August 23, 2023

IN THIS ISSUE

🌚 India becomes first nation to land at the moon's South Pole

🧵 Threads finally gets an all-important web version

🚀 SpaceX all set for crewed launch to ISS early Friday

LUNAR EXPLORATION

India becomes first nation to land at the moon's South Pole

The success follows a failed effort by the country four years ago

India has become the first nation to land near the lunar South Pole, and only the fourth to achieve a soft landing on the moon.

The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) confirmed that the Chandrayaan-3 mission had achieved the feat early evening local time on Wednesday after its Vikram lander module touched down on the lunar surface as planned. Engineers are now checking that Vikram's systems are all in order.

Only the U.S., China, and the former Soviet Union have succeeded in the challenging task of nailing a soft landing on the surface of our nearest neighbor. Russia failed in an attempt just a few days ago.

The lunar South Pole is of great scientific interest as it’s believed to hold water ice, an important resource that could aid future crewed missions to the moon.

As the Indian nation celebrates becoming part of an exclusive club, the Vikram lander will set about deploying a small rover called Pragyan that will use an array of scientific instruments to explore its surroundings before beaming back its discoveries.

SOCIAL MEDIA

Threads finally gets a much-requested web version

The new feature will allow it to better compete with X, formerly known as Twitter

Meta has finally come up with a web version of Threads to accompany the app.

Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg said the feature will be rolling out over the coming days.

Since its high-profile launch in July, things have gone a bit quiet for the new social media app, so it’s hoped that the much-requested web version might generate renewed interest in the platform and persuade existing users to stick around.

As pointed out by Bloomberg, Threads really needs a web version if it’s to appeal to power users of the platform or brands that buy advertising, as managing busy or multiple accounts is easier on a large monitor than on a small smartphone display.

It also notes how such users keep the desktop version of X open on their work computers during the day “while they schedule posts, analyze performance, and manage any money they’re spending on the platform.”

To see if the web version of Threads is up and running, head to threads.net.

ASTRONAUT MISSION

SpaceX all set for crewed launch to ISS early Friday

It's the first crewed launch to the space station since May

NASA and SpaceX are about to launch another crew to the International Space Station, and you can watch a livestream of the Falcon 9 rocket blasting off the launchpad at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

For folks on the East Coast, however, it’ll mean a late night or early morning as the mission is currently set to get underway at 3:49 a.m. on Friday, August 25, which is 12:49 a.m. PT, and 9:49 a.m. for much of continental Europe.

If you’re planning to watch, be sure to check SpaceX’s social feeds in case of any last-minute changes to the schedule.

The Crew-7 astronauts heading to the ISS include NASA’s Jasmin Moghbeli, the European Space Agency’s Andreas Mogensen, Satoshi Furukawa of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, and Konstantin Borisov of Roscosmos.

They’ll spend six months living and working aboard the space station as it orbits about 250 miles above Earth.

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