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SpaceX to upgrade Dragon with the most immersive window ever launched into space
SpaceX and Inspiration4 customer Jared Isaacman have revealed a substantial and unexpected design change made to the Crew Dragon spacecraft that will carry the billionaire and three guests into orbit later this year.
Reminiscent of the beloved “Cupola” (Italian for dome) built by the European Space Agency (ESA) and installed on the International Space Station (ISS) in 2010, SpaceX says it has designed a spectacular ‘glass dome’ window add-on for Crew Dragon. Thanks to some level of newfound commercial interest in free-flying Crew Dragon missions, in which the spacecraft would operate as its own miniature space station for several days, SpaceX concluded that it could fully remove the spacecraft’s docking adapter.
In its place, SpaceX has apparently designed a huge, monolithic, dome-like window that promises to offer a viewing experience likely unmatched in the history of spaceflight.
While the ISS Cupola is reminiscent of Crew Dragon’s glass dome, the two windows are only similar in the sense that they’re both space-based viewing windows. Beyond that, the Dragon Dome is more akin to the ultimate realization of the platonic ideal that ESA engineers tried to achieve with the Cupola. Featuring an approximate 2:1 ratio of framework and structural support material to glass, the Cupola’s central circular window has an uninterrupted diameter of 80 cm (2.6 ft), while the whole assembly has a total internal diameter of ~2m (6.6 ft) and a depth (the ‘height’ of the conical windowed area) of about 50 cm (1.6 ft).
Assuming SpaceX is explicitly designing the dome to integrate with Crew Dragon’s existing International Docking Adapter (IDA) support structure, it could have a diameter as large as 1.4m (~4.5 ft) and a depth of 60 cm (~2 ft; assuming a perfect hemisphere for maximum strength). If SpaceX’s official render is correct, the dome will also be monolithic, meaning that the glass window itself would be completely uninterrupted by structural supports.
Much like the Cupola, which has foldable ‘petals’ that serve as shades and micrometeorite shields when the module isn’t in use, Crew Dragon’s glass dome would be safely enclosed inside the spacecraft’s nosecone. It’s unclear what material the dome would be made out of, given that large, monolithic, bulletproof domes are a technology that effectively does not exist. At least one company, Surmet, specializes in manufacturing aluminum oxynitride (“transparent aluminum”) windows, including small domes for things like missile sensor pods.
However, the maximum size of those commercial ALON domes is roughly half a foot in diameter and there is no evidence that anyone has attempted the produce an ALON dome even a full magnitude smaller than what SpaceX’s Dragon window would require. This is to say that if SpaceX has found a way to produce massive monolithic windows and domes rated for space travel, it will effectively leap from a total outsider to a de facto leader of the niche bulletproof glass dome industry. It’s worth noting that CEO Elon Musk has stated that Tesla’s Cybertruck will feature “transparent metal” windows, which would likely make the EV company the world leader in ALON window mass-production – expertise that SpaceX could borrow from given their history of joint materials R&D.
In a live March 30th event celebrating the final crew selection, SpaceX director Benji Reed stated that NASA has been closely involved with with development of Dragon’s dome window. Most notably, he strongly implied that flight-proven Crew Dragons would be able to swap between dome and docking hardware with enough ease that a Dragon flown with a dome on a SpaceX tourist mission could still be modified to support NASA astronaut launches, thus ensuring commonality within the Dragon ‘fleet’ SpaceX is building.
SpaceX has implied that its Dragon Dome will debut as early as September 2021 on billionaire Jared Isaacman’s Inspiration4 mission – currently on track to become the world’s first fully private astronaut launch.
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.
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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.
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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
