Light Start — SpaceX’s double, Gmail de-scanned, a new Leaf, and CoD: MW is on

SpaceX, bored with single landings, is now doing two at a time 

Okay, so ‘two at a time’ might be stretching things a little but SpaceX is turning up the impressiveness by pulling off multiple rocket landings this past weekend. The company successfully landed two rockets, the first being one of the company’s previously used Falcon 9 boosters which launched and landed successfully on Friday. The second was a new Falcon 9 which was trying out some new grid fins in addition to its space delivery. The grid fins help to stabilise the rocket and the new versions, made from a single cast block of titanium, fared a whole lot better than the older versions which have previously caught fire on reentry.  The second rocket, launched on Sunday, also made it home safe.

Source: Ars Technica

Gmail will no longer be scanning emails in order to provide targeted advertising

Perhaps you knew, but possibly you didn’t, that Google scanned the contents of your email in order to provide you with targeted advertising. Like, if you were talking about puppies, you would get ads about pet stores and so on. Unless, that is, you were using G Suite or Google Apps for Education. If you didn’t know and are now freaking about a bit, don’t worry. Google has announced that “consumer Gmail content will not be used or scanned for any ads personalization after this change.” The “change” being that computerised systems will follow G Suite’s example and not scan your mail for keywords. Just for other reasons. The alterations will be kicking in a little later this year.

Source: Google

Nissan has a new Leaf coming and it’s going to be semi-autonomous

Tesla’s Autopilot has sparked a lot of competition, with Nissan being the newest company to announce similar features. There’s a new Leaf on the way and it’s going to be bringing along something called ProPILOT. This is a tech that looks very similar, on paper, to Tesla’s automatic driving functions — though we’d love to see in in action before actually taking it for a test drive. Just so we know how effective it is. Nissan says that the system will “control acceleration, braking, and steering during single-lane driving on the highway”, meaning that you won’t be able to take it on an SA backroad and then take a nap or something. Still, cars are getting smarter and that trend isn’t slowing down. Nissan, like so many others, has designs on a fully-autonomous vehicle in the next few years.

Source: Nissan

Why yes, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered standalone will be launching… tomorrow for PS4

We were pretty convinced by some pretty convincing leaks last week but Activision has gone and made it official. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered is going to be getting its standalone edition, with the game landing on PS4 tomorrow, 27 June. There’s an Xbox One and PC launch happening at a later stage. Local pricing is still TBC, but it’ll be retailing for $40 in the states, which comes to about R520 here. And, as this is Activision we’re talking about, you’ll have to pay extra for the additional maps that have been released rather than it being a bundled edition. Not ideal but… hey, Backlot.

Source: via Polygon