Are Self-driving Cars The Next Crime Frontier?

Enlarge (credit: Honda) Global carmakers are stepping up their investment in hybrid technologies as consumers’ growing wariness over fully electric vehicles forces the industry to rapidly shift gear, according to top executives. A combination of still high interest rates and concern over inadequate charging infrastructure has chilled buyers’ enthusiasm for fully electric cars, prompting a rebound in sales of hybrid vehicles that most of the industry had long regarded as nothing more than a stop-gap. Tapping the resurgent demand for hybrids was a priority, executives from General Motors, Nissan, Hyundai, Volkswagen and Ford told the Financial Times’ Future of the Car Summit this week.

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images | SOPA Images ) T-Mobile is reportedly close to buying a portion of the regional carrier US Cellular, while Verizon has also held talks about buying some of US Cellular's assets. "T-Mobile is closing in on a deal to buy a chunk of the regional carrier for more than $2 billion, taking over some operations and wireless spectrum licenses, according to people familiar with the matter," The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday. When contacted by Ars today, T-Mobile said it doesn't "comment on rumors and speculation." US Cellular also said it doesn't "comment on rumors or speculation." T-Mobile is one of just three major nationwide carriers.

Enlarge / One of many human-created objects destroyed in Apple's "Crush!" ad for the iPad Pro. (credit: Apple) Earlier this week, Apple took the wraps off of a thoroughly leaked iPad Pro refresh with a 1 minute and 8 second ad spot wherein a gigantic hydraulic press comprehensively smushes a trumpet, an arcade cabinet, a record player, paint cans, a piano, a TV, sculptures, a bunch of emoji, and plenty of other tools that one might loosely categorize as "artistic implements." At the end of the ad, the press lifts away to reveal a somewhat thinner, somewhat faster version of Apple's iPad Pro.

Enlarge (credit: Graham Hughes/Bloomberg via Getty Images) The federal government is looking at a phantom braking problem that appears to be affecting the Fisker Ocean electric crossover. Earlier this week, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's Office of Defects Investigation opened a safety probe into the electric vehicle—its fourth so far.

Enlarge / Xorides praecatorius is a parasitoid wasp. (credit: TorriPhoto via Getty) If you puncture the ovary of a wasp called Microplitis demolitor, viruses squirt out in vast quantities, shimmering like iridescent blue toothpaste. “It’s very beautiful, and just amazing that there’s so much virus made in there,” says Gaelen Burke, an entomologist at the University of Georgia. M.

Enlarge / 60 Starlink satellites stacked for launch at SpaceX facility in Cape Canaveral, Florida in 2019. (credit: SpaceX) According to the research firm Quilty Space, SpaceX's Starlink satellite Internet business is now profitable. During a webinar on Thursday, analysts from the firm outlined the reasons why they think SpaceX has been able to achieve a positive cash flow in its space Internet business just five years after the first batch of 60 satellites were launched. The co-founder of the firm, Chris Quilty, said the rapidity of Starlink's rise surprised a lot of people, including himself.