Uncrewed Blue Origin capsule lands safely after New Shepard rocket failure

Blue Origin’s recent NS-23 flight didn’t go according to plan. On Monday morning, the private space firm was forced to abort the uncrewed mission after one of its New Shepard rockets suffered an unspecified “booster failure.” The problem came up about a minute after the flight took off from Blue Origin’s West Texas launch site at 10:26AM ET. You can see the entire incident unfold in the video the company shared on Twitter.

“It appears we have experienced an anomaly with today’s flight,” a commentator said during the NS-23 livestream. “This was unplanned and we don’t have any details yet. But our crew capsule was able to escape successfully, we’ll follow its progress through landing. As you can see, the drogues have deployed, and the mains are going to be pulled out next.”

The capsule was carrying NASA-funded research equipment. “It’s useless to speculate about what happened at this point. Not even the company knows the cause,” tweeted Eric Berger, senior space editor at Ars Technica, adding in a separate post that had the spacecraft been manned, the crew “would have felt a serious jolt, but would have been safe.”

Blue Shepard won’t be able to fly again until Blue Origin investigates the incident and the Federal Aviation Administration signs off on the company’s findings. 

Sony’s next State of Play will highlight 10 PS4, PS5 and PS VR2 titles

Sony’s next State of Play preview event is going down on Tuesday, September 13th at 6pm ET, the company announced via Twitter Monday. “We’ll have some great updates from our amazing Japanese partners and developers all around the world,” Sony noted in a subsequent tweet. “Expect about ~20 minutes covering 10 upcoming games.”

Further details regarding which games will be showcased were not provided, however Sony has repeatedly focused on PS VR2 titles during the past two events, seemingly intent on teasing all of the nearly two dozen “major” titles — including from the Among Us and Horizon franchises — which are scheduled to launch alongside the next generation headset.  

The State of Play will live stream through PlayStation’s Twitch and YouTube channels. Gaming fans will be in for a treat tomorrow, as this afternoon event follows Nintendo’s next Direct stream, which is happening Tuesday morning, at 10am ET.

Twitter starts rolling out podcasts to Blue subscribers

Twitter has begun rolling out its redesigned Spaces tab. Starting today, Twitter Blue members on iOS can check out the new interface element through the subscription’s early access Labs feature. The tab brings together live and recorded Spaces, and eve…

Google’s iOS 16 lock screen widgets include a shortcut to Chrome’s Dino game

Apple released iOS 16 earlier today, and one of the more notable features the update introduces is a redesigned lock screen experience. For the first time, Apple is letting you customize the typeface and accent color of on-screen elements like the date…

Canon R10 review: 4K and fast shooting speeds for less than $1,000

From the moment Canon launched the full-frame mirrorless EOS R, everyone wondered if it would use the same mount for APS-C cameras and effectively kill the EF-M system. It did just that in May, launching not just one but two RF APS-C cameras. One was t…

watchOS 9 is now available

Alongside iOS 16, Apple has released watchOS 9. To install the update on your smartwatch, you’ll first need to download iOS 16 on your iPhone. You can do that by opening the Settings app and then tapping “General,” followed by “Software” and lastly “Update.” If you own an Apple Watch Series 3, you won’t get access to the software as Apple is dropping support for its 2017 wearable. It’s also worth noting that not every watchOS 9 feature will be available on every Apple Watch and in every region.  

As with past updates, fitness is a major focus of watchOS 9. You’ll now see your heart rate zones when working out and reviewing your sleep patterns. There’s also support for multisport workouts and a way to monitor your personal best performances. Additionally, you can set up to the software to remind you to take your medications. Other new features include a redesigned interface for Siri, Quick actions and a handful of new watch faces.

iOS 16 is now available

The wait is over. Apple has released iOS 16 to the public. You can download the latest version of the company’s mobile operating system by opening the Settings app on your iPhone and tapping on “General,” followed by “Software” and then “Update.” The software is available on the iPhone 8 and later. 

The theme of iOS 16 is personalization. Apple redesigned the iPhone’s lock screen to give you more control over the interface. You can now tweak the typeface and accent color of the on-screen clock and date to more closely match your wallpaper. Additionally, you can add widgets to your home screen and change the information that’s displayed toward the top of the screen. It’s now also possible to create multiple lock screens and tie them to specific focus modes. Complementing those changes are redesigned notifications that support a feature called Live Activities that makes it easier to track things like scores and Uber rides.         

Other notable new features include the ability to edit and unsend messages in iMessage. You can also mark texts as unread to remind you to read them later. On the iPhone XS and later, you can use the Photos app to copy an object from an image and paste it somewhere else without a background. Apple has also added support for passkeys to add an extra layer of security to your online credentials. Passkeys will work with non-Apple products and they’re available through your iCloud Keychain.

One thing to note about today’s update is that iPadOS 16 will arrive at a later date to give Apple more time to polish the software’s Stage Manager feature.