Montana on Wednesday became the first US state to ban TikTok, with the law set to take effect next year as debate escalates over the impact and...

Japan is aiming to become the first country in the world to beam solar energy from space back to Earth to generate electricity at scale. A public-private partnership led by Japanese space agency JAXA will see the first satellite transmitters set up by 2025, according to local reports, The satellites will convert solar power into microwaves and send them to ground-based receiving stations, which then convert it into electrical energy. “If we can demonstrate our technology ahead of the rest of the world, it will also be a bargaining tool for space development with other countries,” Kyoto University professor Naoki Shinohara told Nikkei. The concept, which was first theorised in 1968, has several advantages over terrestrial solar power setups, notably being able to harvest solar energy for much longer, unhindered by the Sun’s typical cycle. Microwaves are capable of passing through clouds, so the technology is also able to operate in adverse weather conditions. Japan has already achieved several firsts in this field, having been the first to transmit power via microwaves in space in the 1980s. In 2015, JAXA scientists followed this up with another breakthrough that saw 1.8 kilowatts of power beamed down to an Earth-based receiver – roughly enough to power an electrical kettle. Several other countries and regions are also working on the technology, with the European Space Agency unveiling a plan last year to test the viability of space-based solar power. The Solaris program aims to make Europe a global leader in this untapped energy resource, with the hope of setting up a development program in 2025. More research still needs to be done before it becomes feasible at a significant scale, though recent advances in high-efficiency solar cells, wireless power transmission and robotic in-orbit assembly mean that China and the US are also working on ways to tap the Sun’s energy from space. Among the concerns surrounding the technology are the health impacts of low-power microwaves on humans, animals and plants. “These are the kind of technical questions that Solaris will look into, to explore further the feasibility of the concept,” Sanjay Vijendran, ESA’s lead for the Solaris proposal, said last year. “As an added plus, any breakthroughs achieved in these areas will be valuable in their own right, applicable to many other spaceflight endeavours.” Read More Scientists break world record for solar power window material Huge ‘plume’ seen coming out of nearby moon that could support alien life Elon Musk meets Chinese foreign minister on first visit for three years Mitigating ‘extinction’ from AI should be ‘global priority’, experts say

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 18, 2023--

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MrBeast has reached out to a young boy and his father who were pranked by people pretending to be from his team. It comes after TikTok user NoahGlennCarter posted about an incident where the two were scammed into thinking MrBeast wanted them involved in one of his videos. As the viral video explains, the young boy and his dad were shopping when they were approached by someone claiming they worked for MrBeast. They then told the son and father they were going to blindfold them and let them fill up the shopping cart with as much as they could get their hands on. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter However, when they were blindfolded the fake MrBeast employees ran away. “To make matters even worse, the boy has to wear hearing aids and apparently the fake MrBeast employees said that the reason they chose him specifically was because of his hearing problems.” @noahglenncarter This family was tricked by a fake Mr Beast #foryou #mrbeast #prank Thankfully, there was happy news for the young boy as he “received two hundred [dollars] from an organisation in his town, and Target decided to match that amount. So in the end he got four hundred [dollars] just for a shopping spree.” To make things even better after the distasteful incident, it looks like MrBeast himself is on the case. The hugely popular YouTuber replied to a news post about the scam, writing: “Give me his info!!” It comes after MrBeast, real name James Stephen Donaldson, randomly asked for cash from one of the world’s richest men. The YouTuber recently wrote a tweet saying that it “feels like a great day for Jeff Bezos to give me a billion dollars for fun”. Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

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Chaos at Twitter has seemingly led to a new surge of activity on Mastodon, a rival social network, according to its creator. Mastodon has seen some success since Elon Musk took over at Twitter, as users search for alternatives. Unlike its rival, Mastodon has a decentralised structure that relies on users to support and build the network itself. “Looks like Mastodon‘s active user base has increased by 110K (110,000) over the last day. Not bad,” Eugen Rochko, creator and chief executive of Mastodon, wrote on the platform late on Sunday. “I would prefer it if Elon Musk was destroying his site during the work week. This isn’t the first time,” another post from Rochko read. On Saturday, Twitter boss Elon Musk announced new limits on the number of posts accounts can read in a day. Previously, he had expressed displeasure with artificial intelligence firms like OpenAI, the owner of ChatGPT, for using Twitter’s data to train their large language models. Musk took over Twitter in October 2022. Since then, his erratic management style has prompted some users and advertisers to turn away from the site. Mastodon has similar features to Twitter but rather than being controlled by one company, it is installed on thousands of computer servers, largely run by volunteer administrators who join their systems together in a federation. After Mr Musk’s announcements over the weekend, Twitter is also now requiring people to log on to view tweets and profiles - a change in its long-time practice to allow everyone to peruse the chatter on what Mr Musk has frequently touted as the world’s digital town square. The restrictions could result in users being locked out of Twitter for the day after scrolling through several hundred tweets. Thousands of users complained on Saturday of not being able to access the site. In a tweet on Friday, Mr Musk described the new restrictions as a temporary measure that was taken because “we were getting data pillaged so much that it was degrading service for normal users”. Additional reporting by agencies Read More Twitter is breaking more and more What Twitter’s ‘rate limit’ message means and why Elon Musk has imposed restrictions Jack Dorsey calls for ‘open internet’ as Musk imposes new reading limits on Twitter