Author name: Paul Patrick

discord-terrorist-known-as-“rabid”-gets-30-years-for-preying-on-kids

Discord terrorist known as “Rabid” gets 30 years for preying on kids

child sexual abuse materials, cyber terrorism, discord, online child safety, Policy, Terrorism / /

Densmore likely motivated by fame

Online, Densmore was known in so-called “Sewer” communities under the alias “Rabid.” During their investigation, the FBI found that Densmore kept a collection of “child pornography and bloody images of ‘Rabid,’ ‘Sewer,’ and ‘764’ carved into victims’ limbs, in some cases with razor blades and boxcutters nearby.” He also sexually exploited children, the DOJ said, including paying another 764 member to coerce a young girl to send a nude video with “Rabid” written on her chest. Gaining attention for his livestreams, he would threaten to release the coerced abusive images if kids did not participate “on cam,” the DOJ said.

“I have all your information,” Densmore threatened one victim. “I own you …. You do what I say now, kitten.”

In a speech Thursday, Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen described 764 as a terrorist network working “to normalize and weaponize the possession, production, and distribution of child sexual abuse material and other types of graphic and violent material” online. Ultimately, by attacking children, the group wants to “destroy civil society” and “collapse the US government,” Olsen said.

People like Densmore, Olsen said, join 764 to inflate their “own sense of fame,” with many having “an end-goal of forcing their victims to commit suicide on livestream for the 764 network’s entertainment.”

In the DOJ’s press release, the FBI warned parents and caregivers to pay attention to their kids’ activity both online and off. In addition to watching out for behavioral shifts or signs of self-harm, caregivers should also take note of any suspicious packages arriving, as 764 sometimes ships kids “razor blades, sexual devices, gifts, and other materials to use in creating online content.” Parents should also encourage kids to discuss online activity, especially if they feel threatened.

“If you are worried about someone who might be self-harming or is at risk of suicide, please consult a health care professional or call 911 in the event of an immediate threat,” the DOJ said.

If you or someone you know is feeling suicidal or in distress, please call the Suicide Prevention Lifeline number, 1-800-273-TALK (8255), which will put you in touch with a local crisis center.

Discord terrorist known as “Rabid” gets 30 years for preying on kids Read More »

the-next-starship-launch-may-occur-in-less-than-two-weeks

The next Starship launch may occur in less than two weeks

raptor, Science, Space, starship, test flight / /

The company will also use Starship’s next flight to assess new tiles and other elements of the vehicle’s heat shield.

“Several thermal protection experiments and operational changes will test the limits of Starship’s capabilities and generate flight data to inform plans for ship catch and reuse,” the company’s statement said. “The flight test will assess new secondary thermal protection materials and will have entire sections of heat shield tiles removed on either side of the ship in locations being studied for catch-enabling hardware on future vehicles. The ship also will intentionally fly at a higher angle of attack in the final phase of descent, purposefully stressing the limits of flap control to gain data on future landing profiles.”

Final flight of the first Starship

The five previous flights of Starship, dating back to April 2023, have all launched near dawn from South Texas. For the upcoming mission, the company will look for a late-afternoon launch window, which will allow the vehicle to reenter during daylight into the Indian Ocean.

SpaceX’s update also confirms that this will be the last flight of the initial version of the Starship vehicle, with the next generation including redesigned forward flaps, larger propellant tanks, and newer tiles and secondary thermal protection layers.

Reaching a near-monthly cadence of Starship flights during only the second year of the vehicle’s operation is impressive, but it’s also essential if SpaceX wants to unlock the full potential of a rocket that needs multiple refueling launches to support Starship missions to the Moon or Mars.

Wednesday’s announcement comes the day after the US presidential election in which Donald Trump was given a second term by American voters, and it is notable that he was assisted in this through an all-out effort by SpaceX founder Elon Musk.

Musk’s interventions in politics were highly controversial and alienated a significant segment of the US population and political class. Nevertheless Musk’s gambit paid off, as the election of Trump will now likely accelerate Starship’s development and increase its centrality to the nation’s space exploration endeavors.

However, the timing of this launch announcement is likely coincidental, as SpaceX did not need formal regulatory approval to move ahead with this sixth attempt—it was almost entirely dependent on the readiness of the company’s hardware, software, and ground systems.

The next Starship launch may occur in less than two weeks Read More »

corning-faces-antitrust-actions-for-its-gorilla-glass-dominance

Corning faces antitrust actions for its Gorilla Glass dominance

antitrust, Apple, Biz & IT, Corning, European Commission, Gorilla Glass, IPhone, Tech / /

The European Commission (EC) has opened an antitrust investigation into US-based glass-maker Corning, claiming that its Gorilla Glass has dominated the mobile phone screen market due to restrictive deals and licensing.

Corning’s shatter-resistant alkali-aluminosilicate glass keeps its place atop the market, according to the EC’s announcement, because it both demands, and rewards with rebates, device makers that agree to “source all or nearly all of their (Gorilla Glass) demand from Corning.” Corning also allegedly required device makers to report competitive offers to the glass maker. The company is accused of exerting a similar pressure on “finishers,” or those firms that turn raw glass into finished phone screen protectors, as well as demanding finishers not pursue patent challenges against Corning.

“[T]he agreements that Corning put in place with OEMs and finishers may have excluded rival glass producers from large segments of the market, thereby reducing customer choice, increasing prices, and stifling innovation to the detriment of consumers worldwide,” the Commission wrote.

Ars has reached out to Corning for comment and will update this post with response.

Gorilla Glass does approach Xerox or Kleenex levels of brand name association with its function. New iterations of its thin, durable glass reach a bit further than the last and routinely pick up press coverage. Gorilla Glass 4 was pitched as being “up to two times stronger” than any “competitive” alternative. Gorilla Glass 5 could survive a 1.6-meter drop 80 percent of the time, and 6 built in more repetitive damage resistance.

Apple considers Corning’s glass products so essential to its products, like the ceramic shield on the iPhone 12, as to have invested $45 million into the company to expand its US manufacturing. The first iPhone was changed very shortly before launch to use Gorilla Glass instead of a plastic screen, per Steve Jobs’ insistence.

Corning faces antitrust actions for its Gorilla Glass dominance Read More »

the-ps5-pro’s-biggest-problem-is-that-the-ps5-is-already-very-good

The PS5 Pro’s biggest problem is that the PS5 is already very good

Features, gaming / /

For $700, I was hoping for a much larger leap in visual impact.

The racing stripe makes it faster. Credit: Kyle Orland

In many ways, the timing of Sony’s 2016 launch of the PS4 Pro couldn’t have been better. The slightly upgraded version of 2013’s PlayStation 4 came at a time when a wave of 4K TVs was just beginning to crest in the form of tens of millions of annual sales in the US.

Purchasing Sony’s first-ever “mid-generation” console upgrade in 2016 didn’t give original PS4 owners access to any new games, a fact that contributed to us calling the PS4 Pro “a questionable value proposition” when it launched. Still, many graphics-conscious console gamers were looking for an excuse to use the extra pixels and HDR colors on their new 4K TVs, and spending hundreds of dollars on a stopgap console years before the PS5 served that purpose well enough.

Fast-forward to today and the PS5 Pro faces an even weaker value proposition. The PS5, after all, has proven more than capable of creating excellent-looking games that take full advantage of the 4K TVs that are now practically standard in American homes. With 8K TVs still an extremely small market niche, there isn’t anything akin to what Sony’s Mike Somerset called “the most significant picture-quality increase probably since black and white went to color” when talking about 4K TV in 2016.

Front view of the PS5 Pro. Note the complete lack of a built-in disc drive on the only model available. Kyle Orland

Instead, Sony says that spending $700 on a PS5 Pro has a decidedly more marginal impact—namely, helping current PS5 gamers avoid having to choose between the smooth, 60 fps visuals of “Performance” mode and the resolution-maximizing, graphical effects-laden “Fidelity” mode in many games. The extra power of the PS5 Pro, Sony says, will let you have the best of both worlds: full 4K, ray-traced graphics and 60 fps at the same time.

While there’s nothing precisely wrong with this value proposition, there’s a severe case of diminishing returns that comes into play here. The graphical improvements between a “Performance mode” PS5 game and a “Performance Pro mode” PS5 game are small enough, in fact, that I often found it hard to reliably tell at a glance which was which.

Is it just me, or does the Ps5 Pro look like a goofy puppet from this angle? The sloped mouth, the PS logo eye… you see it, right? Kyle Orland

The biggest problem with the PS5 Pro, in other words, is that the original PS5 is already too good.

Smooth operator

In announcing the PS5 Pro in September, Sony’s Mark Cerny mentioned that roughly three-quarters of PS5 owners opt for Performance mode over Fidelity mode when offered the choice on a stock PS5. It’s not hard to see why. Research shows that the vast majority of people can detect a distinct decrease in flickering or juddery animation when the frames-per-second counter is cranked up from (Fidelity mode’s) 30 fps to (Performance mode’s) 60 fps.

The extra visual smoothness is especially important in any reflex-heavy game, where every millisecond of reaction time between your eyes and your thumbs can have a dramatic impact. That reaction advantage can extend well past 60 fps, as PC gamers know all too well.

But the other reason that Performance mode is so overwhelmingly popular among PS5 players, I’d argue, is that you don’t really have to give up too much to get that frame rate-doubling boost. In most games, hopping from Fidelity mode to Performance means giving up a steady 4K image for either a (nicely upscaled) 1440p image or “Dynamic 4K” resolution (i.e., 4K that sometimes temporarily drops down lower to maintain frame rates). While some gamers swear that this difference is important to a game’s overall visual impact, most players will likely struggle to even notice that resolution dip unless they’re sitting incredibly close to a very large screen.

For the PS5 Pro, Sony is marketing “PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution,” its buzzword for an AI-driven upscaling feature that adds further clarity and detail to scenes. Sony’s original announcement of “Super Resolution” heavily used zoomed-in footage to highlight the impact of this feature on distant details. That’s likely because without that level of zoom, the effect of this resolution bump is practically unnoticeable.

Tracing those rays

The other visual upgrade often inherent in a PS5 game’s Fidelity mode is support for ray-tracing, wherein the system tracks individual light rays for more accurate reflections and light scattering off of simulated objects. Having ray-tracing enabled can sometimes lead to striking visual moments, such as when you see Spider-Man’s every move reflected in the mirrored windows of a nearby skyscraper. But as we noted in our initial PS5 review, the effect is usually a much subtler tweak to the overall “realism” of how objects come across in a scene.

Having those kind of ray-traced images at a full 60 fps is definitely nice, but the impact tends to be muted unless a scene has a lot of highly reflective objects. Even the “Fidelity Pro” mode in some PS5 Pro games—which scales the frame rate back to 30 fps to allow for the ray-tracing algorithm to model more reflections and more accurate occlusion and shadows—doesn’t create very many “wow” moments over a standard PS5 in moment-to-moment gameplay.

On the original PS5, I never hesitated to give up the (often marginal) fidelity improvements in favor of a much smoother frame rate. Getting that slightly improved fidelity on the PS5 Pro—without having to give up my beloved 60 fps—is definitely nice, but it’s far from an exciting new frontier in graphical impact.

Which is which?

When testing the PS5 Pro for this review, I had my original PS5 plugged into a secondary input on the same TV, running the same games consecutively. I’d play a section of a game in Pro mode on the PS5 Pro, then immediately switch to the PS5 running the same game in Performance mode (or vice versa). Sitting roughly six feet away from a 60-inch 4K TV, I was struggling to notice any subjective difference in overall visual quality.

I also took comparative screenshots on an original PS5 and a PS5 Pro in as close to identical circumstances as possible, some of which you can see shared in this review (be sure to blow them up to full screen on a good monitor). Flipping back and forth between two screenshots, I could occasionally make out small tangible differences—more natural shine coming off the skin of Aloy’s face in Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered, for instance, or a slight increase in detail on Ratchet’s Lombax fur. More often than not, though, I had legitimate trouble telling which screenshot came from which console without double-checking which TV input was currently active.

I’m a single reviewer with a single pair of eyes, of course. Your impression of the relative visual improvement might be very different. Luckily, if you have access to a PS5 already, you can run your own visual test just by switching between Fidelity and Performance modes on any of your current games. If you find the individual screens in Performance mode look noticeably worse than those in Fidelity mode (putting frame rate aside), then you might be in the market for a PS5 Pro. If you don’t, you can probably stop reading this review right here.

Barely a bang for your buck

Even if you’re the kind of person who appreciates the visual impact of Fidelity mode on the PS5, upgrading to the PS5 Pro isn’t exactly an instant purchase. At $700, getting a PS5 Pro is akin to a PC gamer purchasing a top-of-the-line graphics card, even though the lack of modular components means replacing your entire PS5 console rather than a single part. But while a GeForce RTX 4070 Ti could conceivably keep running new PC games for a decade or more, the PS5 Pro should be thought of as more of a stopgap until the PlayStation 6 (and its inevitable exclusive games) hit around 2028 or so (based on past PlayStation launch spacing).

If you already have a PS5, that $700 could instead go toward the purchase of 10 full, big-budget games at launch pricing or even more intriguing indie releases. That money could also go toward more than four years of PlayStation Plus Premium and access to its library of hundreds of streaming and downloadable modern and classic PlayStation titles PS5 titles. Both strike me as a better use of a limited gaming budget than the slight visual upgrade you’d get from a PS5 Pro.

Even if you’re in the market for your first PS5, I’m not sure the Pro is the version I’d recommend. The $250 difference between a stock PS5 and the PS5 Pro similarly feels like it could be put to better use than the slight visual improvements on offer here. And while the addition of an extra terabyte of high-speed game storage on the PS5 Pro is very welcome, the need to buy an external disc drive peripheral for physical games on the new console may understandably rub some players the wrong way.

Back when the PlayStation 2 launched, I distinctly remember thinking that video game graphics had reached a “good enough” plateau, past which future hardware improvements would be mostly superfluous. That memory feels incredibly quaint now from the perspective of nearly two-and-a-half decades of improvements in console graphics and TV displays. Yet the PS5 Pro has me similarly feeling that the original PS5 was something of a graphical plateau, with this next half-step in graphical horsepower struggling to prove its worth.

Maybe I’ll look back in two decades and consider that feeling similarly naive, seeing the PS5 Pro as a halting first step toward yet unimagined frontiers of graphical realism. Right now, though, I’m comfortable recommending that the vast majority of console gamers spend their money elsewhere.

Photo of Kyle Orland

Kyle Orland has been the Senior Gaming Editor at Ars Technica since 2012, writing primarily about the business, tech, and culture behind video games. He has journalism and computer science degrees from University of Maryland. He once wrote a whole book about Minesweeper.

The PS5 Pro’s biggest problem is that the PS5 is already very good Read More »

“havard”-trained-spa-owner-injected-clients-with-bogus-botox,-prosecutors-say

“Havard”-trained spa owner injected clients with bogus Botox, prosecutors say

botox, counterfeit, fda, fraud, health, Science, skin fillers, spa / /

Mounting evidence

Multiple clients and employees told investigators that Fadanelli also said she is a registered nurse, which is false. Though she is a registered aesthetician, aestheticians are not permitted to administer injections or prescription drugs.

Investigators set up an undercover operation where an agent went in for a consultation, and Fadanelli provided a quote for a $450 Botox treatment. Investigators also obtained videos and images of Fadanelli performing injections. And the evidence points to those injections being counterfeit, prosecutors allege. Sales records from the spa indicate that Fadanelli performed 1,631 “Botox” injections, 95 “Sculptra” injections, and 990 injections of unspecified “filler,” all totaling over $933,000. But sales records from the manufacturers of the brand name drugs failed to turn up any record of Fadanelli or anyone else from her spa ever purchasing legitimate versions of the drugs.

Despite the mounting evidence against her, Fadanelli reportedly stuck to her story, denying that she ever told anyone she was a nurse and denying ever administering any injections. “When agents asked Fadanelli if she would like to retract or modify that claim if she knew there was evidence showing that she was in fact administering such products, she reiterated that she does not administer injections.”

Ars has reached to Fadanelli’s spa for comment and will update this story if we get a response. According to the affidavit, clients who received the allegedly bogus injections complained of bumps, tingling, and poor appearances, but no infections or other adverse health outcomes.

In a press release announcing her arrest, Acting United States Attorney for Massachusetts Joshua Levy said: “For years, Ms. Fadanelli allegedly put unsuspecting patients at risk by representing herself to be a nurse and then administering thousands of illegal, counterfeit injections. … The type of deception alleged here is illegal, reckless, and potentially life-threatening.”

For a charge of illegal importation, Fadanelli faces up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. For each of two charges of knowingly selling or dispensing a counterfeit drug or counterfeit device, she faces up to 10 years in prison and a fine of $250,000.

“Havard”-trained spa owner injected clients with bogus Botox, prosecutors say Read More »

anthropic’s-haiku-3.5-surprises-experts-with-an-“intelligence”-price-increase

Anthropic’s Haiku 3.5 surprises experts with an “intelligence” price increase

AI, AI pricing, Anthropic, Anthropic Claude, API, Biz & IT, chatbots, chatgpt, chatgtp, Claude, Claude 3.5, Claude 3.5 Haiku, Claude Haiku, large language models, machine learning / /

Speaking of Opus, Claude 3.5 Opus is nowhere to be seen, as AI researcher Simon Willison noted to Ars Technica in an interview. “All references to 3.5 Opus have vanished without a trace, and the price of 3.5 Haiku was increased the day it was released,” he said. “Claude 3.5 Haiku is significantly more expensive than both Gemini 1.5 Flash and GPT-4o mini—the excellent low-cost models from Anthropic’s competitors.”

Cheaper over time?

So far in the AI industry, newer versions of AI language models typically maintain similar or cheaper pricing to their predecessors. The company had initially indicated Claude 3.5 Haiku would cost the same as the previous version before announcing the higher rates.

“I was expecting this to be a complete replacement for their existing Claude 3 Haiku model, in the same way that Claude 3.5 Sonnet eclipsed the existing Claude 3 Sonnet while maintaining the same pricing,” Willison wrote on his blog. “Given that Anthropic claim that their new Haiku out-performs their older Claude 3 Opus, this price isn’t disappointing, but it’s a small surprise nonetheless.”

Claude 3.5 Haiku arrives with some trade-offs. While the model produces longer text outputs and contains more recent training data, it cannot analyze images like its predecessor. Alex Albert, who leads developer relations at Anthropic, wrote on X that the earlier version, Claude 3 Haiku, will remain available for users who need image processing capabilities and lower costs.

The new model is not yet available in the Claude.ai web interface or app. Instead, it runs on Anthropic’s API and third-party platforms, including AWS Bedrock. Anthropic markets the model for tasks like coding suggestions, data extraction and labeling, and content moderation, though, like any LLM, it can easily make stuff up confidently.

“Is it good enough to justify the extra spend? It’s going to be difficult to figure that out,” Willison told Ars. “Teams with robust automated evals against their use-cases will be in a good place to answer that question, but those remain rare.”

Anthropic’s Haiku 3.5 surprises experts with an “intelligence” price increase Read More »

rto-mandate-was-attempt-at-thwarting-grindr-workers-unionizing:-us-labor-board

RTO mandate was attempt at thwarting Grindr workers unionizing: US labor board

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The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is accusing Grindr of using a return-to-office (RTO) mandate in an attempt to block employee efforts to form a union.

On July 20, 2023, employees at the LGBTQ+ dating app announced plans to unionize. On August 3, 2023, Grindr told employees that they had two weeks to decide if they would start working in an office location two days per week or exit Grindr with six months of severance, per The New York Times, which reported that it saw the memo. Grindr also reportedly offered up to $15,000 for relocation expenses to its offices in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Washington DC. Before the RTO mandate, Grindr allowed fully remote work.

Despite the announcement’s timing, Grindr said in August 2023 that it had been working on an RTO mandate for months and that employees were notified of this in early summer 2023, per the NYT. On August 4, 2023, the Communications Workers of America Union, which Grindr employees were working to join, filed a complaint with the NLRB.

Most workers attempting to unionize quit after RTO mandate

About 80 of the 120 workers who were trying to unionize left due to the RTO mandate, Bloomberg reported on Monday. Grindr was said to have 178 employees when it announced the mandate, meaning it lost about 45 percent of employees overall.

In August 2023, a Grindr spokesperson told The Times that Grindr’s RTO plans were unrelated to union efforts and claimed that Grindr executives “respect and support our team members’ rights to make their own decision about union representation.”

In a September 2023 statement, Eric Cortez, a member of the group organizing the Grindr union, said regarding the employee departures: “These decisions have left Grindr dangerously understaffed and raises questions about the safety, security, and stability of the app for users.”

NLRB files complaint against Grindr

The NLRB’s general counsel office followed up on Friday with a complaint against Grindr, saying that the RTO mandate was issued illegally in retaliation of workers unionizing, Bloomberg reported Monday. The NLRB’s also accusing Grindr of breaking the law by not recognizing or negotiating with the union.

RTO mandate was attempt at thwarting Grindr workers unionizing: US labor board Read More »

guy-makes-“dodgy-e-bike”-from-130-used-vapes-to-make-point-about-e-waste

Guy makes “dodgy e-bike” from 130 used vapes to make point about e-waste

disposable vapes, e-bike, e-bikes, e-waste, elf bar, fda, Tech, vape / /

Disposable vapes are indefensible. Many, or maybe most, of them contain rechargeable lithium-ion batteries, but manufacturers prefer to sell new ones. More than 260 million vape batteries are estimated to enter the trash stream every year in the UK alone. Vapers and vape makers are simply leaving an e-waste epidemic to the planet’s future residents to sort out.

To make a point about how wasteful this practice is—and to also make a pretty rad project and video—Chris Doel took 130 disposable vape batteries (the bigger “3,500 puff” types with model 20400 cells) found littered at a music festival and converted them into a 48-volt, 1,500-watt e-bike battery, one that powered an e-bike with almost no pedaling more than 20 miles. You can see the whole build and watch Doel zoom along trails on his YouTube video.

A pile of empty aluminum vape shells, and the juice and batteries that came out of them, on Chris Doel’s workstation. A pile of empty aluminum

To be clear: Do not do this. Do not put disposable vape cartridges in a vise clamp to “pop out” their components. Do not desolder them from vape cartridges that have a surprising amount of concentration still in them. Do not wire them together using a balance board, group them using 3D-printed cell holders, and then wire them in series. Heck, do not put that much power into a rear hub on a standard bike frame, at least more than once. Doel has a fire extinguisher present and visible on his workbench, and he shows you what happens when two of the wrong batteries happen to make momentary contact—smoke, coughing, and strong warnings.

And yet, when you see Doel get 33 kilometers (about 20.5 miles) on his vape-powered ride, almost entirely without pedaling, hitting 32 miles per hour once, the point is made. We are tossing out a lot of battery materials that could be doing a lot of other things. Doel estimates his “dodgy bike” cost about $60 in filament and materials to piece together. Most of the cells are rated for a minimum of 300 cycles, which is both not a lot, but also more than some bikes and scooters actually take on.

Guy makes “dodgy e-bike” from 130 used vapes to make point about e-waste Read More »

ipod-fans-evade-apple’s-drm-to-preserve-54-lost-clickwheel-era-games

iPod fans evade Apple’s DRM to preserve 54 lost clickwheel-era games

Apple, Features, gaming, iPod, iPod games / /

Dozens of previously hard-to-access games can now be synced via Virtual Machine.

Mom: We have the Game Boy Advance at home / At home: Credit: Aurich Lawson

Mom: We have the Game Boy Advance at home / At home: Credit: Aurich Lawson

Old-school Apple fans probably remember a time, just before the iPhone became a massive gaming platform in its own right, when Apple released a wide range of games designed for late-model clickwheel iPods. While those clickwheel-controlled titles didn’t exactly set the gaming world on fire, they represent an important historical stepping stone in Apple’s long journey through the game industry.

Today, though, these clickwheel iPod games are on the verge of becoming lost media—impossible to buy or redownload from iTunes and protected on existing devices by incredibly strong Apple DRM. Now, the classic iPod community is engaged in a quest to preserve these games in a way that will let enthusiasts enjoy these titles on real hardware for years to come.

Perhaps too well-protected

The short heyday of iPod clickwheel gaming ran from late 2006 to early 2009, when Apple partnered with major studios like Sega, Square Enix, and Electronic Arts to release 54 distinct titles for $7.49 each. By 2011, though, the rise of iOS gaming made these clickwheel iPod titles such an afterthought that Apple completely removed them from the iTunes store, years before the classic iPod line was discontinued for good in 2014.

YouTuber Billiam looks takes a hands-on tour through some of the clickwheel iPod’s games.

In the years since that delisting, the compressed IPG files representing these clickwheel games have all been backed up and collected in various archives. For the most part, though, those IPG files are practically useless to classic iPod owners because of the same strict Fairplay DRM that protected iTunes music and video downloads. That DRM ties each individual IPG file not just to a particular iTunes account (set when the game file was purchased) but also to the specific hardware identifier of the desktop iTunes installation used to sync it.

Games already synced to iPods and iTunes libraries years ago will still work just fine. But trying to sync any of these aging games to a new iPod (and/or a new iTunes installation) requires pairing the original IPG file provided by Apple years ago with the authorized iTunes account that made the original purchase.

Didn’t back up that decades-old file? Sorry, you’re out of luck.

A set of 20 clickwheel iPod games was eventually patched to work on certain iPod Video devices that are themselves flashed with custom firmware. But the majority of these games remain completely unplayable for the vast majority of classic iPod owners to this day.

A virtual workaround

Luckily for the sizable community of classic iPod enthusiasts, there is a bit of a workaround for this legacy DRM issue. Clickwheel iPod owners with working copies of any of these games (either in their iTunes library or on an iPod itself) are still able to re-authorize their account through Apple’s servers to sync with a secondary installation of iTunes.

Reddit user Quix shows off his clickwheel iPod game collection.

Reddit user Quix shows off his clickwheel iPod game collection. Credit: Reddit

If multiple iPod owners each reauthorize their accounts to the same iTunes installation, that copy of iTunes effectively becomes a “master library” containing authorized copies of the games from all of those accounts (there’s a five-account limit per iTunes installation, but it can be bypassed by copying the files manually). That iTunes installation then becomes a distribution center that can share those authorized games to any number of iPods indefinitely, without the need for any online check-ins with Apple.

In recent years, a Reddit user going by the handle Quix used this workaround to amass a local library of 19 clickwheel iPod games and publicly offered to share “copies of these games onto as many iPods as I can.” But Quix’s effort ran into a significant bottleneck of physical access—syncing his game library to a new iPod meant going through the costly and time-consuming process of shipping the device so it could be plugged into Quix’s actual computer and then sending it back to its original owner.

Enter Reddit user Olsro, who earlier this month started the appropriately named iPod Clickwheel Games Preservation Project. Rather than creating his master library of authorized iTunes games on a local computer in his native France, Olsro sought to “build a communitarian virtual machine that anyone can use to sync auth[orized] clickwheel games into their iPod.” While the process doesn’t require shipping, it does necessitate jumping through a few hoops to get the Qemu Virtual Machine running on your local computer.

A tutorial shot showing how to use USB passthrough to sync games from Olsro’s Virtual Machine.

A tutorial shot showing how to use USB passthrough to sync games from Olsro’s Virtual Machine. Credit: Github / Olsro

Over the last three weeks, Olsro has worked with other iPod enthusiasts to get authorized copies of 45 different clickwheel iPod games synced to his library and ready for sharing. That Virtual Machine “should work fully offline to sync the clickwheel games forever to any amount of different iPods,” Olsro wrote, effectively preserving them indefinitely.

For posterity

Olsro told Ars in a Discord discussion that he was inspired to start the project due to fond memories of playing games like Asphalt 4 and Reversi on his iPod Nano 3G as a child. When he dove back into the world of classic iPods through a recent purchase of a classic iPod 7G, he said he was annoyed that there was no way for him to restore those long-lost game files to his new devices.

“I also noticed that I was not alone to be frustrated about that one clickwheel game that was a part of a childhood,” Olsro told Ars. “I noticed that when people had additional games, it was often only one or two more games because those were very expensive.”

Beyond the nostalgia value, even Olsro admits that “only a few of [the clickwheel iPod games] are really very interesting compared to multiplatform equivalents.” The iPod’s round clickwheel interface—with only a single “action” button in the center—is less than ideal for most action-oriented games, and the long-term value of “games” like SAT PREP 2008 is “very debatable,” Olsro said.

A short review of Phase shows off the basic rhythm-matching gameplay.

Still, the classic iPod library features a few diamonds in the rough. Olsro called out the iPod version of Peggle for matching the PC version’s features and taking “really good advantage from the clickwheel controls” for its directional aiming. Then there’s Phase, a rhythm game that creates dynamic tracks from your own iPod music library and was never ported to other platforms. Olsro described it as “very addictive, simple, but fun and challenging.”

Even the bad clickwheel iPod games—like Sega’s nearly impossible-to-control Sonic the Hedgehog port—might find their own quirky audience among gaming subcommunities, Olsro argued. “One [person] beat Dark Souls using DK bongos, so I would not be surprised if the speedrun community could try speedrunning some of those odd games.”

More than entertainment, though, Olsro said there’s a lot of historical interest to be mined from this odd pre-iPhone period in Apple’s gaming history. “The clickwheel games were a reflect[ion] of that gaming period of premium games,” Olsro said. “Without ads, bullshit, and micro-transactions and playable fully offline from start to end… Then the market evolved [on iOS] with cheaper premium games like Angry Birds before being invaded with ads everywhere and aggressive monetizations…”

The iPod might not be the ideal device for playing Sonic the Hedgehog, but you can do it!

The iPod might not be the ideal device for playing Sonic the Hedgehog, but you can do it! Credit: Reddit / ajgogo

While Olsro said he’s happy with the 42 games he’s preserved (and especially happy to play Asphalt 4 again), he won’t be fully satisfied until his iTunes Virtual Machine has all 54 clickwheel titles backed up for posterity. He compared the effort to complete sets of classic game console ROMs “that you can archive somewhere to be sure to be able to play any game you want in the future (or research on it)… Getting the full set is also addictive in terms of collection, like any other kind of collectible things.”

But Olsro’s preservation effort might have a built-in time limit. If Apple ever turns off the iTunes re-authorization servers for clickwheel iPods, he will no longer be able to add new games to his master clickwheel iPod library. “Apple is now notoriously known to not care about announcing closing servers for old things,” Olsro said. “If that version of iTunes dies tomorrow, this preservation project will be stopped. No new games will be ever added.”

“We do not know how much time we still have to accomplish this, so there is no time to lose,” Olsro wrote on Reddit. iPod gamers who want to help can contact him through his Discord account, inurayama.

Photo of Kyle Orland

Kyle Orland has been the Senior Gaming Editor at Ars Technica since 2012, writing primarily about the business, tech, and culture behind video games. He has journalism and computer science degrees from University of Maryland. He once wrote a whole book about Minesweeper.

iPod fans evade Apple’s DRM to preserve 54 lost clickwheel-era games Read More »

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What is happening with Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft?

Boeing, Science, Space, starliner / /

Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft safely landed empty in the New Mexico desert about eight weeks ago, marking a hollow end to the company’s historic first human spaceflight. The vehicle’s passengers during its upward flight to the International Space Station earlier this summer, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, remain in space, awaiting a ride home on SpaceX’s Crew Dragon.

Boeing has been steadfastly silent about the fate of Starliner since then. Two senior officials, including Boeing’s leader of human spaceflight, John Shannon, were originally due to attend a post-landing news conference at Johnson Space Center in Houston. However, just minutes before the news conference was to begin, two seats were removed—the Boeing officials were no-shows.

In lieu of speaking publicly, Boeing issued a terse statement early on the morning of September 8, attributing it to Mark Nappi, vice president and program manager of Boeing’s commercial crew program. “We will review the data and determine the next steps for the program,” Nappi said, in part.

And since then? Nothing. Requests for comment from Boeing have gone unanswered. The simple explanation is that the storied aviation company, which has a new chief executive named Kelly Ortberg, remains in the midst of evaluating Boeing’s various lines of business.

Figuring out what to do with Starliner

“There are probably some things on the fringe there that we can be more efficient with, or that just distract us from our main goal here. So, more to come on that,” Ortberg said during his first quarterly earnings call last week. “I don’t have a specific list of things that we’re going to keep and we’re not going to keep. That’s something for us to evaluate, and the process is underway.”

Also last week, The Wall Street Journal reported that Boeing is considering putting some of its space businesses, including Starliner, up for sale. This suggests that if Boeing can get a return on its investment in Starliner, it probably would be inclined to take the money. To date, the company has reported losses of $1.85 billion on Starliner. As a result, Boeing has told NASA it will no longer bid on fixed-price space contracts in the future.

What is happening with Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft? Read More »

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Finally, a sign of life for Europe’s sovereign satellite Internet constellation

broadband, Commercial space, European Union, Internet, iris2, Science, Space / /

The estimated 10 billion-plus euro cost of the IRIS² program is nearly double initial projections. European officials also confirmed the sovereign satellite network won’t begin providing services to European government customers until 2030, three years later than the commission’s previous schedule.

Rising costs and negotiations over how much governments and industry will pay for IRIS² have delayed the contract award for months. Earlier this year, press reports indicated the SpaceRISE consortium’s proposal for IRIS² carried a total cost of 12 billion euros. It seems the price has been negotiated down, at least by a small percentage, to around 10 billion.

It’s also worth noting that the EU will this year only commit to funding the IRIS² initiative through the end 0f 2027, when the commission’s seven-year budget framework expires. It’s almost certain the IRIS² program will require more government funding beyond 2027, but the European Commission said it will decide later on additional money, subject to the “availability of the corresponding appropriations.”

In April, a senior official in the German government, the EU’s top contributor, called for the IRIS² program to be restarted. Robert Habeck, Germany’s economy minister, called the proposed 12 billion euro price “exorbitant” and said the entire project was “ill-conceived” in a letter to Thierry Breton, then the EU’s internal market commissioner, according to a report in the Germany newspaper Handelsblatt.

Habeck’s protest obviously did not stop the European Commission from awarding the contract to the SpaceRISE consortium. The 12-year agreement will cover the development, deployment, and operation of at least 290 satellites placed at different orbital altitudes, from low-Earth orbit up to medium-Earth orbit several thousand miles above the planet.

At these higher altitudes, IRIS² can cover the globe with fewer satellites than Starlink, OneWeb, or Amazon Kuiper.

The commission’s press release said the agreement, the largest space contract in EU history, should be signed in December. At that time, “legal and financial commitment from both parties will be taken,” the commission said.

The SpaceRISE consortium includes numerous European satellite and telecom companies, including spacecraft manufacturers Airbus Defence and Space, Thales Alenia Space, and OHB. Telespazio, Deutsche Telekom, Orange, Hisdesat, and Thales SIX are also part of the industry group.

These companies are typically competitors in the satellite and telecom markets, as are SES, Eutelsat, and Hispasat, which head up the consortium. Getting all the contractors and subcontractors to play nice with one another will be no small feat.

Finally, a sign of life for Europe’s sovereign satellite Internet constellation Read More »

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Distracted driving tool shows just how far you can travel while texting

Cars, distracted driving / /

The texting example is particularly good at getting the point across, at least to me—my times averaged about 14 seconds to complete the task. Had I been behind the wheel of an actual car at that speed, I would have traveled more than 1,400 feet (426 m) with my eyes on the phone during that period. Not good!

Of course, the people behind the distracted driving simulator recognize that this is mostly an awareness-raising tool—for academics studying the topic, we have things like the $80 million National Advanced Driving Simulator, which can pitch, yaw, roll, tilt, and move about inside a large hangar-like room in Coralsville, Iowa.

“While this simulator can’t provide a complete picture of the dangers of distracted driving, our hope is to help illustrate how dangerous it is to glance down at your phone—and remind everyone how that time can add up when you’re behind the wheel,” Ryan said.

Thankfully, the solution to distracted driving is rather simple—at least conceptually. Just keep your eyes on the road, and save the phone use for when you’re parked.

Distracted driving tool shows just how far you can travel while texting Read More »