TLDR 2021-10-01

Amazon Game Studios has released a new game called New World. The game lets thousands of players explore and build a virtual colony. It has averaged hundreds of thousands of concurrent players on Steam since its launch on Tuesday. The game peaked at more than 700,000 concurrent players on launch day. The early success of New World marks a significant step for Amazon. Very few companies have had success breaking into the game industry.

Apple's iOS 15 update lets users invite Windows and Android users to FaceTime calls. Users will now have an option to share a link to invite people to join FaceTime calls via web browser. Hosts will have to approve anyone trying to join the call. An Apple device is required to start a call, but anyone can join after the call has started. Instructions on how to start and join a call are available in the article.

GW Ori is a star system 1,300 light years away from Earth. It has three stars and is surrounded by a massive disk of dust and gas. The disk is divided in two, and it is hypothesized that the gap in the disk may have been caused by the formation of one or more planets. Recent models suggest that a massive gas giant the size of Jupiter exists in the system. Observations over the next few months could confirm the existence of the planet.

The Nreal Air is a pair of augmented reality glasses with a micro-OLED display. The lightweight glasses are designed for watching videos on YouTube and other streaming apps. While they look like sunglasses, Nreal claims they're optimized for both indoor and outdoor wear. They can cast a 90 Hz virtual display measuring up to 201 inches diagonally when viewed from 6 meters away. The Nreal Air will be available in China, Japan, and South Korea in December. Nreal has plans to launch the glasses in the US and likely the EU.

makesure is a task/command runner with declarative goals and dependencies. It can create shortcuts in scripts so that specific parts can be called or skipped. It is portable, simple to use, and it features useful built-in facilities.

SpiceDB is a Zanzibar-inspired database that stores, computes, and validates application permissions. It features expressive APIs, a schema language with a playground dev environment, a powerful graph engine, pluggable storage, and more. SpiceDB allows developers to iterate quickly and test designs before altering any application code.

A handful of Amazon's new devices announced at its annual fall hardware event this week bear striking similarities to preexisting products. While it is possible that Amazon had created its own designs, the company has a history of copying designs sold on its platform and then undercutting the originals on price. Amazon's platform allows it to collect valuable data that can be used to launch competing products. The company has policies to prevent its employees from using non-public data to determine private label product launches, but there are ways around these rules.

Uber Eats will roll out a feature starting October 1 that will allow people in Los Angeles, San Diego, and West Palm Beach to order seasonal items, starting with Halloween-themed items. After Halloween, the service will offer delivery for Christmas items, and then rotate seasonally. The holiday shop can be accessed by entering a ghost or pumpkin emoji in the search bar on the Uber Eats app. Uber Pass and Eats Pass holders will have their delivery fees waived on eligible orders over $15.