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NASA picks diverse astronaut roster for SpaceX Crew Dragon 2021 mission
With Demo-2, the final certification test flight of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule nearing completion, NASA is looking ahead to future operational crewed missions. NASA previously announced that following NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley’s successful return from the International Space Station (ISS) in early August, three NASA astronauts and one Japanese astronaut of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) would soon be following on their own flight to the Space Station, SpaceX’s first operational crewed flight known as “Crew-1.” This mission is tentatively scheduled to occur no earlier than Fall of 2020.
Just days ahead of Demo-2’s anticipated conclusion, NASA, along with its international partners, has announced the roster and date of SpaceX’s third operational crewed mission referred to as “Crew-2.” Like Crew-1, the Crew-2 mission will feature a diverse international roster of four astronauts. Onboard will be veteran flyers, NASA astronauts Megan McArthur and Shane Kimbrough, along with JAXA astronaut Akihiko Hoshide, and European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Thomas Pesquet. Should everything go as planned with Crew-1, Crew Dragon’s third operational crewed flight, Crew-2, is scheduled for liftoff no earlier than the Spring of 2021.
NASA keeps it in the family
One Crew-2 participant stands out from the rest, NASA astronaut Megan McArthur. She is a veteran NASA flyer having previously flown aboard the STS-125 space shuttle Atlantis mission in May of 2009. Although Crew-2 will be her second time to orbit, it will be her first visit to the ISS. During her first mission, she spent her time in orbit serving as a Mission Specialist servicing NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope. In 2019 she was appointed as NASA’s Deputy Chief of the Astronaut Office ISS Operations Branch, a role in which she provides support to astronauts in training and aboard the ISS.
Not only is McArthur an experienced space flyer and well-versed in mission support, but she is also married to NASA astronaut Bob Behnken. While Behnken served as Joint Operations Commander for Crew Dragon’s Demo-2 mission, McArthur was back at SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, CA training for her own Crew Dragon mission to the ISS.
https://twitter.com/Astro_Megan/status/1288203342250901504
McArthur was joined by her NASA and international partners Crew-2 crewmates to train at the SpaceX facility utilizing the Crew Dragon simulator. According to an interview with ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet, the entire crew has been at various training facilities located in Texas and California presumably for weeks familiarizing themselves with Crew Dragon and ISS specific training, just as Behnken and Hurley did prior to their Demo-2 departure.
Looks like I'll be the first European to ever ride a Dragon into space! Training has already started at SpaceX's futuristic facilities. Stay tuned for more updates… and wait, how do you install the "launch" app on these giant tablet-screens? 😅😉🙃 pic.twitter.com/wD7zOf7EAl
— Thomas Pesquet (@Thom_astro) July 28, 2020
Commercial and international crew will bring the ISS to full capacity
NASA astronaut Shane Kimbrough will fly for his third trip to orbit after having previously flown aboard space shuttle Endeavour for STS-126 and aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft for Expedition 49/50 in 2016. Japanese astronaut Akihiko Hoshide will be the second JAXA astronaut to fly aboard SpaceX’s Crew Dragon following Soichi Noguchi on Crew-1. ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet will be the first European to fly aboard the Crew Dragon. It will be his second mission to orbit following a six-month-long stay aboard the ISS in 2016.
The 2021 Crew-2 mission will increase the number of ISS occupants from six to a full complement of seven. Crew-2’s four Dragon Riders will be joined by a three-member crew set to launch aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft. The increase of long-duration crew members will allow NASA to “effectively double the amount of science that can be conducted in space,” as stated in an official NASA Commercial Crew blog post. The Crew-2 astronauts are expected to stay aboard the orbiting outpost for six months.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk’s X will start using a Tesla-like software update strategy
The initiative seems designed to accelerate updates to the social media platform, while maintaining maximum transparency.
Elon Musk’s social media platform X will adopt a Tesla-esque approach to software updates for its algorithm.
The initiative seems designed to accelerate updates to the social media platform, while maintaining maximum transparency.
X’s updates to its updates
As per Musk in a post on X, the social media company will be making a new algorithm to determine what organic and advertising posts are recommended to users. These updates would then be repeated every four weeks.
“We will make the new 𝕏 algorithm, including all code used to determine what organic and advertising posts are recommended to users, open source in 7 days. This will be repeated every 4 weeks, with comprehensive developer notes, to help you understand what changed,” Musk wrote in his post.
The initiative somewhat mirrors Tesla’s over-the-air update model, where vehicle software is regularly refined and pushed to users with detailed release notes. This should allow users to better understand the details of X’s every update and foster a healthy feedback loop for the social media platform.
xAI and X
X, formerly Twitter, has been acquired by Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence startup, xAI last year. Since then, xAI has seen a rapid rise in valuation. Following the company’s the company’s upsized $20 billion Series E funding round, estimates now suggest that xAI is worth tens about $230 to $235 billion. That’s several times larger than Tesla when Elon Musk received his controversial 2018 CEO Performance Award.
As per xAI, the Series E funding round attracted a diverse group of investors, including Valor Equity Partners, Stepstone Group, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Qatar Investment Authority, MGX, and Baron Capital Group, among others. Strategic partners NVIDIA and Cisco Investments also continued support for building the world’s largest GPU clusters.
News
Tesla FSD Supervised wins MotorTrend’s Best Driver Assistance Award
The decision marks a notable reversal for the publication from prior years, with judges citing major real-world improvements that pushed Tesla’s latest FSD software ahead of every competing ADAS system.
Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (Supervised) system has been named the best driver-assistance technology on the market, earning top honors at the 2026 MotorTrend Best Tech Awards.
The decision marks a notable reversal for the publication from prior years, with judges citing major real-world improvements that pushed Tesla’s latest FSD software ahead of every competing ADAS system. And it wasn’t even close.
MotorTrend reverses course
MotorTrend awarded Tesla FSD (Supervised) its 2026 Best Tech Driver Assistance title after extensive testing of the latest v14 software. The publication acknowledged that it had previously criticized earlier versions of FSD for erratic behavior and near-miss incidents, ultimately favoring rivals such as GM’s Super Cruise in earlier evaluations.
According to MotorTrend, the newest iteration of FSD resolved many of those shortcomings. Testers said v14 showed far smoother behavior in complex urban scenarios, including unprotected left turns, traffic circles, emergency vehicles, and dense city streets. While the system still requires constant driver supervision, judges concluded that no other advanced driver-assistance system currently matches its breadth of capability.
Unlike rival systems that rely on combinations of cameras, radar, lidar, and mapped highways, Tesla’s FSD operates using a camera-only approach and is capable of driving on city streets, rural roads, and freeways. MotorTrend stated that pure utility, the ability to handle nearly all road types, ultimately separated FSD from competitors like Ford BlueCruise, GM Super Cruise, and BMW’s Highway Assistant.
High cost and high capability
MotorTrend also addressed FSD’s pricing, which remains significantly higher than rival systems. Tesla currently charges $8,000 for a one-time purchase or $99 per month for a subscription, compared with far lower upfront and subscription costs from other automakers. The publication noted that the premium is justified given FSD’s unmatched scope and continuous software evolution.
Safety remained a central focus of the evaluation. While testers reported collision-free operation over thousands of miles, they noted ongoing concerns around FSD’s configurable driving modes, including options that allow aggressive driving and speeds beyond posted limits. MotorTrend emphasized that, like all Level 2 systems, FSD still depends on a fully attentive human driver at all times.
Despite those caveats, the publication concluded that Tesla’s rapid software progress fundamentally reshaped the competitive landscape. For drivers seeking the most capable hands-on driver-assistance system available today, MotorTrend concluded Tesla FSD (Supervised) now stands alone at the top.
News
Elon Musk’s Grokipedia surges to 5.6M articles, almost 79% of English Wikipedia
The explosive growth marks a major milestone for the AI-powered online encyclopedia, which was launched by Elon Musk’s xAI just months ago.
Elon Musk’s Grokipedia has grown to an impressive 5,615,201 articles as of today, closing in on 79% of the English Wikipedia’s current total of 7,119,376 articles.
The explosive growth marks a major milestone for the AI-powered online encyclopedia, which was launched by Elon Musk’s xAI just months ago. Needless to say, it would only be a matter of time before Grokipedia exceeds English Wikipedia in sheer volume.
Grokipedia’s rapid growth
xAI’s vision for Grokipedia emphasizes neutrality, while Grok’s reasoning capabilities allow for fast drafting and fact-checking. When Elon Musk announced the initiative in late September 2025, he noted that Grokipedia would be an improvement to Wikipedia because it would be designed to avoid bias.
At the time, Musk noted that Grokipedia “is a necessary step towards the xAI goal of understanding the Universe.”
Grokipedia was launched in late October, and while xAI was careful to list it only as Version 0.1 at the time, the online encyclopedia immediately earned praise. Wikipedia co-founder Larry Sanger highlighted the project’s innovative approach, noting how it leverages AI to fill knowledge gaps and enable rapid updates. Netizens also observed how Grokipedia tends to present articles in a more objective manner compared to Wikipedia, which is edited by humans.
Elon Musk’s ambitious plans
With 5,615,201 total articles, Grokipedia has now grown to almost 79% of English Wikipedia’s article base. This is incredibly quick, though Grokipedia remains text-only for now. xAI, for its part, has now updated the online encyclopedia’s iteration to v0.2.
Elon Musk has shared bold ideas for Grokipedia, including sending a record of the entire knowledge base to space as part of xAI’s mission to preserve and expand human understanding. At some point, Musk stated that Grokipedia will be renamed to Encyclopedia Galactica, and it will be sent to the cosmos.
“When Grokipedia is good enough (long way to go), we will change the name to Encyclopedia Galactica. It will be an open source distillation of all knowledge, including audio, images and video. Join xAI to help build the sci-fi version of the Library of Alexandria!” Musk wrote, adding in a later post that “Copies will be etched in stone and sent to the Moon, Mars and beyond. This time, it will not be lost.”
Elon Musk’s X will start using a Tesla-like software update strategy
Tesla FSD Supervised wins MotorTrend’s Best Driver Assistance Award
