-series. The device came out in September and uses a front-facing camera with computer vision to better understand its environment's layout than any other iRobot robot.

Enlarge / What's in the box? (credit: Getty / Aurich Lawson)

Blizzard's upcoming open beta launch of Diablo Immortal later this week will be skipping the Netherlands and Belgium, thanks to regulations in those countries that consider games with randomized loot boxes to be illegal gambling.

"Diablo Immortal will not be available in Belgium or the Netherlands, and will not appear on Battle.net or the Belgian and Netherlands App or Google Play Stores," an Activision Blizzard spokesperson told Eurogamer over the weekend. "This is related to the current operating environment for games in those countries. Accordingly, pre-registrations for the game are not accessible in those markets."

Activision Blizzard had reportedly let Belgian and Dutch players preregister for the game's public beta test and listed the game briefly on mobile app stores in both countries. But the company quietly changed course in recent months, as Dutch gaming news site Tweakers noticed over the weekend.