Nasa Beamed 484 Gigabytes From The Moon, And It Could Redefine How Humans Experience Deep Space Forever

I noted on a previous post that nasa was using a laser to send compressed data back to earth. It had less lag than a traditional radio broadcast (as we used in Apollo), and contained way more data in the stream. They were able to broadcast near HD video from the spacecraft. 

Here some additional details on how this worked, and what they learned. 

https://dailygalaxy.com/2026/05/nasa-just-beamed-484-gigabytes-from-moon/

Scientists “bottle the sun” with a liquid battery that stores solar energy | ScienceDaily

The intent here is:

Researchers at UC Santa Barbara believe they may have found an answer that avoids the need for massive battery systems or reliance on the electrical grid. Writing in the journal Science, Associate Professor Grace Han and her research team describe a new material capable of absorbing sunlight, storing that energy in chemical bonds, and later releasing it as heat whenever needed. The material is based on a modified organic molecule called pyrimidone and represents a new step forward in Molecular Solar Thermal (MOST) energy storage technology.

Now that’s an advancement in a clean energy storage system. 

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2026/05/260513221821.htm

The DOJ Is Demanding Apple And Google Identify Over 100,000 Users Of This Car App

This can’t end well. The DOJ asking for a list of everyone who downloaded an app sets a dangerous precedent for surveillance. These people may not have done anything wrong, or perhaps downloaded it in error. 

And yet their names will appear on a list that will surely lead to enforcement.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2026/05/14/government-demands-apple-and-google-identify-over-100000-users-of-car-app/

World’s largest operating tokamak restarts with 8-meter coils upgrade

Europe and Asia continue to lead in finding alternative fuel sources. Here’s a story about a tokamak that is being tested. 

A tokamak is an experimental device that uses powerful magnetic fields to confine a superheated plasma in the shape of a donut (torus). It is the leading design for harnessing nuclear fusion—the process that powers the sun—to create clean, limitless, and on-demand energy on Earth.

 

https://interestingengineering.com/energy/largest-operating-tokamak-begins-commissioning

California farmer prepares to rip up 9-year-old peach trees worth $12,500/acre after largest buyer collapsed

This is the story of fallout from sweeping changes by this administration. However it’s framed, Delmonte closed a packing plant, laid off workers, and now the effects are being felt by the growers who supplied produce. 

And of course, we’ll feel it at the grocery stores when we are unable to get fresh produce. 

FAFO indeed. 

https://finance.yahoo.com/sectors/energy/articles/california-farmer-prepares-rip-9-093500462.html

Soarin over the USA

In case you missed the memo, the Soarin’ attraction at Epcot made a change this week to temporarily go from “Soarin around the world” to “Soarin over the USA” in honor of our nations 250th anniversary (or as Patrick refers to it: the Semiquincentennial; And yes, his opening bit is cute)

Some kind soul recorded it and put it online. And my honest opinion is that it sucks. 

It’s a lot of CGI and things don’t look “right”… plus the things they chose to show aren’t really representative of America. What of our historical places, landmarks that really define  the country, our great national parks (and the redwoods maybe?), or a sense of how vast our country is?

It’s just underwhelming. I am disappointed that Disney whiffed on this opportunity. Especially given how good they often are at such things. 

You can watch it here: 

https://youtu.be/4ZAfniMD8So

And not only that, they turned off the soarin challenge - the game that you can play while in line. A game which I have led several times! 

To be fair, I opted to write some code which reads the question and gives the right answer most of the time, within milliseconds. But it was always fun to see my player on the leaderboard. 

 

A cautionary tale about spirit airlines

What happened a few weeks ago with Spirit airlines is maybe a little dispiriting (pun intended) for several specific reasons: we lost a low cost carrier that drove the competition to keep pricing down, there were many thousands of workers who were laid off, and we got a not-so-great lesson in economics.

Its that lesson that I wanted to talk about.  Spirit was a Fort Lauderdale - based airline, and that made it an employer of note in my hometown.  Did I love them?  No.  Had I ever flown them?  Also no.  But they drove some amount of economy here locally. 

Sometime around 2016, Frontier looked to acquire them, but the price point was too low, and the shareholders rejected that.  Then, in 2022, there was a much-hyped offer for JetBlue to acquire them. This one was complicated.  It wasn't entirely clear what JetBlue would get out of it, other than adding planes and some routes to its portfolio.  But it wasn't.a great fit and there was internal strife, and several rejections by shareholders and the board was also wwrking to reject it.

Ultimately, it was nixed by the Biden-era DOJ who said that allowing them to merge would raise prices and stifle competition.  To be fair, if the DOJ had allowed it to proceed, its still possible (maybe even likely) that the board of JetBlue would have killed the deal anyway.  But, sure, lets "blame it on Biden" ...

The thing that was clear 4 years ago was that without a change, Spirit would not be able to continue operation for very long.  It was a well-known fact that they needed operating capital in an ever-changing landscape.

Enter private equity in around 2024, who bought stakes in the airline and helped manage it along, with an intent to have it sold somewhere.  

But it still wasn't enough, and in early 2026, Spirit needed an influx of capital.  The airline and the private equity ownership asked the government for a bailout. 

The T-rump administration asked for a 90% stake in the company, which would make it government owned.  The board of Spirit wasn't aligned with that.  And that private equity firm said no thanks; there would be little return for them.

So they declared bankruptcy, and are selling their planes, and their routes to other airlines (notably: JetBlue).  And in the end, they. went out of business and we lost a low-cost airline anyway.  Based on the desire to have it be state run, its funny that almost no one is saying "blame it on T-rump" and point back to the failed merger as their reason for the bankruptcy.

But its as much the problem of private equity as anything.

Is sad that the media can't wrap their head around all that's happened here.  The debt should get mostly paid off, but the private equity firm will also get a nice payout for their "help" ... and as always, we consumers get screwed.