Repair stuff, earn large awards? Perhaps, if this concept for restore bounties takes off. The group is dubbed the FULU Basis, for “Freedom from Unethical Limitations on Customers,” and was co-founded by right-to-repair activist Kevin O’Reilly and perennial Huge Tech thorn-in-the-side Louis Rossman. The working mannequin works a bit just like the bug bounty system, however in reverse: FULU posts money bounties on consumer-hostile merchandise, like fridges that DRM their water filters or bricked thermostats. The bounty begins at $10,000, however can enhance primarily based on donations from the general public. FULU will match these donations as much as $10,000, doubtlessly making a really wealthy pot for the individual or workforce that fixes the issue.
To this point, it seems like FULU has awarded two $14,000 bounties for separate options to the bricked Nest thermostats. A second $10,000 bounty, for an air air purifier with DRM’d filters, is below evaluate. There’s additionally a $30,000 bounty excellent for an answer to the element pairing drawback in Xbox Sequence X gaming consoles. Whereas we love the thought of placing bounties on consumer-unfriendly merchandise and practices, and we have a good time the fixes found to this point, we will’t assist however fear that this might go dramatically fallacious for the bounty hunters, if — OK, when — somebody at a Huge Tech firm decides to struggle again. When that occurs, any bounty they rating goes to appear like small potatoes in comparison with a DMCA crackdown.
From the “Attention-grabbing occasions, fascinating issues” Division comes this announcement by NASA of a change in vendor for the bottom help autos for the Artemis program. The US house company had been all set to make use of EVs manufactured by Canoo to whisk astronauts on the nine-mile journey from their prep facility to the launch pad, however when the corporate went stomach up earlier this yr, issues abruptly modified. Now, as an alternative of the tiny electrical vans that look the identical coming and going, NASA will revert to kind and use modified Airstream coaches to do the job. Actually, we expect this shall be higher for the astronauts. The inside of the Airstream is spacious, permitting for big seats to accommodate cumbersome spacesuits and even offering sufficient headroom to face up, a troublesome proposition within the outsized breadloaf form-factor of the Canoo EV. In the event that they’re going to strap you into a few million kilos of explosives and blast you to the Moon, the least they’ll do is make the previous few miles on Earth just a little extra comfy.
Talking of house, we stumbled throughout an fascinating story about time on Mars that offered a little bit of a “Effectively, duh!” second with intriguing implications. The article goes into a few of the particulars about clocks operating slower on Mars in comparison with Earth, because of the decrease mass of the Crimson Planet and the decreased gravity. That was the “duh” half for us, as was the “Einstein was proper” bit within the title, however we didn’t understand that the distinction could be so giant — virtually half a millisecond. Whereas which may not sound like a lot, it may have big implications when contemplating human exploration of Mars and even eventual colonization. All the things from the Martian equal of GPS to a mixed Earth-Mars Web would want to take the differing idea of what a second is into consideration. Taking issues a bit additional, would future native-born Martians even need to use models of measurement primarily based on these developed across the processes and parameters of the Outdated World? Looks as if they may favor a system of time primarily based on their planet’s orbital and rotational traits. And why would they measure something in meters, being primarily based (a minimum of initially) on the space between the North Pole and the equator on a line passing by way of Paris — or was it Greenwich? No matter; it wasn’t Mars, and that’s most likely going to develop into a sticking level sometime. And also you thought the U.S. versus the metric system conflict was dangerous!
Sticking with house information, what does it take to be a U.S. Area Pressure guardian? Brains and brawn, apparently, as the 2025 “Guardian Enviornment” competitors kicked off this week at Florida’s Area Pressure Base Patrick. Guardians, as Area Pressure members are recognized, compete as groups in each bodily and psychological challenges, equivalent to pushing Humvees and calculating orbital properties of a satellite tv for pc. Thirty-five models from throughout the Area Pressure compete for the title of Finest Unit, with the emphasis on teamwork. It’s not fairly the Colonial Marines, nevertheless it’s fairly shut.
And eventually, Canada is getting in on the classic pc bandwagon with the first-ever VCF Montreal. In simply a few weeks, Canadian classic pc buffs will get collectively on the Royal Army Faculty of Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu for a formidable slate of audio system, together with our pal “Curious Marc” Verdiell, expounding on his workforce’s efforts to unlock the secrets and techniques of the Apollo program’s digital communications system. Together with the talks, there’s an extended listing of exhibitors and distributors. The present kicks off on January 24, so get your tickets whilst you can.
