Discord is [1]testing "Discord Orbs," a new in-app currency that [2]rewards users for engaging with interactive ads and promotional Quests . The Verge reports:

> In addition to spending Orbs on regular items on the Discord Shop, users can exchange the digital tokens for Orb exclusives like special badges or 3-day passes to try out Discord's subscription service, Discord Nitro. Discord says Orbs are rolling out globally to a "small number" of its users to start before a wider rollout. If you're part of the beta test for Orbs, you will get a notification like the one below.

>

> Before this, publishers or brands that offered Quests had to provide their own rewards -- things like avatar decorations or in-game bonuses. They can still do that if they want, Discord spokesperson Bradley Sheets tells The Verge in an email; awarding Orbs is simply an alternative option.



[1] https://discord.com/blog/checkpoint-3-leveling-up-discord-quests-with-orbs-and-advanced-measurement

[2] https://www.theverge.com/news/675481/discord-orbs-currency-quests-ads

The world is facing a new form of climate denial -- not the dismissal of climate science, but a concerted attack on the idea that the economy can be reorganised to fight the crisis, the president of global climate talks has warned. The Guardian [1]reports :

> Andre Correa do Lago, the veteran Brazilian diplomat who will direct this year's UN summit, Cop30, believes his biggest job will be to counter the attempt from some vested interests to prevent climate policies aimed at shifting the global economy to a low-carbon footing.

>

> "There is a new kind of opposition to climate action. We are facing a discredit of climate policies. I don't think we are facing climate denial," he said, referring to the increasingly desperate attempts to pretend there is no consensus on climate science that have plagued climate action for the past 30 years. "It's not a scientific denial, it's an economic denial." This economic denial could be just as dangerous and cause as much delay as repeated attempts to deny climate science in previous years, he warned in an exclusive interview with the Guardian.



[1] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/may/28/andre-correa-do-lago-cop30-interview-climate-crisis

A security researcher has discovered an exposed database [1]containing 184 million login credentials for major services including Apple, Facebook, and Google accounts, along with credentials linked to government agencies across 29 countries. Jeremiah Fowler found the 47-gigabyte trove in early May, but the database contained no identifying information about its owner or origins.

The records included plaintext passwords and usernames for accounts spanning Netflix, PayPal, Discord, and other major platforms. A sample analysis revealed 220 email addresses with government domains from countries including the United States, China, and Israel. Fowler told Wired he suspects the data was compiled by cybercriminals using infostealer malware. World Host Group, which hosted the database, shut down access after Fowler's report and described it as content uploaded by a "fraudulent user." The company said it would cooperate with law enforcement authorities.



[1] https://www.wired.com/story/mysterious-database-logins-governments-social-media/

CD Projekt Red's (CDPR) sequel to Cyberpunk 2077, which the studio is now calling Cyberpunk 2, has [1]moved from a "conceptual phase" into preproduction , according to an earnings report released on Wednesday. The Verge:

> Cyberpunk 2 isn't the official title, CDPR senior PR manager Ola Sondej tells The Verge. "'Cyberpunk 2' just means it's another game in the Cyberpunk universe." The game has had the codename of "Project Orion" since it was announced in 2022.

>

> CDPR hasn't shared many details about the game, but did describe it on Wednesday as "the next big game set in the Cyberpunk universe." There are 96 developers working on the title as of April 30th, according to a slide deck. There's no official release date, either, though on an investor call, joint chief executive officer Michal Nowakowski said that the company would deliver the game "in due time."



[1] https://www.theverge.com/news/675651/cd-projekt-red-cyberpunk-2-project-orion

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge:

> Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced Wednesday that the U.S. would [1]restrict visas for "foreign nationals who are responsible for censorship of protected expression in the United States ." He called it "unacceptable for foreign officials to issue or threaten arrest warrants on U.S. citizens or U.S. residents for social media posts on American platforms while physically present on U.S. soil" and "for foreign officials to demand that American tech platforms adopt global content moderation policies or engage in censorship activity that reaches beyond their authority and into the United States."

>

> It's not yet clear how or against whom the policy will be enforced, but seems to implicate Europe's Digital Services Act, a law that came into effect in 2023 with the goal of making online platforms safer by imposing requirements on the largest platforms around removing illegal content and providing transparency about their content moderation. Though it's not mentioned directly in the press release about the visa restrictions, the Trump administration has slammed the law on multiple occasions, including in [2]remarks earlier this year by Vice President JD Vance.

>

> The State Department's homepage currently links to an [3]article on its official Substack , where senior advisor for the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor Samuel Samson critiques the DSA as a tool to "silence dissident voices through Orwellian content moderation." He adds, "Independent regulators now police social media companies, including prominent American platforms like X, and threaten immense fines for non-compliance with their strict speech regulations."

"We will not tolerate encroachments upon American sovereignty," Rubio says in the announcement, "especially when such encroachments undermine the exercise of our fundamental right to free speech."



[1] https://www.theverge.com/news/675811/us-immigration-visas-censorship-content-moderation-europe-digital-services-act

[2] https://www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/europe-looks-embrace-ai-paris-summits-2nd-day-while-global-consensus-unclear-2025-02-11/

[3] https://statedept.substack.com/p/the-need-for-civilizational-allies-in-europe

According to [1]Bloomberg's Mark Gurman (paywalled), this year's iOS update won't be called iOS 19. "Instead, Apple is [2]planning to call it 'iOS 26 ' as part of a new year-based naming strategy," reports 9to5Mac. The new naming scheme will apply to all of Apple's software platforms. From the report:

> Bloomberg explains that Apple is making this change to "bring consistency to its branding and move away from an approach that can be confusing to customers and developers." The branding alignment comes as Apple is also reportedly planning dramatic redesigns for all of its platforms. The goal seems to be to unify everything both in terms of naming and design.



[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-05-28/apple-to-rebrand-device-operating-systems-ios-26-macos-26-watchos-26?srnd=undefined

[2] https://9to5mac.com/2025/05/28/ios-26-coming-next-month/

Telegram has [1]partnered with xAI to integrate the Grok chatbot into its platform for one year, with xAI [2]paying $300 million in cash and equity . Telegram will also receive 50% of subscription revenue from Grok. TechCrunch reports:

> Earlier this year, xAI made the Grok chatbot available to Telegram's premium users. It seems Grok might now be made available to all users. A video posted by [Telegram CEO Pavel Durov] on X suggested that Grok can be pinned on top of chats within the app, and users can also ask questions to Grok from the search bar. Notably, Meta has also integrated Meta AI into the search bar on Instagram and WhatsApp. The video also shows that you will be able to use Grok for writing suggestions, summarizing chats, links, and documents, and creating stickers. Grok will supposedly also help answer questions for businesses and assist with moderation.

UPDATE: In a response to Durov's X post outlining the partnership, Elon Musk [3]said : "No deal has been signed."

"Musk's denial, however, raises questions about the status and structure of the agreement," reports [4]TheStreet . "It's unclear whether the partnership has been formalized or if Durov was announcing a framework that remains under discussion. Neither Telegram nor xAI has issued a follow-up clarification."



[1] https://x.com/durov/status/1927697402095378432

[2] https://techcrunch.com/2025/05/28/xai-to-pay-300m-in-telegram-integrate-grok-into-app/

[3] https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1927839555828220165

[4] https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/markets/elon-musk-has-a-blunt-response-to-telegram-founders-300m-ai-deal-claim

An anonymous reader quotes a report from 9to5Google:

> Google Photos was announced at I/O 2015 and the company is now [1]celebrating the app's 10th birthday with a redesign of the photo editor . Google is [2]redesigning the Photos editor so that it "provides helpful suggestions and puts all our powerful editing tools in one place." It starts with a new fullscreen viewer that places the date, time, and location at the top of your screen. Meanwhile, it's now Share, Edit, Add to (instead of Lens), and Trash at the bottom.

>

> Once editing, Google Photos has moved controls for aspect ratio, flip, and rotate to be above the image. In the top-left corner, we have Auto Frame, which debuted in Magic Editor on the Pixel 9, to fill-in backgrounds and is now coming to more devices. Underneath, we get options for Enhance, Dynamic, and "AI Enhance" in the Auto tab. That's followed by Lighting, Color, and Composition, as well as a search shortcut: "You can use AI-powered suggestions that combine multiple effects for quick edits in a variety of tailored options, or you can tap specific parts of an image to get suggested tools for editing that area."

>

> The editor allows you to circle or "tap specific parts of an image to get suggested tools for editing that area." This includes the subject, background, or some other aspect. You then see the Blur background, Add portrait light, Sharpen, Move and Reimagine appear in the example below. We also see the redesigned sliders throughout this updated interface. This Google Photos editor redesign "will begin rolling out globally to Android devices next month, with iOS following later this year." We already know the app is set for a [3]Material 3 Expressive redesign . Meanwhile, Google Photos is starting to roll out the ability to share albums with a QR code. This method makes for easy viewing and adding with people nearby. Google even suggests printing it out when in (physical) group settings.

Google shared a few tips, tricks and tools for the new editor in a [4]blog post .



[1] https://9to5google.com/2025/05/28/google-photos-10th-birthday/

[2] https://blog.google/products/photos/picture-this-fresh-approach-to-photos/

[3] https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/05/06/2119207/google-accidentally-reveals-androids-material-3-expressive-interface

[4] https://blog.google/products/photos/google-photos-10-years-tips-tricks/

Japan Post has launched a "digital address" system that links seven-digit combinations of numbers and letters [1]to physical addresses . From a report:

> Under [2]the system , users can input these seven-digit codes on online shopping websites, and their addresses will automatically appear on the sites.

>

> People can obtain digital addresses by registering with Japan Post's Yu ID membership service. Their digital addresses will not change even if their physical addresses change. Their new addresses will be linked to the codes if they submit notices of address changes.



[1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/business/2025/05/27/companies/japan-post-digital-address/

[2] https://lp.da.pf.japanpost.jp/

The world faces an 80% probability of breaking another annual temperature record within the next five years, according to a forecast released Wednesday by the World Meteorological Organization and the UK Meteorological Office.

The projections, derived from more than 200 computer simulations run by 10 global scientific centers, indicate an 86% chance that [1]one of the next five years will surpass the 1.5 degrees Celsius warming threshold established by the Paris climate accord, with a 70% chance that the entire five-year period will average above that milestone.

For the first time, the agencies identified a slight possibility that global annual temperatures could reach the more alarming 2 degrees Celsius benchmark before the decade's end.



[1] https://apnews.com/article/climate-change-deadly-record-heat-wildfires-hurricanes-535b4df63b476d0f36ec553a1a78669d

Sales of blue book exam booklets have [1]surged dramatically across the nation as professors turn to analog solutions to prevent ChatGPT cheating. The University of California, Berkeley reported an 80% increase in blue book sales over the past two academic years, while Texas A&M saw 30% growth and the University of Florida recorded nearly 50% increases this school year. The surge comes as students who were freshmen when ChatGPT launched in 2022 approach senior year, having had access to AI throughout their college careers.



[1] https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/they-were-every-student-s-worst-nightmare-now-blue-books-are-back/ar-AA1FnEIg

An anonymous reader shares a report:

> Without seeking approval of the San Francisco Board of Education, Superintendent of Schools Maria Su plans to [1]unveil a new Grading for Equity plan on Tuesday that will go into effect this fall at 14 high schools and cover over 10,000 students. The school district is already negotiating with an outside consultant to train teachers in August in a system that awards a passing C grade to as low as a score of 41 on a 100-point exam.

>

> Were it not for an intrepid school board member, the drastic change in grading with implications for college admissions and career readiness would have gone unnoticed and unexplained. It is buried in a three-word phrase on the last page of a PowerPoint presentation embedded in the school board meeting's 25-page agenda. The plan comes during the last week of the spring semester while parents are assessing the impact of over $100 million in budget reductions and deciding whether to remain in the public schools this fall. While the school district acknowledges that parent aversion to this grading approach is typically high and understands the need for "vigilant communication," outreach to parents has been minimal and may be nonexistent. The school district's Office of Equity homepage does not mention it and a page containing the SFUSD definition of equity has not been updated in almost three years.

>

> Grading for Equity eliminates homework or weekly tests from being counted in a student's final semester grade. All that matters is how the student scores on a final examination, which can be taken multiple times. Students can be late turning in an assignment or showing up to class or not showing up at all without it affecting their academic grade. Currently, a student needs a 90 for an A and at least 61 for a D. Under the San Leandro Unified School District's grading for equity system touted by the San Francisco Unified School District and its consultant, a student with a score as low as 80 can attain an A and as low as 21 can pass with a D.



[1] https://thevoicesf.org/grading-for-equity-coming-to-san-francisco-high-schools-this-fall/

The recent surge in cyberattacks is pushing cyber insurers [1]toward a fundamental reassessment of premium pricing , Bloomberg reports, with industry analysts warning of an impending "inflection point" that could reshape the market. Marks & Spencer's [2]impending $404 million hit to its operating profit from a recent hack underscores claims that will "attract intense scrutiny from insurers," according to cybersecurity expert Adam Casey.

While incidents like this might not trigger immediate premium hikes across the board, they might likely contribute to an upward pricing trend. Panmure Liberum analyst Abid Hussain said that premiums have recently been falling as policy coverage has tightened, but the industry now faces a critical decision point. "There's going to be another step change, either in the policy wording or in the premiums, or both," Hussain said.



[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-05-28/cyberattack-surge-creates-opportunity-for-insurers-prompts-rethink-on-premiums

[2] https://it.slashdot.org/story/25/05/14/1050202/marks-and-spencer-confirms-hackers-stole-customers-personal-data-cyber-insurance-payout-to-be-worth-up-to-133-million

A [1]fairly comprehensive look at the early personal computer culture reveals that from 1975 through early 1977, personal computers remained "almost exclusively the province of hobbyists who loved to play with computers and found them inherently fascinating," according to newly surfaced historical research. When BYTE magazine launched in 1975, its cover called computers "the world's greatest toy," reflecting the recreational rather than practical focus of early adopters.

A BYTE magazine survey from late 1976 showed these pioneers were remarkably homogeneous: 72% held at least a bachelor's degree, had a median annual income of $20,000 ($123,000 in 2025 dollars), and were overwhelmingly male at 99%. Rather than developing practical software applications, early users gravitated toward games, particularly Star Trek simulations that appeared frequently in magazine advertisements and user group demonstrations.

The hobbyist community organized around local clubs like the famous Homebrew Computer Club, retail stores, and specialized magazines that helped establish what one researcher calls "a mythology of the microcomputer." This narrative positioned hobbyists as democratizing heroes who "ripped the computer and the knowledge of how to use it from the hands of the priests, sharing freedom and power with the masses," challenging what they termed the "computer priesthood" of institutional gatekeepers. This self-contained hobbyist culture would soon be "subsumed by a larger phenomenon" as businessmen began targeting mass markets in 1977.



[1] https://technicshistory.com/2025/05/24/the-hobby-computer-culture/

Great swathes of the planet's oceans have become [1]darker in the past two decades , according to researchers who fear the trend will have a severe impact on marine life around the world. From a report:

> Satellite data and numerical modelling revealed that more than a fifth of the global ocean darkened between 2003 and 2022, reducing the band of water that life reliant on sunlight and moonlight can thrive in. The effect is evident across 75m sq km (30m sq miles) of ocean, equivalent to the land area of Europe, Africa, China and North America combined, and disturbs the upper layer of water where 90% of marine species live.

>

> Dr Thomas Davies, a marine conservationist at the University of Plymouth, said the findings were a "genuine cause for concern," with potentially severe implications for marine ecosystems, global fisheries and the critical turnover of carbon and nutrients in the oceans. Most marine life thrives in the photic zones of the world's oceans, the surface layers that allow sufficient light through for organisms to exploit. While sunlight can reach a kilometre beneath the waves, in practice there is little below 200 metres.



[1] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/may/27/planets-darkening-oceans-pose-threat-marine-life-scientists-say

Japanese police referred five individuals and a company [1]to prosecutors last week for allegedly operating a website that published detailed movie plots without permission from rights holders. The Miyagi Prefectural Police Headquarters and Minamisanriku Police Station sent the case to the Sendai District Public Prosecutors Office on suspicion of violating the Copyright Act.

The Content Overseas Distribution Association described the case as having "very few precedents for a corporation being referred to the prosecutor's office on suspicion of violating the Copyright Act, making this an extremely rare case."

The website posted detailed content from films including "Godzilla Minus One" and four others copyrighted by Toho, "Shin Kamen Rider" and two others by Toei, "Neck" and one other by KADOKAWA, and "Shin Ultraman" by Tsuburaya Productions. The site listed more than 8,000 films with complete storylines, character names, dialogue, and scene descriptions.



[1] https://coda-cj.jp/news/2397/

A former Minnesota waitress unknowingly helped North Korean workers [1]steal $17.1 million in wages from over 300 American companies through an elaborate remote work scheme, federal prosecutors said this week. Christina Chapman operated a "laptop farm" from her home, managing dozens of computers that allowed North Koreans using stolen U.S. identities to work as legitimate tech employees.

The FBI estimates this broader infiltration involves thousands of North Korean workers generating hundreds of millions annually for the sanctions-hit regime. Chapman, recruited via LinkedIn in 2020 to serve as "the U.S. face" for overseas IT workers, handled logistics including receiving company laptops, installing remote access software, and processing falsified employment documents.

The North Korean workers accessed the devices daily from overseas, with some maintaining jobs for months or years at major American corporations. Chapman earned just under $177,000 before the FBI raided her Arizona operation in October 2023, seizing over 90 computers. She pleaded guilty in February to wire fraud, identity theft, and money laundering charges, facing up to nine years in prison at her July sentencing.



[1] https://www.wsj.com/business/north-korea-remote-jobs-e4daa727

In an interview with [1]Wired (paywalled), OnePlus co-founder and Nothing CEO, Carl Pei, said the future of smartphones will [2]center around the OS and AI to get things done -- rendering traditional apps a thing of the past. 9to5Google reports:

> Pei says that Nothing's strength is in "creativity," adding that "the creative companies of the past" such as Apple "have become very big and very corporate, and they're no longer very creative." He then dives into what else but AI, explaining that Nothing wants to create the "iPod" of AI, saying that Apple built a product that simply built a better user experience: "If you look back, the iPod was not launched as 'an MP3 player with a hard disk drive.' The hard disk drive was merely a means to a better user experience. AI is just a new technology that enables us to create better products for users. So, our strategy is not to make big claims that AI is going to change the world and revolutionize smartphones. For us, it's about using it to solve a consumer problem, not to tell a big story. We want the product to be the story."

>

> Pei then says that he doesn't see the current trend of AI products -- citing wearables such as smart glasses -- as the future of the technology. Rather, he sees the smartphone as the most important device for AI "for the foreseeable future," but as one that will "change dramatically." According to Pei, the future of the smartphone is one without apps, with the experience instead just revolving around the OS and what it can do and how it can "optimize" for the user, acting as a proactive, automated agent and that, in the end, the user "will spend less time doing boring things and more time on what they care about."



[1] https://www.wired.com/story/carl-pei-thinks-the-phone-of-the-future-will-only-have-one-app/

[2] https://9to5google.com/2025/05/27/nothing-carl-pei-smartphone-future-without-apps/

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols writes in an op-ed for The Register:

> I use AI a lot, but not to write stories. I use AI for search. When it comes to search, AI, especially Perplexity, is simply better than Google. Ordinary search has gone to the dogs. Maybe as Google goes gaga for AI, its search engine will get better again, but I doubt it. In just the last few months, I've noticed that [1]AI-enabled search, too, has been getting crappier .

>

> In particular, I'm finding that when I search for hard data such as market-share statistics or other business numbers, the results often come from bad sources. Instead of stats from 10-Ks, the US Securities and Exchange Commission's (SEC) mandated annual business financial reports for public companies, I get numbers from sites purporting to be summaries of business reports. These bear some resemblance to reality, but they're never quite right. If I specify I want only 10-K results, it works. If I just ask for financial results, the answers get... interesting. This isn't just Perplexity. I've done the exact same searches on all the major AI search bots, and they all give me "questionable" results.

>

> Welcome to Garbage In/Garbage Out (GIGO). Formally, in AI circles, this is known as AI model collapse. In an AI model collapse, AI systems, which are trained on their own outputs, gradually lose accuracy, diversity, and reliability. This occurs because errors compound across successive model generations, leading to distorted data distributions and "irreversible defects" in performance. The final result? A [2]Nature 2024 paper stated, "The model becomes poisoned with its own projection of reality." [...]

>

> We're going to invest more and more in AI, right up to the point that model collapse hits hard and AI answers are so bad even a brain-dead CEO can't ignore it. How long will it take? I think it's already happening, but so far, I seem to be the only one calling it. Still, if we believe OpenAI's leader and cheerleader, Sam Altman, who tweeted in February 2024 that "OpenAI now generates about 100 billion words per day," and we presume many of those words end up online, it won't take long.



[1] https://www.theregister.com/2025/05/27/opinion_column_ai_model_collapse/

[2] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07566-y

SpaceX's Starship Flight 9 successfully launched and reached space -- marking the first reuse of a Super Heavy booster -- but both rocket stages were [1]ultimately lost mid-mission due to a "rapid unscheduled disassembly ." SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said in a statement: "Starship made it to the scheduled ship engine cutoff, so big improvement over last flight! Leaks caused loss of main tank pressure during the coast and re-entry phase. Lot of good data to review." Musk said the next three Starship test launches could lift off every three to four weeks in the days ahead. Space.com reports:

> The mission lifted off from Starbase today at 7:37 p.m. EDT (2337 GMT; 6:37 p.m. local Texas time), sending the 40-story-tall rocket into the Texas sky atop a pillar of flame. It was a milestone launch, marking the first-ever reuse of a Super Heavy booster; this one earned its wings on Flight 7 in January. (SpaceX swapped out just four of its Raptors after that mission, meaning that 29 of the engines that flew today were flight-proven.) "Lessons learned from the first booster refurbishment and subsequent performance in flight will enable faster turnarounds of future reflights as progress is made towards vehicles requiring no hands-on maintenance between launches," the company wrote in a Flight 9 mission preview.

>

> The Super Heavy had a somewhat different job to do today; it conducted a variety of experiments on its way back down to Earth. For example, the booster performed a controlled rather than randomized return flip and hit the atmosphere at a different angle. "By increasing the amount of atmospheric drag on the vehicle, a higher angle of attack can result in a lower descent speed, which in turn requires less propellant for the initial landing burn," SpaceX wrote in the mission preview. "Getting real-world data on how the booster is able to control its flight at this higher angle of attack will contribute to improved performance on future vehicles, including the next generation of Super Heavy." These experiments complicated Super Heavy's flight profile compared to previous missions, making another "chopsticks" catch at Starbase a tougher proposition. So, rather than risk damaging the launch tower and other infrastructure, SpaceX decided to bring the booster back for a "hard splashdown" in the Gulf of Mexico on Flight 9. That was the plan, anyway; Super Heavy didn't quite make it that far. The booster broke apart about 6 minutes and 20 seconds into today's flight, just after beginning its landing burn. "Confirmation that the booster did demise," [Dan Huot, of SpaceX's communications team] said during the Flight 9 webcast. Super Heavy's flight ended "before it was able to get through landing burn," he added.

>

> Ship, by contrast, improved its performance a bit this time around. It reached space today on a suborbital trajectory that took it eastward over the Atlantic Ocean -- the same basic path the vehicle took on the truncated Flight 7 and Flight 8. But Flight 9 got choppy for Ship after that. The vehicle was supposed to deploy eight dummy versions of SpaceX's Starlink satellites about 18.5 minutes after liftoff, which would have been a landmark first for the Starship program. That didn't happen, however; the payload door couldn't open fully, so SpaceX abandoned the deployment try. Then, about 30 minutes after launch, Ship started to tumble, which was the result of a leak in Ship's fuel-tank systems, according to Huot. "A lot of those [tanks] are used for your attitude control," he said. "And so, at this point, we've essentially lost our attitude control with Starship." As a result, SpaceX nixed a plan to relight one of Ship's Raptor engines in space, a test that was supposed to happen about 38 minutes after launch. And the company gave up hope of a soft splashdown for the vehicle, instead becoming resigned to a breakup over the Indian Ocean during Ship's reentry.

>

> The company therefore will not get all the data it wanted about Flight 9. And there was quite a bit to get; for example, SpaceX removed some of Ship's heat-shield tiles to stress-test vulnerable areas, and it also tried out several different tile materials, including one with an active cooling system. But the company plans to bounce back and try again soon, just as it did after Flight 7 and Flight 8.

You can watch a recording of the launch [2]on YouTube .



[1] https://www.space.com/space-exploration/launches-spacecraft/spacex-launches-starship-flight-9-to-space-in-historic-reuse-of-giant-megarocket-video

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okOzxHN9NOA