#U.S. space development company

[afeelgoodblog]

The Best News of Last Week

1. Arizona governor Ok's over the counter birth control

Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs (D) has expanded access to over-the-counter birth control that will “soon be available to Arizonans,” according to a press release.

Arizonans 18 and older will soon be able to go to their local pharmacy and purchase oral contraceptives without a doctor’s prescription.

2. ‘Great news’: EU hails discovery of massive phosphate rock deposit in Norway

A massive underground deposit of high-grade phosphate rock in Norway, pitched as the world’s largest, is big enough to satisfy world demand for fertilisers, solar panels and electric car batteries over the next 50 years, according to the company exploiting the resource. About 90% of the world’s mined phosphate rock is used in agriculture for the production of phosphorous for the fertiliser industry, for which there is currently no substitute.

3. U.S. Is Destroying the Last of Its Once-Vast Chemical Weapons Arsenal

Decades behind its initial schedule, the dangerous job of eliminating the world’s only remaining declared stockpile of lethal chemical munitions will be completed as soon as Friday.

4. Chinese scientists create edible food packaging to replace plastic

By incorporating certain soy proteins into the structure, Chinese University of Hong Kong scientists successfully created edible food packaging.

5. World's 1st 'tooth regrowth' medicine moves toward clinical trials in Japan

A Japanese research team is making progress on the development of a groundbreaking medication that may allow people to grow new teeth, with clinical trials set to begin in July 2024. The tooth regrowth medicine is intended for people who lack a full set of adult teeth due to congenital factors.

6. No Longer Endangered: The Bald Eagle is an Icon of the ESA

When the Endangered Species Act (ESA) was enacted in 1973, bald eagle population numbers across the country showed that the species was close to disappearing. Before the ESA, in the 1950s and ‘60s, eagles were shot routinely despite the protection. The ESA listing helped bring public attention to the issue.

Through the early 1970s and into the early ‘80s, numbers increased gradually. Then, as you got into the ‘90s, there was still gradual growth. From the late ‘90s into the 2000s, the population really exploded. There was a doubling rate of every several years or so for a while.

7. Deforestation in Brazil's Amazon drops 34% in first half 2023

Deforestation in Brazil's Amazon fell 34% in the first half of 2023, preliminary government data showed on Thursday, hitting its lowest level in four years as President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva institutes tougher environmental policies.

Data produced by Brazil's national space research agency Inpe indicated that 2,649 square km (1,023 square miles) of rainforest were cleared in the region in the half year, the lowest for the period since 2019.

----

That's it for this week :)

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[theliterarywolf]

I have to ask. How come Western Culture is so appalled with erotic stuff? For today. Because I’ve been seeing so many people being so… puritan lately.

It's a misplacement of blame.

People are, admittedly, scared shitless about current developments in the U.S. and the UK. However, rather than actually examine the legitimate backing causes for these developments (the widespread encouragement of ignorance, bodily-autonomy being interpreted by some groups as 'selfish', and certain groups insisting that an increased acknowledgement of the LGBTA population is a slippery slope for pedophilia and sin), it's easier to go for an easier target.

Hence the backlash against Erotica and 18+ content.

'Oh, my abuser used porn to coerce me! It's obviously the porn that's the issue!' Yes, and some of us were groomed with toys and video games, should we nuke those industries too?

'Porn is the leading cause in abuse towards women!' Okay, even if that was true -- which it isn't -- what about the erotica that... doesn't involve women whatsoever?

'Young people who are exposed to porn get their brains warped and think that that's what sex is in real life~!' Isn't that more a problem stemming from a lack of unbiased/unimposed sexual-education programs in American schools?

'If people see something in erotic material, they'll think it's okay to try in real life~!' Go watch Quills.

'Women and teenage girls shouldn't be exposing their delicate minds to such filth!' Okay, ignoring the fact that teenagers shouldn't be in adult spaces anyway, wow you just... said the quiet part out loud, there, didn't you?

'If 18+ material wasn't so dangerous, why would the big credit card companies want to ban it~?' The core reason why credit card companies claim to be against 18+ content is because 'Adult Content has a higher rate of chargebacks than other purchases'. It has nothing to do with dangers and, really, I'm certain that the numbers don't eve add up so, in reality, it's the big credit card companies trying to be authoritarian and police the private lives of grown people.

Something that everyone should be against but, you know... Porn is 'icky' so actions like these are seen as 'based' for certain camps.

[reasonsforhope]

"A new community housing development in the Bronx will feature a cool piece of kit: an on-site aerobic digester that can turn 1,100 pounds of food scraps into 220 pounds of high-quality fertilizer every single day.

Built by Harp Renewables, it’s basically a big stomach filled with bacteria that breaks down food scraps and wasted food into their component parts, and in the future could be a standard part of all apartment units as the amount of food waste in American reaches 30% of the total mass of all trash collection.

The Peninsula, organized by Gilbane Development Company, will feature 740 units of affordable housing, 50,000 square-foot light industrial space and equal sized green space, and 15,000 feet of commercial space, all of which will send their castaway comestibles right into the digester...

Fast Company reports that Christina Grace, founder of a zero-waste food management company, helped plan the design and implementation of the digester into The Peninsula, and helped organize a 40% grant from the city to pay the $50,000 upfront cost.

“The goal is for this material to work its way into the community garden network in the Bronx,” [Christina Grace, who helped plan the design] told the magazine, adding that she expects it to pay for itself over just a few years. “We see this as highly replicable in both commercial and residential venues. We know there’s a need for fertilizer.”

Producing fertilizer right there in the city reduces the need for it to be trucked in from afar, chipping away, even if just a bit, at NYC traffic.

Big problem solver

Perhaps uniquely beneficial to New York City compared to other spots in the U.S. is that the digester will have a significant impact on the Bronx’s share of the city’s rodent problem.

Those who’ve watched the Morgan Spurlock documentary Rats will understand why that’s significant—while those that haven’t will have to imagine what living in a megacity where rats outnumber people by around 8 or 10 to 1 looks like.

Another big problem the bio-digesters could potentially help is pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. Fertilizer is a big emitter of all three of the most-targeted GHGs. Fertilizer, like quarry dust and ammonia is, like so many commodities, often imported from countries who specialize in its production, such as Norway, but also Russia and Ukraine, whose conflict has recently highlighted the fragility of the supply chain with sharp increases in prices...

Bio-digesters by design keep the CO2 and methane in the fertilizer produced, rather than it entering the atmosphere.

For these reasons and more, the aerobic bio-digester is slowly making its way into residential and industrial spaces around the country.

GNN reported on an enormous bio-digester at the heart of the D.C. advanced resource (sewage) recovery center outside the capital, and on the use of bio-digesters on Australian pig farms which are helping reduce the environmental and psychological impact of the effluent produced from such operations.

Harp Renewables tweeted how happy they were to have installed their bio-digester in the town of Cashel, Ireland.

Expect to see more stories like this pop up around the globe."

-via Good News Network, March 17, 2022

Note: Obviously gentrification bad and "affordable housing" is sometimes nowhere near as affordable as it should be, etc. etc. That said, this is such a fantastic use case that I felt I had to post it anyway.

[zvaigzdelasas]

There’s little doubt that the American government has decided to slow China’s economic rise, most notably in the fields of technological development. To be sure, the Biden administration denies that these are its goals. Janet Yellen said on April 20, “China’s economic growth need not be incompatible with U.S. economic leadership. The United States remains the most dynamic and prosperous economy in the world. We have no reason to fear healthy economic competition with any country.” And Jake Sullivan said on April 27, “Our export controls will remain narrowly focused on technology that could tilt the military balance. We are simply ensuring that U.S. and allied technology is not used against us.”

Yet, in its deeds, the Biden administration has shown that its vision extends beyond those modest goals. It has not reversed the trade tariffs Donald Trump imposed in 2018 on China, even though presidential candidate Joe Biden criticized them in July 2019, saying: “President Trump may think he’s being tough on China. All that he’s delivered as a consequence of that is American farmers, manufacturers and consumers losing and paying more.” Instead, the Biden administration has tried to increase the pressure on China by banning the export of chips, semiconductor equipment, and selected software.

It has also persuaded its allies, like the Netherlands and Japan, to follow suit. More recently, on Aug. 9, the Biden administration issued an executive order prohibiting American investments in China involving “sensitive technologies and products in the semiconductors and microelectronics, quantum information technologies, and artificial intelligence sectors” which “pose a particularly acute national security threat because of their potential to significantly advance the military, intelligence, surveillance, or cyber-enabled capabilities” of China.

All these actions confirm that the American government is trying to stop China’s growth. Yet, the big question is whether America can succeed in this campaign—and the answer is probably not. Fortunately, it is not too late for the United States to reorient its China policy toward an approach that would better serve Americans—and the rest of the world.[...]

Since the creation of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, several efforts have been made to limit China’s access to or stop its development in various critical technologies, including nuclear weapons, space, satellite communication, GPS, semiconductors, supercomputers, and artificial intelligence. The United States has also tried to curb China’s market dominance in 5G, commercial drones, and electric vehicles (EVs). Throughout history, unilateral or extraterritorial enforcement efforts to curtail China’s technological rise have failed and, in the current context, are creating irreparable damage to long-standing U.S. geopolitical partnerships. In 1993 the Clinton administration tried to restrict China’s access to satellite technology. Today, China has some 540 satellites in space and is launching a competitor to Starlink.

When America restricted China’s access to its geospatial data system in 1999, China simply built its own parallel BeiDou Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) system in one of the first waves of major technological decoupling. In some measures, BeiDou is today better than GPS. It is the largest GNSS in the world, with 45 satellites to GPS’s 31, and is thus able to provide more signals in most global capitals. It is supported by 120 ground stations, resulting in greater accuracy, and has more advanced signal features, such as two-way messaging[...]

American measures to deprive China access to the most advanced chips could even damage America’s large chip-making companies more than it hurts China. China is the largest consumer of semiconductors in the world. Over the past ten years, China has been importing massive amounts of chips from American companies. According to the US Chamber of Commerce, China-based firms imported $70.5 billion worth of semiconductors from American firms in 2019, representing approximately 37 percent of these companies’ global sales. Some American companies, like Qorvo, Texas Instruments, and Broadcom, derive about half of their revenues from China. 60 percent of Qualcomm’s revenues, a quarter of Intel’s revenues, and a fifth of Nvidia’s sales are from the Chinese market. It’s no wonder that the CEOs of these three companies recently went to Washington to warn that U.S. industry leadership could be harmed by the export controls. American firms will also be hurt by retaliatory actions from China, such as China’s May ban on chips from US-based Micron Technology. China accounts for over 25 percent of Micron’s sales.[...]

The U.S. Semiconductor Industry Association released a statement on July 17, saying that Washington’s repeated steps “to impose overly broad, ambiguous, and at times unilateral restrictions risk diminishing the U.S. semiconductor industry’s competitiveness, disrupting supply chains, causing significant market uncertainty, and prompting continued escalatory retaliation by China,” and called on the Biden administration not to implement further restrictions without more extensive engagement with semiconductor industry representatives and experts.

The Chips Act cannot subsidize the American semiconductor industry indefinitely, and there is no other global demand base to replace China. Other chip producing nations will inevitably break ranks and sell to China (as they have historically) and the American actions will be for naught. And, in banning the export of chips and other core inputs to China, America handed China its war plan years ahead of the battle. China is being goaded into building self-sufficiency far earlier than they would have otherwise. Prior to the ZTE and Huawei components bans, China was content to continue purchasing American chips and focusing on the front-end hardware. Peter Wennink, the CEO of ASML, stated that China is already leading in key applications and demand for semiconductors. Wennink wrote, “The roll-out of the telecommunication infrastructure, battery technology, that’s the sweet spot of mid-critical and mature semiconductors, and that’s where China without any exception is leading.”[...]

Former State Department official Susan Thornton, who oversaw the study as director of the Forum on Asia-Pacific Security at NCAFP, said: “This audit of U.S.-China diplomacy shows that we can make progress through negotiations and that China follows through on its commitments. The notion that engagement with China did not benefit the U.S. is just not accurate.”[...]

One fundamental problem is that domestic politics in America are forcing American policymakers to take strident stands against China instead of pragmatic positions. For instance, sanctions preventing the Chinese Defense Minister, Li Shangfu, from traveling to the United States are standing in the way of U.S.-China defense dialogues to prevent military accidents.

19 Sep 23

[beardedmrbean]

TOKYO -- A Japanese spacecraft touched down on the moon early Saturday, making Japan the fifth country to reach the lunar surface. But officials said they still needed to analyze the pinpoint accuracy of the landing.

Hitoshi Kuninaka, head of the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science, said they believe that rovers were launched and data were being transmitted back to Earth. But there could an issue with the power supply.

The Smart Lander for Investigating Moon, or SLIM, landed at about 12:20 a.m. Tokyo time on Saturday (1520 GMT Friday). Japan follows the United States, the Soviet Union, China and India in reaching the moon.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.

Japan’s spacecraft arrived on the surface of the moon early Saturday, but it wasn’t immediately clear if the landing was a success, because the Japanese space agency said it was still “checking its status.”

More details about the spacecraft, which is carrying no astronauts, would be given at a news conference, officials said. If the Smart Lander for Investigating Moon, or SLIM, landed successfully, Japan would become the fifth country to accomplish the feat after the United States, the Soviet Union, China and India.

SLIM came down onto the lunar surface at around 12:20 a.m. Tokyo time Saturday (1520 GMT Friday).

As the spacecraft descended, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's mission control said that everything was going as planned and later said that SLIM was on the lunar surface. But there was no mention of whether the landing was successful.

Mission control kept repeating that it was “checking its status" and that more information would be given at a news conference. It wasn't immediately clear when the news conference would start.

SLIM, nicknamed "the Moon Sniper," started its descent at midnight Saturday, and within 15 minutes it was down to about 10 kilometers (six miles) above the lunar surface, according to the space agency, which is known as JAXA.

At an altitude of five kilometers (three miles), the lander was in a vertical descent mode, then at 50 meters (165 feet) above the surface, SLIM was supposed to make a parallel movement to find a safe landing spot, JAXA said.

About a half-hour after its presumed landing, JAXA said that it was still checking the status of the lander.

SLIM, which was aiming to hit a very small target, is a lightweight spacecraft about the size of a passenger vehicle. It was using “pinpoint landing” technology that promises far greater control than any previous moon landing.

While most previous probes have used landing zones about 10 kilometers (six miles) wide, SLIM was aiming at a target of just 100 meters (330 feet).

The project was the fruit of two decades of work on precision technology by JAXA.

The mission's main goal is to test new landing technology that would allow moon missions to land “where we want to, rather than where it is easy to land,” JAXA has said. If the landing was a success, the spacecraft will seek clues about the origin of the moon, including analyzing minerals with a special camera.

The SLIM, equipped with a pad to cushion impact, was aiming to land near the Shioli crater, near a region covered in volcanic rock.

The closely watched mission came only 10 days after a moon mission by a U.S. private company failed when the spacecraft developed a fuel leak hours after the launch.

SLIM was launched on a Mitsubishi Heavy H2A rocket in September. It initially orbited Earth and entered lunar orbit on Dec. 25.

Japan hopes a success will help regain confidence for its space technology after a number of failures. A spacecraft designed by a Japanese company crashed during a lunar landing attempt in April, and a new flagship rocket failed its debut launch in March.

JAXA has a track record with difficult landings. Its Hayabusa2 spacecraft, launched in 2014, touched down twice on the 900-meter-long (3,000-foot-long) asteroid Ryugu, collecting samples that were returned to Earth.

Experts say a success of SLIM's pinpoint landing, especially on the moon, would raise Japan's profile in the global space technology race.

Takeshi Tsuchiya, aeronautics professor at the Graduate School of Engineering at the University of Tokyo, said it was important to confirm the accuracy of landing on a targeted area for the future of moon explorations.

“It is necessary to show the world that Japan has the appropriate technology in order to be able to properly assert Japan's position in lunar development,” he said. The moon is important from the perspective of explorations of resources, and it can also be used as a base to go to other planets, like Mars, he said.

SLIM is carrying two small autonomous probes — lunar excursion vehicles LEV-1 and LEV-2, which will be released just before landing.

LEV-1, equipped with an antenna and a camera, is tasked with recording SLIM's landing. LEV-2, is a ball-shaped rover equipped with two cameras, developed by JAXA together with Sony, toymaker Tomy and Doshisha University.

JAXA will broadcast a livestream of the landing, while space fans will gather to watch the historic moment on a big screen at the agency's Sagamihara campus southwest of Tokyo.

[racefortheironthrone]

Please innumerate for us the specialized problems of the library sciences.

Let me start with the caveat that my information is based on my experiences at the National Archives more than a decade ago, and policy has definitely changed on this front as we can see from this graph of recent digitization - apparently NARA wants to get to 85% digitization by 2026. (Even still, I'd note that the records of the WPA are <0.001% digitized.)

However, back when I was doing the research that would eventually become my first book, I remember being at the National Archives II building in College Park, Maryland (Go Terps!) and getting really frustrated that all the records of the WPA were only available in their original physical form and that all the guides and indexes were also in paper only and were all from the 1970s, and I asked the archivist why the hell the National Archives hadn't been digitized already.

This is what they told me: if it's handled correctly and stored in the right environmental circumstances, paper can last a thousand years. Carbon copies can last even longer, if they don't rip. (Seriously, the bastard things are like onion skins, they'll split if you look at them funny.) Microfilm is slightly more technologically advanced than paper, but it only lasts 500 years in the right conditions.

We've only had computers en masse since the 1980s, and already there's a huge amount of records (especially from the early years) that we don't have any more, because the hard drives got re-formatted due to higher costs of storage space back in the day, or because old computers got thrown out when they were replaced by newer models and the hard drives are all rotting in landfills somewhere, or because backwards compatibility broke down and we just can't read those file types on our modern computers, or because the actual data got corrupted on the disc, or because some legacy company is asserting copyright against a video game museum, or because some political hack and/or president of the United States decided to violate the Presidential Records Act.

While we thought that the internet would cause an explosion of written records from ordinary people on the scale of the advent of mass literacy, there are vast swathes of the early internet that simply do not exist any more because the servers got switched off when Geocities et al. folded in the dot-com bubble burst or when everyone migrated to Web 2.0, and the Internet Archive tries its best (bless its heart, affectionately) but it can't be everywhere and save everything.

As a result, the archivist told me, digitization is a fraught question: what file format do we use? How do we know that file format will still be compatible and backwards-compatible in 50 years? 100? Longer? Do we keep everything locally or store it on the cloud, and how do we ensure that the storage mechanisms won't fail if there's a blackout or a virus or whatever? Do we digitize everything now, or do we wait until optical character recognition improves enough to the point where digitized records can be searched for words and phrases? Etc.

Keep in mind, I am a public policy historian who studies the 20th century U.S - I work primarily with the official records and the central archives of the richest government in the world. From a library sciences perspectives, this is kind of an ideal scenario, and it's still kind of fucked up. (Let me tell you, the rage and grief I felt when I learned that most of the General File of the Public Works Administration was thrown away by the National fucking Archives and Records Administration in the mid-1950s because they were running out of shelf space in the D.C location and didn't think these records were important...)

Now imagine what it's like at a local historical society or a small liberal arts college, or the national museum of a developing nation for that matter, who do not have the resources for the kind of grand digitization project that NARA started doing five years ago. Think of the sheer scale of historical records that sleep, unseen and untouched perhaps for decades and perhaps for ever, in little cubbyholes all across the world. Among professionals, historical records are measured in linear and cubic feet - think about that for a second, how many pages of paper there are in a foot when you stack them up, and how many hundreds and thousands and millions of feet there are across the face of the world. Think of all the millions of feet of pieces of paper that have been lost to us because of fire or rot or war or time itself.

This is why Peter Turchin is a quack. Historical records are not a standardized little database for social scientists to plug their fucking spreadsheets into; historians don't play that kind of bullshit t-ball, with all our data neatly packaged and handed to us on a silver platter. Our profession is not a social science, it's a goddamn treasure hunt through boxes that were never catalogued or categorized (or that were re-catalogued so many times no one remembers how they were put together in the first place) to find writing that no one has read since the authors died. All of us know that our work, our understanding, will always be partial and limited, because memory is infinitely fragile and the very idea of historical preservation is a mad existential defiance of entropy itself. These records are real, they are fragile - to hell with the Library of Alexandria, remember the National Museum of Brazil? - and they are all that is left to us of the dead.

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

STARSHIPS ARE MEANT TO FLY

SpaceX was founded in 2002 to expand access to outer space. Not just for government or traditional satellite operators, but for new participants around the globe. Today, we’re flying at an unprecedented pace as the world’s most active launch services provider. SpaceX is safely and reliably launching astronauts, satellites, and other payloads on missions benefiting life on Earth and preparing humanity for our ultimate goal: to explore other planets in our solar system and beyond.

Starship is paramount to making that sci-fi future, along with a growing number of U.S. national priorities, a reality. It is the largest and most powerful space transportation system ever developed, and its fully and rapidly reusable design will exponentially increase humanity’s ability to access and utilize outer space. Full reusability has been an elusive goal throughout the history of spaceflight, piling innumerable technical challenges on what is already the most difficult engineering pursuit in human existence. It is rocket science, on ludicrous mode.

Every flight of Starship has made tremendous progress and accomplished increasingly difficult test objectives, making the entire system more capable and more reliable. Our approach of putting flight hardware in the flight environment as often as possible maximizes the pace at which we can learn recursively and operationalize the system. This is the same approach that unlocked reuse on our Falcon fleet of rockets and made SpaceX the leading launch provider in the world today. 

To do this and do it rapidly enough to meet commitments to national priorities like NASA’s Artemis program, Starships need to fly. The more we fly safely, the faster we learn; the faster we learn, the sooner we realize full and rapid rocket reuse. Unfortunately, we continue to be stuck in a reality where it takes longer to do the government paperwork to license a rocket launch than it does to design and build the actual hardware. This should never happen and directly threatens America’s position as the leader in space. 

FLIGHT 5

The Starship and Super Heavy vehicles for Flight 5 have been ready to launch since the first week of August. The flight test will include our most ambitious objective yet: attempt to return the Super Heavy booster to the launch site and catch it in mid-air.

This will be a singularly novel operation in the history of rocketry. SpaceX engineers have spent years preparing and months testing for the booster catch attempt, with technicians pouring tens of thousands of hours into building the infrastructure to maximize our chances for success. Every test comes with risk, especially those seeking to do something for the first time. SpaceX goes to the maximum extent possible on every flight to ensure that while we are accepting risk to our own hardware, we accept no compromises when it comes to ensuring public safety.

It's understandable that such a unique operation would require additional time to analyze from a licensing perspective. Unfortunately, instead of focusing resources on critical safety analysis and collaborating on rational safeguards to protect both the public and the environment, the licensing process has been repeatedly derailed by issues ranging from the frivolous to the patently absurd. At times, these roadblocks have been driven by false and misleading reporting, built on bad-faith hysterics from online detractors or special interest groups who have presented poorly constructed science as fact.

We recently received a launch license date estimate of late November from the FAA, the government agency responsible for licensing Starship flight tests. This is a more than two-month delay to the previously communicated date of mid-September. This delay was not based on a new safety concern, but instead driven by superfluous environmental analysis. The four open environmental issues are illustrative of the difficulties launch companies face in the current regulatory environment for launch and reentry licensing.

STEEL AND WATER

Starship’s water-cooled steel flame deflector has been the target of false reporting, wrongly alleging that it pollutes the environment or has operated completely independent of regulation. This narrative omits fundamental facts that have either been ignored or intentionally misinterpreted.

At no time did SpaceX operate the deflector without a permit. SpaceX was operating in good faith under a Multi-Sector General Permit to cover deluge operations under the supervision of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ). SpaceX worked closely with TCEQ to incorporate numerous mitigation measures prior to its use, including the installation of retention basins, construction of protective curbing, plugging of outfalls during operations, and use of only potable (drinking) water that does not come into contact with any industrial processes. A permit number was assigned and made active in July 2023. TCEQ officials were physically present at the first testing of the deluge system and given the opportunity to observe operations around launch.

The water-cooled steel flame deflector does not spray pollutants into the surrounding environment. Again, it uses literal drinking water. Outflow water has been sampled after every use of the system and consistently shows negligible traces of any contaminants, and specifically, that all levels have remained below standards for all state permits that would authorize discharge. TCEQ, the FAA, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service evaluated the use of the system prior to its initial use, and during tests and launch, and determined it would not cause environmental harm.

When the EPA issued its Administrative Order in March 2024, it was done before seeking a basic understanding of the facts of the water-cooled steel flame deflector’s operation or acknowledgement that we were operating under the Texas Multi-Sector General Permit. After meeting with the EPA—during which the EPA stated their intent was not to stop testing, preparation, or launch operations—it was decided that SpaceX should apply for an individual discharge permit. Despite our previous permitting, which was done in coordination with TCEQ, and our operation having little to nothing in common with industrial waste discharges covered by individual permits, we applied for an individual permit in July 2024.

The subsequent fines levied on SpaceX by TCEQ and the EPA are entirely tied to disagreements over paperwork. We chose to settle so that we can focus our energy on completing the missions and commitments that we have made to the U.S. government, commercial customers, and ourselves. Paying fines is extremely disappointing when we fundamentally disagree with the allegations, and we are supported by the fact that EPA has agreed that nothing about the operation of our flame deflector will need to change. Only the name of the permit has changed.

GOOD STEWARD

No launch site operates in a vacuum. As we have built up capacity to launch and developed new sites across the country, we have always been committed to public safety and mitigating impacts to the environment. At Starbase, we implement an extensive list of mitigations developed with federal and state agencies, many of which require year-round monitoring and frequent updates to regulators and consultation with independent biological experts. The list of measures we take just for operations in Texas is over two hundred items long, including constant monitoring and sampling of the short and long-term health of local flora and fauna. The narrative that we operate free of, or in defiance of, environmental regulation is demonstrably false.

Environmental regulations and mitigations serve a noble purpose, stemming from common-sense safeguards to enable progress while preventing undue impact to the environment. However, with the licensing process being drawn out for Flight 5, we find ourselves delayed for unreasonable and exasperating reasons.

On Starship’s fourth flight, the top of the Super Heavy booster, commonly known as the hot-stage, was jettisoned to splash down on its own in the Gulf of Mexico. The hot-stage plays an important part in protecting the booster during separation from Starship’s upper stage before detaching during the booster’s return flight. This operation was analyzed thoroughly ahead of Starship’s fourth flight, specifically focused on any potential impact to protected marine species. Given the distribution of marine animals in the specific landing area and comparatively small size of the hot-stage, the probability of a direct impact is essentially zero. This is something previously determined as standard practice by the FAA and the National Marine Fisheries Service for the launch industry at large, which disposes of rocket stages and other hardware in the ocean on every single launch, except of course, for our own Falcon rockets which land and are reused. The only proposed modification for Starship’s fifth flight is a marginal change in the splashdown location of the hot-stage which produces no increase in likelihood for impacting marine life. Despite this, the FAA leadership approved a 60-day consultation with the National Marine Fisheries Service. Furthermore, the mechanics of these types of consultations outline that any new questions raised during that time can reset the 60-day counter, over and over again. This single issue, which was already exhaustively analyzed, could indefinitely delay launch without addressing any plausible impact to the environment.

Another unique aspect to Starship’s fifth flight and a future return and catch of the Super Heavy booster will be the audible sonic booms in the area around the return location. As we’ve previously noted, the general impact to those in the surrounding area of a sonic boom is the brief thunder-like noise. The FAA, in consultation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, evaluated sonic booms from the landing of the Super Heavy and found no significant impacts to the environment. Although animals exposed to the sonic booms may be briefly startled, numerous prior studies have shown sonic booms of varying intensity have no detrimental effect on wildlife. Despite this documented evidence, the FAA leadership approved an additional 60-day consultation with U.S. Fish and Wildlife as a slightly larger area could experience a sonic boom.

Lastly, the area around Starbase is well known as being host to various protected birds. SpaceX already has extensive mitigations in place and has been conducting biological monitoring for birds near Starbase for nearly 10 years. The protocol for the monitoring was developed with U.S. Fish and Wildlife service, and is conducted by professional, qualified, independent biologists. To date, the monitoring has not shown any population-level impacts to monitored bird populations, despite unsubstantiated claims to the contrary that the authors themselves later amended. Even though Starship’s fifth flight will take place outside of nesting season, SpaceX is still implementing additional mitigations and monitoring to minimize impacts to wildlife, including infrared drone surveillance pre- and post-launch to track nesting presence. We are also working with USFWS experts to assess deploying special protection measures prior to launches during bird nesting season.

SpaceX is committed to minimizing impact and enhancing the surrounding environment where possible. One of our proudest partnerships in South Texas is with Sea Turtle Inc, a local nonprofit dedicated to sea turtle conservation. SpaceX assists with finding and transporting injured sea turtles to their facilities for treatment. SpaceX has also officially adopted Boca Chica Beach through the Texas General Lands Office Adopt a Beach Program, with the responsibility of picking up litter and promoting a litter-free environment. SpaceX sponsors and participates in quarterly beach cleanups as well as quarterly State Highway 4 cleanups. SpaceX has removed hundreds of pounds of trash from the beach and State Highway 4 over the last several years. SpaceX also fosters environmental education at the local level by hosting school tours as well as an Annual Environmental Education Day with Texas Parks and Wildlife, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, National Park Service, and Sea Turtle Inc. 

TO FLY

Despite a small, but vocal, minority of detractors trying to game the regulatory system to obstruct and delay the development of Starship, SpaceX remains committed to the mission at hand. Our thousands of employees work tirelessly because they believe that unlimited opportunities and tangible benefits for life on Earth are within reach if humanity can fundamentally advance its ability to access space. This is why we’re committed to continually pushing the boundaries of spaceflight, with a relentless focus on safety and reliability.

Because life will be multiplanetary, and will be made possible by the farsighted strides we take today.

[lonestarflight]

Comparison between the enlarged VentureStar and the X-33.

"This artist's rendering depicts the NASA/Lockheed Martin X-33 technology demonstrator alongside the Venturestar, a Single-Stage-To-Orbit (SSTO) Reusable Launch Vehicle (RLV). The X-33, a half-scale prototype for the Venturestar, is scheduled to be flight tested in 1999. NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center, Edwards, California, plays a key role in the development and flight testing of the X-33. The RLV technology program is a cooperative agreement between NASA and industry. The goal of the RLV technology program is to enable signifigant reductions in the cost of access to space, and to promote the creation and delivery of new space services and other activities that will improve U.S. economic competitiveness. NASA Headquarter's Office of Space Access and Technology is overseeing the RLV program, which is being managed by the RLV Office at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, located in Huntsville, Alabama. The X-33 was a wedged-shaped subscale technology demonstrator prototype of a potential future Reusable Launch Vehicle (RLV) that Lockheed Martin had dubbed VentureStar. The company had hoped to develop VentureStar early this century. Through demonstration flight and ground research, NASA's X-33 program was to provide the information needed for industry representatives such as Lockheed Martin to decide whether to proceed with the development of a full-scale, commercial RLV program. A full-scale, single-stage-to-orbit RLV was to dramatically increase reliability and lower costs of putting a pound of payload into space, from the current figure of $10,000 to $1,000. Reducing the cost associated with transporting payloads in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) by using a commercial RLV was to create new opportunities for space access and significantly improve U.S. economic competitiveness in the world-wide launch marketplace. NASA expected to be a customer, not the operator, of the commercial RLV. The X-33 design was based on a lifting body shape with two revolutionary 'linear aerospike' rocket engines and a rugged metallic thermal protection system. The vehicle also had lightweight components and fuel tanks built to conform to the vehicle's outer shape. Time between X-33 flights was normally to have been seven days, but the program had hoped to demonstrate a two-day turnaround between flights during the flight-test phase of the program. The X-33 was to have been an unpiloted vehicle that took off vertically like a rocket and landed horizontally like an airplane. It was to have reached altitudes of up to 50 miles and high hypersonic speeds. The X-33 program was managed by the Marshall Space Flight Center and was to have been launched at a special launch site on Edwards Air Force Base. Due to technical problems with the liquid hydrogen tank, and the resulting cost increase and time delay, the X-33 program was cancelled in February 2001."

Date: September 23, 1999

source

NASA Identifier: NIX-ED97-43929, ED97-43938-1

[unpluggedfinancial]

Coinbase's Legal Battle with the SEC: A Push for Transparency and Clear Regulation

The ongoing tension between Coinbase and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has taken a new turn. In recent months, Coinbase has launched two significant legal actions against the SEC, reflecting the company's growing frustration with the regulatory environment for cryptocurrencies in the United States. These actions underscore the urgent need for transparency and clear rules in the rapidly evolving digital asset industry.

Lawsuit Over FOIA Requests

In June 2024, Coinbase filed lawsuits against both the SEC and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) for failing to comply with Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. Coinbase's FOIA requests sought critical information on two fronts:

The SEC's View on Ethereum: Coinbase is particularly interested in how the SEC perceives Ethereum, especially after its transition to a proof-of-stake consensus mechanism. This shift has sparked debates about whether Ethereum should be classified as a security under current U.S. laws.

"Pause Letters": Coinbase also requested copies of "Pause Letters" referenced in an Office of Inspector General report. These letters could provide insight into the SEC's internal communications and strategies regarding the regulation of digital assets.

By taking legal action, Coinbase aims to compel these agencies to release the requested information. The company alleges that federal financial regulators are attempting to "cripple the digital-asset industry" and believes that greater transparency will shed light on the true motivations and actions of these regulators.

Petition for Rulemaking

The second significant legal action by Coinbase is its April 2023 lawsuit against the SEC, which seeks to force the agency to respond to a petition for rulemaking. Coinbase initially submitted this petition in July 2022, requesting formal guidance on the regulatory framework for the crypto industry. The SEC's prolonged silence prompted Coinbase to seek judicial intervention, hoping to secure a clear and actionable response.

This lawsuit highlights Coinbase's argument that the SEC's current approach—termed "regulation by enforcement"—is detrimental to the crypto industry. Coinbase asserts that the lack of clear rules creates uncertainty and stifles innovation. The company contends that formal guidance would provide the necessary clarity for businesses operating in the digital asset space.

Broader Context and Implications

These legal battles are part of a broader debate over the regulation of cryptocurrencies in the United States. The SEC has taken a stringent stance, asserting that most cryptocurrencies are securities and should be regulated as such. This perspective has led to numerous enforcement actions against various crypto companies, including Coinbase.

In March 2024, a federal judge ruled that most of the SEC's claims against Coinbase could proceed to trial, marking a significant setback for the company's efforts to dismiss the lawsuit. Coinbase argues that the SEC's aggressive stance is counterproductive and calls for a more collaborative approach to developing a comprehensive regulatory framework.

Aligning with Coinbase's Mission

These legal actions are not just strategic moves but are deeply aligned with Coinbase's mission statement of promoting financial freedom. By challenging the SEC and advocating for transparent and clear regulations, Coinbase is doing everything in its power to create an environment where digital assets can thrive. This dedication to financial freedom and innovation is at the core of Coinbase's goals, reflecting its commitment to transforming the financial landscape.

Conclusion

Coinbase's legal actions against the SEC and FDIC reflect a pivotal moment in the relationship between the crypto industry and U.S. regulators. By demanding transparency and clear rules, Coinbase is advocating for a regulatory environment that supports innovation while protecting investors. As this legal battle unfolds, it will undoubtedly shape the future of cryptocurrency regulation in the United States and potentially set precedents for other jurisdictions around the world.

[staysaneathome]

Okay so because this won’t leave my brain, have a weird, tentative, not-quite canonical in any sense timeline:

Bad end of Wolf 359. Pryce and Cutter get the Dear Listeners’ cloning technology and secure the way for humanity’s domination amongst the stars

In response, Goddard Futuristics pulls funding for Dr. John Geistman’s cryotechnology development. After all, who needs to worry about the future of humanity if you’ve guaranteed your corporate survival? Sure, you’ll bring a few of them along as “citizen-employees”, but there’s new markets to conquer among the stars! Forget the sad kiwi, it’s time to diversify services!

And then Dr. John Geistman goes and develops inexplicable necromantic abilities. Hm.

Pryce and Cutter try to have him arrested, secreted away to the states, but the man makes a flesh fortress out of cows, of all things! And then is recruited by the U.S. government to have the sitting president reanimated after the president’s “accident”!

But Pryce and Cutter have excellent PR people, and you can’t survive the cold recesses of space if you can’t adapt! It turns out their corporate “rivals” have the same idea: the weird necromancer can say what he wants about “saving the Earth”, but it turns out that no one really wants to listen after being reminded of what he did to those cows! And those policemen. And the cult he’s steadily amassing.

All told, it’s easier than it feels like it should be to escape the rapidly failing Earth with all of Goddard Futuristic’s vital employees, plus a few lucky relevant non-employee participants (Dr. Geistman has some cousins that Pryce is most interested in seeing if she can awaken any latent wizardry in, see if their children can inherit anything—Warren Kepler is her reluctant lab rat in this). Really, blasting off to space with all the other multitrillionaires is almost boringly simple!

Dr. John Geistman somehow killing the entire planet, ascending to godhood, and destroying every other planet in his way to stop them escaping in an act of spiteful vengeance is the only interesting part of the whole ordeal! And sure one of the twelve ships gets slightly damaged and can’t make it the whole journey.

But Pryce and Cutter have decades of experience in cheating death. This academic can’t even make them break a sweat.

(The unfortunate denizens of this twelfth vessel attempt to soldier on and create civilization anew on the planets they do reach. When the Empire of the Necrolord Prime, the renamed John Gaius, retaliates by killing these planets, they get a bit testy. The descendants of the survivors form the rebellion group the Blood of Eden.)

The eleven ships set up shop several hundred galaxies away. This becomes the Corporation Rim, which warns its inhabitants to not expand too far for fear of “alien” (really necromantic human) remnants.

Goddard Futuristics, with the help of the Dear Listeners’ cloning technology and Pryce’s advances in AI, rebrand as Stellar Firma Ltd. and begin making and selling planets. Pryce and Cutter remain the shadow-rulers behind the all-powerful Board.

Their business rivals on the other six ships set up their own corporations, beginning to set up colonies for mining and contractually -obligated labor. Some of those colonies get lost in the violent in-fighting between these lesser controlled companies which constantly devolve and are reborn anew. Those abandoned colonies form their own governments and societies opposed to those of the Corporation Rim. These are much more successful, and even propagate higher learning and better infrastructure.

In order to keep up with the competition over this new source of income and potential exploitation, the Corporation Rim kickstarts the development of Security Units within their companies, with inbuilt monitoring to data mine their new clients.

Pryce and Cutter meet an untimely end when they take a party barge to the Pleasure Moon of Quixotic, along with the rest of the Board and their families. Stellar Firma, deprived of the overlords that have guided its course since the twenty first century, is thrown into chaos.

I.M.O.G.E.N., Pryce’s magnum opus, becomes the supercomputer behind Stellar Firma’s operation in constant conflict with Internal Standards. She is in charge of using the Dear Listeners’ technology to combine DNA that’s proven to be receptive to the obedience protocol (Donors include R. Min., D. Jac., D. Eif., and A. Max.) to create clone assistants to design and sales consultants. One of these clones proves to be resistant to this gene. She decides to roll with it.

Years later, a Secunit that managed to hack its governor protocol follows a young human that an Asshole Research Transport AI feels very protective over into a coffee shop run by a clone and one of the most powerful administrative AIs to escape the Corporation Rim…

[usafphantom2]

L3Harris will modernize the electronic warfare system of the U.S. Navy F/A-18

Fernando Valduga By Fernando Valduga 11/03/2023 - 16:00 in Military

L3Harris Technologies won a contract with the U.S. Navy to continue developing advanced systems to modernize electronic warfare (EW) capabilities in F/A-18 Super Hornet aircraft, improving pilot protection against emerging and future threats.

L3Harris will develop a next-generation EW system under the $80 million contract for the U.S. Navy's F/A-18E/F Super Hornet fleet. It is one of the two companies selected for the initial contract of the prototype. The final decision for subsequent development and production contracts is scheduled for 2026.

“L3Harris is developing the advanced EW system to boost the success of the mission and ensure that naval aviators are protected in the coming years,” said Ed Zoiss, President, Space and Airborne Systems, L3Harris. "This award is based on decades of providing EW systems to the Navy, and we are excited that our technology is protecting pilots in dangerous situations while allowing them to dominate potential opponents."

The advanced L3Harris system will feature an integrated electronic support measure and an electronic attack system, providing immediate threat detection in all relevant radio frequency bands. With a modular open systems approach and a design compatible with open mission systems, this innovation allows crews to easily insert new and updated technology, saving time and reducing costs.

L3Harris has been providing innovative EW capabilities for F/A-18 for more than two decades. The company has also been providing these resources for more than 60 years to the U.S. Air Force and other allied air services around the world.

Tags: Military AviationF/A-18E/F Super HornetL3HarrisUSN - United States Navy/U.S. Navy

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Fernando Valduga

Fernando Valduga

Aviation photographer and pilot since 1992, has participated in several events and air operations, such as Cruzex, AirVenture, Dayton Airshow and FIDAE. He has work published in specialized aviation magazines in Brazil and abroad. Uses Canon equipment during his photographic work in the world of aviation.

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Cavok Brazil - Digital Tchê Web Creation

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Cavok Brazil - Digital Tchê Web Creation

[fatehbaz]

Nordelta, one of Buenos Aires’s most exclusive areas, is a conglomerate of gated communities with over 50,000 residents. It sits on the wetlands of the River Paraná, second only to the Amazon in South America. And it was built by emptying and refilling canals, which [...] reduced the wetlands’ capacity to absorb rainfall. Nordelta opened in 2001, right when the economy collapsed after a decade of extreme neoliberal adjustments. In 2001, Argentina had five presidents in the span of 11 days, police killed 39 citizens during protests, and personal bank accounts were frozen [...]. Nordelta’s main attraction for consumers was [...] a distinguished, United States lifestyle. [...] Master-planned communities (MPCs) are privately built and designed neighborhoods in the city outskirts constructed by large-scale developers, offering amenities, services, and rules through homeowner associations. [...]

While driving through the main road to the conglomerate, [...] to the right, malls, apartments, and private schools with English names that are only accessible by car. [...] Over 8,000 workers cross these gates daily to provide multiple services. [...] These workers cannot walk on the avenues because “Nordelta residents do not want to see them around,” [...]. This segregationist structure of Nordelta emerged alongside the expansion of the neoliberal state. While Nordelta today resembles Miami, it was initially thought of as the French ville nouvelles (“new towns”), which aimed to integrate rural migrants within European cities.

---

In 1977, engineer Julián Astolfoni acquired the first plot of land from the descendants of [...] a general who had obtained the lands previously peopled by Guaraníes and Carupás after fighting in the “Desert Campaign against the Indians.” When Astolfoni got the plot, Nordelta was conceptualized to fix the problem of undesired urban sprawl at a time when the [...] state of the last civic-military dictatorship was trying to “eradicate” the villas miseria (shantytowns) for being “filthy” spaces threatening private property and national moralities.  

The project goals shifted once it was finally approved in 1992 when Astolfoni partnered with businessmen [EC] and other North American corporations, [...] including [...] a U.S. real estate specialized in MPCs. [...] Nordelta retained the enduring idea of the desert as a space to be filled. Like every pioneer narrative, it positioned Astolfoni and [EC], the engineer-corporate duo, as heroes saving “neglected” environments and conquering a wetland that would remain otherwise “vast, useless, dangerous, and vacant.” They would do this by emulating the U.S. MPCs of the 1960s, the ones that turned public malls into consumption centers [...].

---

In the 1990s, president Carlos Menem’s government extended neoliberal measures and promoted Miami as a tourist destination for middle-class families [...]. Despite its diversity, Miami became a symbol of whiteness and economic success [...]. The neoliberal reconfiguration of white exceptionalism as a desire to emulate western geographies became Nordelta’s mark, offering global lifestyles to the elites who can now “live like in Miami, but a few miles away from the Buenos Aires Obelisk,” as an Argentinian newspaper with connections to Nordelta claimed. [...]

---

In 2001, when the machines were opening the soil, a woman [...] found ceramic pieces and bones. The finding led to an organized movement [...]. A team of archaeologists who had been working in the area before visited the place, corroborated the existence of an ancestral site, and registered it as the Punta Canal archaeological site. [...] Despite protests [...], the company sent excavators and destroyed a significant portion of the site. [...]  [T]he organized group of neighbors and Indigenous peoples constituting the Movimiento en Defensa de la Pacha Mama set out to protect the archaeological remains and the Indigenous cemetery [...]. [T]heir organization pushed for the recognition of the land, now named Punta Querandí, as communitarian in 2020 [...]. Furthermore, [...] the movement achieved the return and reburial of 42 bodies from ancestors whom an archaeologist from the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency had exhumed in 1925. [...]

[T]his long, complex, and well-documented story of the emergence of Punta Querandí [is told] in the museum, el Museo Autónomo de Gestión Indígena, which also has a digital archive. Despite the developers’ representation of the area as wild and rural, Punta Querandí has “made visible that the reality of Indigenous Peoples also occurs in Buenos Aires,” [...]. [T]he desegregationist project of Punta Querandí, a land not attached to geneticized or archaeologized visions of Indigeneity, but rather a Territory where Guaraní, Qom, Colla, Moqoit, or Aymara Peoples, among many others, can reunite [...].

---

Punta Querandí and its desegregationist project shows the power of edges. [...]

Exemplified by Nordelta, MPCs generate profit by transforming rural into elite lands while rearticulating racial and spatial borders that make distinctions sharper, more guarded, and less porous -- between centers and peripheries, grounded and flooded land [...]. MPCs originated in the U.S. and continue to circulate American imaginaries of race, segregation, and neoliberal commons worldwide. [...]  By selling reductionist archetypes, such as the fantasy of white Miami, in order to profit from them, real estate developments obscure how environments continue to be complex, multiple, and diverse despite the violence enacted upon them.

---

Text by: Mara Dicenta. “The Violence of Gated Communities in Buenos Aires’s Wetlands.” Edge Effects. 20 April 2023. [Bold emphasis and some paragraph breaks/contractions added by me.]

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this story from Inside Climate News:

When Peter Else left the University of Arizona in 2005 to live in the San Pedro Valley full time, he planned to spend his retirement farming in one of the most ecologically intact landscapes left in southern Arizona, where the nearby river remains undammed and giant cactuses fill the space between the Galiuro and Rincon mountains. 

But Else, who previously directed the Tucson Area Agricultural Centers at the University of Arizona, soon found himself in the middle of one of the most consequential debates over developing green spaces for green energy. For nearly a decade, he has been fighting the SunZia project—a transmission line connecting 3,000 megawatts of clean energy generated by wind farms in New Mexico to the power grid. The transmission line was routed largely along highways in New Mexico and Arizona but detoured into the San Pedro Valley for roughly 50 miles, cutting through a landscape that for decades avoided most of the impacts of human development. Other routes identified by developers were deemed to have greater negative impacts by federal regulators, while the company said building along existing infrastructure was too costly.  

“I’ve never done anything like that before in my life,” Else said of becoming a citizen intervenor during the Arizona Corporation Commission’s (ACC) permitting process for SunZia, a role that allows citizens impacted by a project to directly participate in its permitting by providing sworn testimony and cross-examining witnesses. “I had no idea what I was getting into.” 

Fifteen years since the project was first proposed and nearly a decade after state regulators began reviewing the project, Else is still involved, suing the ACC, which regulates state utilities, over its issuing of a certificate of environmental compatibility (CEC) to SunZia. The suit argues that the development has fundamentally changed since it was narrowly approved in 2016 and no longer benefits Arizona. 

When SunZia was approved, the project planned to build two side-by-side power lines and connect to a planned substation in Bowie, Arizona. One of the lines built would be an alternating current line, enabling other energy projects in southern Arizona to connect to the grid, while the other would be a direct current line, which doesn’t easily allow for interconnection and is best used for sending large amounts of energy over long distances. But since Pattern Energy purchased the project in 2022, only the DC line is being built after the ACC agreed to separate the permits for both of the lines. The AC line currently lacks the funding to begin construction, and all of the project’s wind energy is slated to be sold in California, where it’s worth more. 

“As a matter of law, the Commission cannot approve a CEC when on one side of the balance is zero (no Arizona purchasers) or noneconomical power, and on the other side is environmental and ecological harm,” the lawsuit reads. “This is an independent reason to remand: the Commission must require Pattern to put on evidence of actual need in Arizona.”

Else’s lawsuit is just the latest in a series of challenges facing SunZia, the biggest renewable energy project in U.S. history, despite construction on the project having already begun. Fights over the development are playing out in state and federal courts. 

Transmission lines are vital to the energy grid and a major component of the transition away from fossil fuels. The lines send energy, often generated in remote places, over long distances, typically to major urban centers. But building them can be a long and tedious process, involving regulators from various states and federal agencies and the consultation and feedback of local and tribal communities, environmental groups and others. 

[mariacallous]

On June 10, a petition appeared on the website of Ukraine’s Cabinet of Ministers calling on the country’s authorities to block the video-sharing app TikTok. The document has already gathered nearly half of the signatures necessary for lawmakers to be required to consider it. It argues that because TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, is Chinese, and China is one of Russia’s partners, the app could pose a threat to Ukraine’s national security. The initiative comes just two months after Washington gave the Chinese firm an ultimatum, giving it nine months to sell TikTok to an American company if it wants to avoid a block in the U.S. Here’s what we know about the campaign to ban TikTok in Ukraine.

A new petition published on the Ukrainian government’s website calls on the country’s lawmakers to block TikTok for the sake of national security. The document asserts that China openly collaborates with Russia and supports it in its war against Ukraine. It also says that Chinese law allows companies to collect information about TikTok users that can subsequently be used for espionage and intelligence purposes. Additionally, the author says that China has the ability to influence ByteDance’s content policy, including by using TikTok to spread propaganda messages or launch algorithm-driven disinformation campaigns.

The petition cites comments made by U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy John Plumb about how China has purportedly used its cyber capabilities to steal confidential information from both public and private U.S. institutions, including its defense industrial base, for decades. It proposes blocking TikTok on Ukrainian territories and banning its use on phones belonging to state officials and military personnel.

The signature collection period for the petition began on June 10. The document’s author is listed as “Oksana Andrusyak,” though this person’s identity is unclear, and Ukrainian media have had difficulty determining who she is. Nonetheless, the petition garnered about 9,000 signatures in the campaign’s first two days, and as of this article’s publication, it has nearly 11,000 supporters. To be officially considered by Ukrainian lawmakers, the document must receive a total of 25,000 signatures within three months.

This isn’t the first time the Ukrainian authorities have discussed banning TikTok. In April 2024, people’s deputy Yaroslav Yurchyshyn, the head of the Verkhovna Rada’s Committee on Freedom of Speech, said in an interview with RBC-Ukraine that such a ban would be well-founded. “If our partner country imposes such sanctions, then so will we,” he told journalists, referring to the possibility of a TikTok ban in the U.S.

It’s currently unclear whether Ukrainian lawmakers already have plans to block TikTok. According to Forbes Ukraine, however, there is legislation in development that would impose new regulations on social media sites and messenger services, including TikTok.

[rabbitcruiser]

Caesars Palace, NV (No. 5)

The Forum Shops at Caesars, also known as The Forum Shops, is an upscale shopping mall on the Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada. It is connected to the Caesars Palace resort, and both feature a Roman theme. The mall project was announced in 1987. It was developed and initially owned by The Gordon Company and Melvin Simon & Associates. The land had previously been used for the unsuccessful Caesars Palace Grand Prix. Construction of the Forum Shops began in 1990, and the project opened on May 1, 1992, with 240,000 sq ft (22,000 m2) of leasable space. An expansion opened in 1997. Simon subsequently took over full ownership, and another expansion was opened in 2004.

The mall has 675,000 sq ft (62,700 m2) and approximately 160 tenants, including various restaurants. It has also offered several shows featuring animatronic statues. Until 2016, the Forum Shops was the highest grossing mall in the U.S., measured in terms of sales per square foot.

Like Caesars Palace, a Roman theme is used throughout the Forum Shops. The mall features an abundance of marble, and several fountains are located inside and out. The interior includes sky-painted ceilings which change from day to night.

The mall has 675,000 sq ft (62,700 m2) of leasable tenant space. It has approximately 160 tenants, including 145 retailers and 15 restaurants. The mall receives an average of 50,000 visitors per day. Approximately 20 percent of the mall's clientele are local residents, with tourists making up the remainder. By 1997, the Forum Shops had become the highest grossing mall in the U.S., measured in terms of sales per square foot.[19][49] It would retain this title until 2016.

The three-story expansion includes a skylight, and features several spiral escalators, created by Mitsubishi Electric. The company spent two years developing the escalators, and took another nine months to install them. At the time, the Forum Shops was one of only two projects in the U.S. to use spiral escalators, joining the Westfield San Francisco Centre shopping mall.

Source: Wikipedia