> On TV, Copilot takes on a "friendly, animated presence" that resembles

So, this is "your plastic pal that's fun to be with", right?

Can't wait for the models with Genuine People Personality to come out :-D

Fellow Deutsch duo student here, on a 5y streak (paid plan)

While I do see the occasional AI slop in there and it's annoying, I think the product is still good. My own complain with it is that the course is too short, you'll finish it before getting to more advanced concepts or sentence structures, and then what?

Myself, I've restarted the course two times (using different "from" languages each time) in order to keep practicing, but when I finish this third round, there is no other language that I speak and can use to practice German. What's next then? What are you looking at?

Myself, I like to complement Duolingo with a daily listen to "Langsam Nachrichten", news bites read slowly and with simple vocab, from the Deutschewelle: https://learngerman.dw.com/de/... (I have it on my podcast app, new episode ready every day)

I also always liked Coffee Break German, but haven't tried their premium course yet, only the free podcast (which is really good) https://coffeebreaklanguages.c...

Bis bald!

Someone got paid to come-up with that, even if all they did was a half-assed prompt to generate it.

And a few people saw that at a meeting and concluded it was good enough.

Sad times, that monstrosity is all distorted and looks horrible.

Just... no. Do not want.

Not that I claim to understand any of the science here, but wanted to say that your claim about time "running faster in the middle of a void" brought to mind the notion of the "zones of thought" from the fantastic book series A" Fire Upon the Deep", by Vernor Vinge :)

Perhaps it would be better if that wasn't the case...

Well, to be fair, it is easier to fire than it is to hire (strictly from the standpoint of judging competence).

When you hire you go from a limited set of interviews and maybe some testing and dynamics. When you fire you (hopefully) are being supported by a track record which shows that for whatever reason, it did not work out (not always, there's also blanket firing for "reasons".)

That's a good option too! When I read the summary I was inclined to suggest that they bolt the experiments on the next iterations to the sides of the craft instead of the floor. Just in case, you know :-)

I view BO's (heh) New Shepard as roughly on par with the risk of everyday commercial air flight. Some factors increase risk, while others (like the fact that the entire spacecraft is thoroughly checked out between flights and telemetered to heck and back) reduce risk. So overall I think it's probably a wash.

It goes straight up and comes straight back down. Atmospheric re-entry heating is a fraction of that of an orbital re-entry.

The capsule is aerodynamically stable on re-entry. The part that should point forward, will always point forward.

The flight is so short that even if atmospheric conditioning failed, as long as the capsule maintains pressure, there should be plenty of breathable atmo for the duration. This is reinforced by the fact that the New Shepard crew are not required to wear pressure suits.

The LES is a simple solid rocket motor - ignite and it will burn, no valves or propellant pressurization to worry about, so it is as sure to work as about anything else in this world, to get you away from the going-boom rocket behind (plus it has already been demostrated both in tests and in a real-life booster failure).

So, I don't think it was that much of a step for JB to ride the first crewed bird, from a technical perspective. And of course there's other reasons why he might want to be on the first flight, but I'll leave it to others to expound on those aspects...

Minor correction there: you mixed latitude and longitude ....

- Oiapoque is at 4 degrees latitude North (above the equator), and
- Chui (not Sombrio) is at 34 degrees latitude South

Solar noon does not indeed vary much between them as they sit at a similar latitude (52 West for Oiapoque and 53 West Chui). What varies, immensely, is the duration of the day and night cycles, which vary little on Oiapoque (close to the equator line) and a lot in Chui (further away).

Still, the point about Brazil needing two or maybe three timezones is a valid one.

Doing the Vulcan neck-pinch on the punk on the bus with the boombox was a good start...

Intuit has every right to ask the question (and they did, but in the form of a "demand"), and The Verge has every right to decline (which they did). That's the best possible outcome in my book, because it adds just a little bit more out there for people to see, and learn about Intuit's shenanegans.

If Intuit really thought they had a leg to stand on (they don't), the request would have come from their lawyers. But it came from the communications director - who, I'd wager, got his metaphorical wee-wee slapped after the fact for not preparing the top dog to answer that particular question in a way that would be least-bad for Intuit, which of course was bound to come up, and is now trying to save face.

I've never used a product like TurboTax. In my youth, I did my federal taxes by hand, on paper, and mailed them in. Now I use a tax professional. I can do that, but many other people can't for various reasons, and I look forward to the day when such products is legislated out of existance.

iPhone's 80% Charge Cap Barely Boosts Battery Life in the first year

It's entirely possible that there will be a bigger benefit at the end of the second or third year. Maybe the year-over-year dropoff will be along the lines of 6%, 12%, 18% instead of 6%, 18%, 36%. If your battery is good enough that an 80% charge gets you through the day, it seems there's no reason not to.