Month: March 2023
Rocket Report: ULA Centaur stage has an ‘anomaly,’ Virgin Orbit funding is dire
“This is why we thoroughly & rigorously exercise every possible condition on the ground.”
Enlarge / This otherworldly photo was taken of the debut launch of the Terran 1 rocket on March 23, 2023. (credit: Relativity Space/John Kraus)
Welcome to Edition 5.31 of the Rocket Report! We’re about to tip over into April, and all signs continue to point to the likelihood of a Starship orbital launch attempt this month. I’ve heard all sorts of dates, but most recently, SpaceX appears to be working internally toward April 10. That lines up with about when a launch license is expected from the Federal Aviation Administration.
It probably won’t happen that soon, but we are pretty darn close, y’all.
As always, we welcome reader submissions, and if you don’t want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets and a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.
The Future of Calendars: Predictions and Trends
We live in a world where online calendars are a part of our daily lives. No matter how diligently you use an online calendar, you’re still benefiting from it. For instance, you might be reminded to send a birthday card online, schedule events or business meetings, or block out your day. It is important to realize that
The post The Future of Calendars: Predictions and Trends appeared first on ReadWrite.
We live in a world where online calendars are a part of our daily lives. No matter how diligently you use an online calendar, you’re still benefiting from it. For instance, you might be reminded to send a birthday card online, schedule events or business meetings, or block out your day.
It is important to realize that online calendars are still a relatively new productivity tool that is rapidly developing. As a matter of fact, your online calendar is becoming more of a personal assistant that will advise you on how to spend your time best. But, there is so much more than calendars are capable of in the future, such as the following predictions and trends.
Solving scheduling problems.
“So far, it looks like the reinvention of the calendar will happen in two phases,” notes David Pierce for Protocol. “First, users will get access to a new set of tools, integrated with Google and Outlook calendars but opening up lots of new features.”
After that, calendars will be turned into a standalone service if they prove successful. In the same way, Slack is to email, Zoom is to a desk phone, and Airtable is to Excel, all these companies hope to be to your Outlook calendar, he adds. “Time is money, all these calendar companies will argue to investors and customers, and we’ll save you both.”
“We’re only at the beginning of the first phase, though, and still attacking the first problem worth solving: scheduling. How about one solution? It’s as simple as speeding up the process.
Superhuman, for example, scans emails for dates like “next Friday” and lets users send invitations accordingly. Scheduling is, in essence, an email problem. As a result, it should be available as an email solution as well. In a similar vein, Vimcal, often referred to as “Superhuman for calendars,” is a new app that focuses on speed, and CEO John Li said most people want meeting creation to happen lightning fast.
Calendar is another option if you want to speed up the scheduling process. The Find a Time feature in Calendar allows you to schedule with others quickly. Using multiple calendar users, create events based on their availability and see when they are busy.
Chatbots will be able to organize your meetings.
Professional life has become quite complicated following the pandemic. For example, working remotely from home isn’t as straightforward as it seems. Many of us find it hard to keep up with the increasing demands on our time.
At the same time, the number of American employees working remotely is expected to increase to 36.2 million by 2025. So, we’re going to have to get used to these new working conditions. Thankfully, technology can save the day.
The majority of the time, work involves scheduling meetings and being on time. In order to make your life easier, you can use a chatbot to help you set up meetings. Chatbots can still be useful as an additional meeting planning tool, such as SharePoint calendars.
You can also schedule meetings using Messagely or TARS. It is also beneficial to manage teams remotely and track their time by using a time tracker. It is possible to balance work and life with the help of these chatbots.
Chatbots and software powered by artificial intelligence also show great promise for helping businesses become more productive and profitable. For example, a phone validator app checks the validity, type of line, network carrier, location, etc., of the line to improve productivity.
These chatbots can handle scheduling and organizing meetings while you focus on other important tasks.
Calendars will become even more intelligent.
Smart calendars or intelligent calendars collect every schedule or action to boost productivity and simplify management using intelligence or automation. Using an intelligent calendar will help you establish boundaries between your personal and professional life.
As well as blocking time, you can reduce the time spent on certain tasks manually. Your ideal workweek can be automatically scheduled and managed using a smart calendar. Besides scheduling tasks, you can use an intelligent calendar to increase efficiency and reduce human dependency.
It goes without saying that an intelligent calendar can enhance productivity and save you time. In an effort to streamline meetings, increase event aggregation, and reduce time wastage, intelligent calendars have become a necessity due to the following:
Notes can be jotted down in the calendar to help keep track of important information and deadlines.
Synchronize your personal and work calendars.
It is possible to get information from smart notes that will help you determine what actions to take.
Organizes all your meeting invitations
From the app, you can get relevant information about the weather, traffic, and drive times.
With Motion, for example, you can always know what to do next. It creates a day-by-day schedule based on meetings, giving you a minute-by-minute overview. Trevor AI is another AI calendar app that helps you organize your day by keeping track of your lists of tasks to do; this AI calendar app puts one task at a time so that you work more efficiently.
Furthermore, Calendar can provide smart suggestions on when, where, and who to invite when scheduling meetings. It’s not magic. With artificial intelligence and machine learning, Calendar can create a unique scheduling experience for you.
Finally, intelligent calendars can help you become less distracted and more productive.
If you block out 8:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. in your calendar for undisturbed work, quiet time is from 8:30 am to 11:30 am. Your calendar will automatically block out this time instead of creating a recurring event.
During this time, you may find your calendar automatically disables distractions like email and social media notifications. It’s possible that your calendar will determine when you’re most productive as well. As such, if you fade out every 50 minutes, you’ll be reminded to stretch and take a break.
And, that’s just scratching the surface. Considering that the size of the global artificial intelligence market was $136.55 billion in 2022 and is projected to increase by 37.3% from 2023 to 2030, calendars will continue to become more and more intelligent.
The AR calendar will bring your calendar to life.
It’s true that some companies have been using augmented reality (AR) to make plain old paper calendars more interactive for the past several years.
As an example, once you download an app, you just need to point your phone at a calendar image and tap the screen. Using AR, Tengo Interactive created an airport calendar that provided users with a behind-the-scenes view. Other companies have created wall calendars that utilize augmented reality to explain their entire product range.
By 2028, the AR market is expected to reach $97.76 billion. Due to this, augmented reality calendars and marketing opportunities will continue to expand rapidly.
By using this technology, you will be able to walk through a property in virtual reality. From there, you might be able to make an appointment with the realtor if you like what you see.
If you are planning a trip to the Grand Canyon, you could experience the destination before booking the trip. Or, you could view local restaurants, salons, or museums. You then have the option to make reservations or book tickets and have them automatically added to your calendar.
Use ChatGPT prompts to manage your time.
On November 30, 2022, ChatGPT was launched, which quickly sent the internet into a frenzy. Just one week after it was launched, OpenAI’s chatbot reached 1 million users. It also gained 57 million users in its first month and is supported by Microsoft’s $10 billion investment in Open AI.
Still not impressed? After two months of launch, ChatGPT reached 100 million monthly active users, making it the world’s fastest-growing consumer app. And some people have even dubbed it “the best AI chatbot ever released to the general public.”
As a result, it would be remiss of us not to mention ChatGPT. Furthermore, the app deserves its own section due to its popularity.
But, what link is there between ChatGPT and calendars?
In particular, Chat GPT can help you locate open times on your calendar for dental appointments or team meetings. In order to fix this problem, you might write a prompt telling it what your schedule looks like for the week and ask for a reorganization.
As well as scheduling meetings and appointments, ChatGPT can keep track of deadlines and deliverables for event managers. ChatGPT’s natural language processing feature enables event managers to input their requirements and view their schedules on a calendar.
Some of your chores will be taken care of by your calendar.
“Online calendars aren’t merely more useful than their paper peers,” writes Howie Jones in a previous Calendar post. “Today’s top calendar apps can recognize and prevent double-bookings.” Others can adjust meetings across time zones.
But, over the next decade or so, how much more will online calendars be capable of?
“While I wouldn’t hold out for magically tackling your chores for you, there are many more online calendars will be able to do by 2030,” Howie adds. You may see the following upgrades:
Book travel.
As your calendar continues to evolve, your reservations will be made for you. How? Several popular online calendar apps will integrate airlines and hotel services. From the same app, you can decide when and where you want to go.
Scan and plan.
Let’s say that you walk past a flyer or a billboard advertising a local event. Rather than scanning down the information, why not let your calendar app copy it down for you?
Suggest nearby events.
You can use your mobile device’s location tools to find out where you are. Your calendar app will then show you all events within a specified radius when you choose the day and hour. As long as it knows your preferences, it won’t suggest a roller coaster park if you hate them.
Tend to your home.
Google Home and Alexa will soon be able to connect with your online calendar, so you can schedule actions for each device connected to your smart home network.
Maintain your vehicle.
Changing your car’s oil and rotating its tires should be done every few thousand miles. Using your calendar app, you can keep track of your mechanic visits and schedule future appointments. With the help of an app like Google Maps, it will alert you when you have reached your mileage threshold. The app will suggest a highly-rated mechanic if your current mechanic is unsatisfactory.
Published First on Calendar. Read Here.
Featured Image Credit: Photo by Samson Katt; Pexels; Thank you!
The post The Future of Calendars: Predictions and Trends appeared first on ReadWrite.
‘Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves’ Plays Like Your Best D&D Game
It’s all the chaos and delight of playing a campaign with your friends, but onscreen.
It’s all the chaos and delight of playing a campaign with your friends, but onscreen.
Virgin Orbit to cease all operations and lay off 85 percent of its workforce
Virgin Orbit was notable for launching its LauncherOne rocket from midair using Cosmic Girl, a converted Boeing 747. | Image: Virgin Orbit
Virgin Orbit, the satellite-launching subsidiary of Richard Branson’s Virgin Group, has announced that it will lay off 85 percent of its workforce and is ceasing operations “for the foreseeable future.” The company, which aimed to provide a more affordable option for launching small satellites into orbit, had been struggling to secure funding to stay afloat and compete with larger players in the private space industry like SpaceX and Blue Origin.
The news comes two months after its most recent mission in Cornwall, UK failed due to a dislodged rocket fuel filter.
Just 100 employees remain at Virgin Orbit, with 675 roles to be cut by April 3rd
According to a regulatory filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Virgin Orbit will end all operations immediately and lay off 675 positions across every department. Layoffs are expected to be complete by April 3rd, leaving just 100 employees remaining at the company. Virgin Orbit will pay approximately $15 million in severance payments and other costs related to winding down the business, paid for by a cash injection of $10.9 million from Branson’s investment arm, Virgin Investments (as reported by the Financial Times).
“Unfortunately, we’ve not been able to secure the funding to provide a clear path for this company. We have no choice but to implement immediate, dramatic, and extremely painful changes,” said Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart, according to meeting audio obtained by CNBC. Hart described the meeting as “probably the hardest all-hands that we’ve ever done in my life.”
On a very bad day for Virgin Orbit, revisiting one of their best moments: LauncherOne release from Cosmic Girl and main engine burn as part of the #LaunchDemo2 a couple of years ago pic.twitter.com/OJg1rw3yEl— Chris Combs (iterative design enjoyer) (@DrChrisCombs) March 30, 2023
The announcement comes two weeks after Virgin Orbit paused operations and furloughed nearly all its workforce on March 15th while the company attempted to secure additional investment. The satellite launch company disclosed an operating loss of $50.5 million in its last quarterly earnings report, and Branson’s Virgin Group has reportedly injected $60 million to keep the business afloat since November.
Virgin Orbit emerged as an offshoot of Branson’s space tourism company Virgin Galactic in 2017. Unlike rival companies like SpaceX that launch heavy rockets from the ground, Virgin Orbit launched its LauncherOne two-stage rocket from midair, carried to a height of 35,000 feet by a converted Boeing 747 dubbed Cosmic Girl. It has carried out six total missions since 2020, with four successful launches and two failures.
Virgin Orbit was notable for launching its LauncherOne rocket from midair using Cosmic Girl, a converted Boeing 747. | Image: Virgin Orbit
Virgin Orbit, the satellite-launching subsidiary of Richard Branson’s Virgin Group, has announced that it will lay off 85 percent of its workforce and is ceasing operations “for the foreseeable future.” The company, which aimed to provide a more affordable option for launching small satellites into orbit, had been struggling to secure funding to stay afloat and compete with larger players in the private space industry like SpaceX and Blue Origin.
The news comes two months after its most recent mission in Cornwall, UK failed due to a dislodged rocket fuel filter.
According to a regulatory filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Virgin Orbit will end all operations immediately and lay off 675 positions across every department. Layoffs are expected to be complete by April 3rd, leaving just 100 employees remaining at the company. Virgin Orbit will pay approximately $15 million in severance payments and other costs related to winding down the business, paid for by a cash injection of $10.9 million from Branson’s investment arm, Virgin Investments (as reported by the Financial Times).
“Unfortunately, we’ve not been able to secure the funding to provide a clear path for this company. We have no choice but to implement immediate, dramatic, and extremely painful changes,” said Virgin Orbit CEO Dan Hart, according to meeting audio obtained by CNBC. Hart described the meeting as “probably the hardest all-hands that we’ve ever done in my life.”
On a very bad day for Virgin Orbit, revisiting one of their best moments: LauncherOne release from Cosmic Girl and main engine burn as part of the #LaunchDemo2 a couple of years ago pic.twitter.com/OJg1rw3yEl
— Chris Combs (iterative design enjoyer) (@DrChrisCombs) March 30, 2023
The announcement comes two weeks after Virgin Orbit paused operations and furloughed nearly all its workforce on March 15th while the company attempted to secure additional investment. The satellite launch company disclosed an operating loss of $50.5 million in its last quarterly earnings report, and Branson’s Virgin Group has reportedly injected $60 million to keep the business afloat since November.
Virgin Orbit emerged as an offshoot of Branson’s space tourism company Virgin Galactic in 2017. Unlike rival companies like SpaceX that launch heavy rockets from the ground, Virgin Orbit launched its LauncherOne two-stage rocket from midair, carried to a height of 35,000 feet by a converted Boeing 747 dubbed Cosmic Girl. It has carried out six total missions since 2020, with four successful launches and two failures.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai promises Bard AI chatbot upgrades soon: ‘We clearly have more capable models’
Illustration: The Verge
Google CEO Sundar Pichai has responded to criticism of the company’s experimental AI chatbot Bard, promising that Google will be upgrading Bard soon.
“We clearly have more capable models,” Pichai said in an interview on The New York Times’ Hard Fork podcast. “Pretty soon, perhaps as this [podcast] goes live, we will be upgrading Bard to some of our more capable PaLM models, which will bring more capabilities; be it in reasoning, coding, it can answer maths questions better. So you will see progress over the course of next week.”
“In some ways I feel like we took a souped-up Civic and put it in a race with more powerful cars.”
Pichai noted that Bard is running on a “lightweight and efficient version of LaMDA,” an AI language model that focuses on delivering dialog. “In some ways I feel like we took a souped-up Civic and put it in a race with more powerful cars,” said Pichai. PaLM, by comparison, is a more recent language model; it’s larger in scale and Google claims it is more capable when dealing with tasks like common-sense reasoning and coding problems.
Bard was first released to public users on March 21st, but failed to garner the attention or acclaim won by OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Microsoft’s Bing chatbot. In The Verge’s own tests of these systems, we found that Bard was consistently less useful than its rivals. Like all general purpose chatbots it is able to respond to a wide range of questions, but its answers are generally less fluent and imaginative, and fail to draw on reliable data sources.
Pichai suggested that part of the reason for Bard’s limited capabilities was a sense of caution within Google. “To me, it was important to not put [out] a more capable model before we can fully make sure we can handle it well,” he said.
Pichai also confirmed that he was talking with Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin about the work (“Sergey has been hanging out with our engineers for a while now”) and that while he himself never issued the infamous “code red” to scramble development, there were probably people in the company who “sent emails saying there is a code red.”
Pichai also discussed concerns that development of AI is currently moving too fast and perhaps poses a threat to society. Many in the AI and tech communities have been warning about the dangerous race dynamic currently in play between companies including OpenAI, Microsoft, and Google. Earlier this week, an open letter signed by Elon Musk and top AI researchers called for a six month pause on the development of these AI systems.
“This is going to need a lot of debate, no-one knows all the answers.”
“In this area, I think it’s important to hear concerns,” said Pichai regarding the open letter calling for the pause. “And I think there is merit to be concerned about it … This is going to need a lot of debate, no-one knows all the answers, no one company can get it right.” He also said that “AI is too important an area not to regulate,” but suggested it was better to simply apply regulations in existing industries — like privacy regulations and regulations in healthcare — than create new laws to tackle AI specifically.
Some experts worry about immediate risks, like chatbots’ tendency to spread mistruths misinformation, while others warn about more existential threats; suggesting that these systems are so difficult to control that once they are connected to the wider web they could be used destructively. Some suggest that current programs are also drawing closer to what’s known as artificial generally intelligence, or AGI: systems that are as least as capable as a human across a wide range of tasks.
“It is so clear to me that these systems are going to be very, very capable, and so it almost doesn’t matter whether you’ve reached AGI or not,” said Pichai. “Can we have an AI system which can cause disinformation at scale? Yes. Is it AGI? It really doesn’t matter. Why do we need to worry about AI safety? Because you have to anticipate this and evolve to meet that moment.”
You can listen to the interview in full and read a transcript here.
Illustration: The Verge
Google CEO Sundar Pichai has responded to criticism of the company’s experimental AI chatbot Bard, promising that Google will be upgrading Bard soon.
“We clearly have more capable models,” Pichai said in an interview on The New York Times’ Hard Fork podcast. “Pretty soon, perhaps as this [podcast] goes live, we will be upgrading Bard to some of our more capable PaLM models, which will bring more capabilities; be it in reasoning, coding, it can answer maths questions better. So you will see progress over the course of next week.”
Pichai noted that Bard is running on a “lightweight and efficient version of LaMDA,” an AI language model that focuses on delivering dialog. “In some ways I feel like we took a souped-up Civic and put it in a race with more powerful cars,” said Pichai. PaLM, by comparison, is a more recent language model; it’s larger in scale and Google claims it is more capable when dealing with tasks like common-sense reasoning and coding problems.
Bard was first released to public users on March 21st, but failed to garner the attention or acclaim won by OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Microsoft’s Bing chatbot. In The Verge’s own tests of these systems, we found that Bard was consistently less useful than its rivals. Like all general purpose chatbots it is able to respond to a wide range of questions, but its answers are generally less fluent and imaginative, and fail to draw on reliable data sources.
Pichai suggested that part of the reason for Bard’s limited capabilities was a sense of caution within Google. “To me, it was important to not put [out] a more capable model before we can fully make sure we can handle it well,” he said.
Pichai also confirmed that he was talking with Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin about the work (“Sergey has been hanging out with our engineers for a while now”) and that while he himself never issued the infamous “code red” to scramble development, there were probably people in the company who “sent emails saying there is a code red.”
Pichai also discussed concerns that development of AI is currently moving too fast and perhaps poses a threat to society. Many in the AI and tech communities have been warning about the dangerous race dynamic currently in play between companies including OpenAI, Microsoft, and Google. Earlier this week, an open letter signed by Elon Musk and top AI researchers called for a six month pause on the development of these AI systems.
“In this area, I think it’s important to hear concerns,” said Pichai regarding the open letter calling for the pause. “And I think there is merit to be concerned about it … This is going to need a lot of debate, no-one knows all the answers, no one company can get it right.” He also said that “AI is too important an area not to regulate,” but suggested it was better to simply apply regulations in existing industries — like privacy regulations and regulations in healthcare — than create new laws to tackle AI specifically.
Some experts worry about immediate risks, like chatbots’ tendency to spread mistruths misinformation, while others warn about more existential threats; suggesting that these systems are so difficult to control that once they are connected to the wider web they could be used destructively. Some suggest that current programs are also drawing closer to what’s known as artificial generally intelligence, or AGI: systems that are as least as capable as a human across a wide range of tasks.
“It is so clear to me that these systems are going to be very, very capable, and so it almost doesn’t matter whether you’ve reached AGI or not,” said Pichai. “Can we have an AI system which can cause disinformation at scale? Yes. Is it AGI? It really doesn’t matter. Why do we need to worry about AI safety? Because you have to anticipate this and evolve to meet that moment.”
You can listen to the interview in full and read a transcript here.
Google AI will soon write the emails I can’t be bothered to send – and I can’t wait
Google has given access to the AI-enhanced versions of Gmail and Docs to a few users, and it looks exciting.
Google has now begun public testing of its generative AI features in Gmail and Docs for consumer, enterprise, and education users in the United States. The small group that has been invited by Google had to sign up in advance, with the choice to leave the program at any time.
The upgrade is designed to try and make the writing and drafting process easier in both applications, and allow users to have a little more assistance when crafting text. The generative AI can draft everything from job cover letters, to wedding invitations, or the introduction to a school project. Google will also provide an option to take what users have already written on their own and expand or summarise it.
Alongside that, Google will be introducing two new abilities ‘Formalize’ and a rather charming ‘I’m feeling lucky’ option that will add levity and a bit of whimsy (like emojis, for the less formal types out there). This is pretty neat, as it caters to the two types of writers out there: those who are a little too formal and need to lighten up, and those of us that are in fact way too casual and informal and sometimes need reining in. Guess which camp I’m in.
So far, Google has shared what the user interface looks like in Gmail for Android, and 9to5 Google spotted a floating action button that shows up in the bottom right corner of the screen that shows off the different options.
Opinion: Google has finally found its groove
In the same vein, the AI in Docs will make your text more detailed or rewrite it to become more concise, as well as draft blog posts and write song lyrics upon request. There’s a ‘Help me write’ button that will generate responses to your prompts and allow you to refine the generated responses (similar to the draft feature we noted in our Google Bard hands-on).
Google expects to expand availability ‘overtime’ and those interested (like myself) should monitor this landing page for updates and possible participation.
Overall this is a super exciting development for Google fans and shows that Google is taking steps to catch up in the AI integration race, and it seems like the company is taking the functionality over speed approach, which I appreciate. Google may have been slow and even dropped the ball here and there at the beginning of its AI journey but these upcoming updates do give us hope that they are finally on the right path and have a plan.
Personally, I’m excited to have a go at using the new – and hopefully improved – Google Workspace. Are you as excited as I am?