NASA’s oft-delayed James Webb Space Telescope has suffered yet another setback. While it was most recently scheduled to lift off on December 18th, it now won’t launch until December 22nd at the earliest. The delay is due to an incident that occurred while technicians were preparing to attach the telescope to the Ariane 5 rocket that will ferry it into space.

“A sudden, unplanned release of a clamp band — which secures Webb to the launch vehicle adapter — caused a vibration throughout the observatory,” according to NASA. It’s now conducting additional testing to ensure the telescope wasn’t damaged during the incident. NASA says it will provide an update on the situation by the end of the week.

The successor to the Hubble Space Telescope has been plagued by delays. When development started in 1996, NASA expected to deploy the JWST in 2007. However, by 2005, it went back to the drawing board. The telescope was then deemed complete in 2016 but then delayed again due to its complex construction. It was only fully assembled in 2019 and then the pandemic caused yet another round of setbacks. Given the history of the JWST, you can understand why NASA wants to play it safe.

Since the start of the year, Twitter has operated a pilot program called Birdwatch that has seen it crowdsource fact checks directly from other Twitter users. It’s now introducing a way for program participants to conceal their identity when they append a note to someone’s tweet. Starting today, the company says it will automatically generate aliases for new Birdwatch users that aren’t publicly associated with their Twitter accounts.

“We want everyone to feel comfortable contributing to Birdwatch, and aliases let you write and rate notes without sharing your Twitter username,” the company said in a blog post. Its hope is that the feature will reduce bias by putting an emphasis on what people write in notes they leave instead of their identity. Citing recent research, it says aliases may also make people feel comfortable with “crossing partisan lines, or criticizing their own side without the prospect of peer pressure or retribution.”

Alongside aliases, Twitter is also rolling out profile pages that will make it easy to see someone’s past Birdwatch contributions. The company says it’s doing this to ensure aliases don’t come “at the expense of accountability.” To that end, each note on someone’s public profile will include the current rating that contribution has earned, letting you know what the community thinks of it. Hopefully, that’s something that helps with the reliability problem that has dogged the program.

For those who joined Birdwatch before today’s announcement, all their previous contributions will now fall under their new alias. Since some people may be able to infer a connection between someone’s Birdwatch profile and Twitter username based on fact checks they saw before today’s feature rollout, the company says program participants can DM the Birdwatch account about deleting their past contributions.

Bobby Kotick has reportedly said he may consider resigning as CEO of Activision Blizzard if he can’t fix the company’s cultural problems fast enough. According to The Wall Street Journal, Kotick held a meeting last week involving senior leadership at Blizzard Entertainment in which he said he was “ashamed” of some of the incidents that had occured at the studio under his tenure as CEO. He reportedly went to apologize for his handling of the current situation after he was told some employees would not be satisfied unless he were to resign. According to The Journal, Kotick left open the possibility of a resignation if he couldn’t fix the company’s problems “with speed.”

We’ve reached out to Activision Blizzard for comment.

Calls for Kotick to resign have steadily increased in frequency since The Wall Street Journalpublished a report last week which alleged he knew about many of the sexual misconduct incidents that had occured at the company over the years. According to the outlet, Kotick has also been accused of mistreating women himself, including one episode involving a voicemail in which he allegedly threatened to have his assistant killed.

After the report came out on November 16th, Activision Blizzard employees staged a walkout and later started a petition calling for Kotick to be removed as CEO of the company. Since then, a group of activist shareholders has also called on Kotick to step down. In leaked emails, the heads of Sony Interactive Entertainment and Microsoft’s Xbox division both said they were troubled by the allegations that had come out of the publisher. In the latter case, Phil Spencer reportedly told employees he was “evaluating all aspects of our relationship with Activision Blizzard and making ongoing proactive adjustments.”

One group Kotick has seemingly not lost support among is Activision Blizzard’s board of directors. On the same day The Journal published its report, the company’s board said it “remains confident that Bobby Kotick appropriately addressed workplace issues brought to his attention.” 

"Why doesn't Kojima just make movies?" It's a rhetorical question fans of Hideo Kojima have asked after every game since Metal Gear Solid. For better or worse, no other creator in the gaming industry has pushed the medium closer to film than Kojima. And after hinting his studio could venture into filmmaking, it's doing precisely that. 

Per GamesIndustry.Biz, Kojima Productions has established a division dedicated to music, TV and film that will operate out of Los Angeles. Riley Russell, a former Sony Interactive executive, will lead the unit as it attempts to expand the cultural footprint of Kojima Productions.

"The new division will be tasked with working with creative and talented professionals in television, music and film, as well as the more familiar games industry," Russell told the outlet. "The team has as its charter, the goal of expanding the reach and awareness of the properties now under development at Kojima Productions, and to make them even more a part of our popular culture."

It's not surprising to see Kojima Productions expand beyond games. Kojima is known for his film-like approach to making games, and if you follow him on Twitter, you'll know he frequently tweets about his favorite albums and movies. The question now becomes how the studio plans to handle the expansion. Since reforming in 2015, Kojima Productions has released one game. You can push that number to two if you count the recent Director's Cut release of Death Stranding as a separate title. What would a film adaptation of Death Stranding look like? For that matter, what would an adaptation of any Kojima game look like? We may just find out soon enough.  

After its first serious foray into e-commerce this past summer, Twitter has started testing a new live shopping experience. The feature essentially allows users to both watch a broadcast and shop at the same time. The first live shopping stream will debut on November 28th at 7PM ET when Walmart hosts a Cyber Week-themed livestream with Jason Derulo. The songwriter will spend about 30 minutes talking about a variety of products, including electronics and home decor.

“Livestreaming on Twitter gives businesses the power to engage with their most influential fans, and adding the ability to shop into this experience is a natural extension to attracting and engaging with receptive audiences,” Twitter said of the feature.

Twitter has also started testing a “Shopping Manager” it says will help with the merchant onboarding experience. Additionally, the company is expanding the availability of the “Shop Module.” First announced in July, the tool allows brands and businesses to add a carousel to their profile that can highlight a selection of products. Over the coming weeks, the company says it will roll out the feature to more merchants in the US.

Compared to other social media platforms, Twitter has been slow to embrace and add e-commerce features. The fact the company is now adding a host of shopping features suggests it sees e-eommerce as a big part of its future.

After multiple delays, the Analogue Pocket finally has an exact release date. In an email the company sent to those who pre-ordered the handheld console, Analogue said it would start shipping the device on December 13th. It expects to deliver most pre-orders by the end of the year.

If you expect you won’t be at home to receive your shipment during that time, Analogue recommends you email it about holding your order. In that case, your Pocket will ship sometime around January 3rd. Lastly, if you want to make any last-minute tweaks to your order, the final day to do so is November 28th.

Getting the Pocket to market has been something of a journey for Analogue. When the company first announced the $199 handheld, with its ability to play Game Boy, Game Gear, Neo Geo Pocket Color and Atari Lynx games, it promised to deliver it sometime in 2020. But that was before the pandemic, and like with many other electronics, supply chain issues forced Analogue to adapt.

Ford and Rivian have abandoned a plan they had to jointly develop an EV together. In an interview with Automotive News, Ford CEO Jim Farley said the automaker will go it alone as it aims to produce 600,000 vehicles per year by the end of 2023.

When the company invested $500 million in Rivian in 2019, the two said they would work together to produce a Ford-branded EV featuring the startup's "skateboard" powertrain. In early 2020, the two, citing the pandemic, canceled a Lincoln-branded EV. At the time, they said they still planned to go forward with an "alternative vehicle" based on Rivian's technology. Now, that project won't go forward either.

"Right now, we have growing confidence in our ability to win in the electric space," Farley told Automotive News. "When you compare today with when we originally made that investment, so much has changed: about our ability, about the brand's direction in both cases, and now it's more certain to us what we have to do."

According to Farley, part of the reason Ford and Rivian decided not to move forward with the project is the complexities of marrying their hardware and software together. The companies say the decision has not affected their relationship.

"As Ford has scaled its own EV strategy and demand for Rivian vehicles has grown, we've mutually decided to focus on our own projects and deliveries," a spokesperson for Rivian told Engadget. "Our relationship with Ford is an important part of our journey, and Ford remains an investor and ally on our shared path to an electrified future."

Activision has delayed the release of Call of Duty Vanguard’s season one update and Warzone Pacific by about a week. The publisher now plans to make both available on December 8th, instead of December 2nd and December 3rd as previously planned. Activision did not provide a reason for the delay. However, it has been mired in controversy this week following an explosive report from The Wall Street Journal on CEO Bobby Kotick and the role he may have played in creating the toxic “frat boy” culture that has seen the company in the news frequently in recent months.

According to a tweet from the official Call of Duty Twitter account, Vanguard’s first seasonal update includes new maps and modes, an update to the game’s Zombies mode and the addition of new gear and weapons for players to earn. Warzone Pacific, meanwhile, adds a map called Caldera to Activision’s popular battle royale. If you own a copy of Vanguard, you’ll get the chance to play the new battleground 24 hours before everyone else.

If you’re a Hulu + Live TV customer, Disney plans to add Disney+ and ESPN+ to your subscription, and you have no choice in the matter. On Friday, the company sent an email to current subscribers informing them of the impending change. Starting on December 21st, all Hulu + Live subscriptions will include access to Disney’s two other streaming platforms. Previously, you could get Hulu + Live TV on its own.

And with the change, the price of Hulu + Live TV plans is increasing by $5 per month for both current and new customers. Come the 21st, the ad-supported tier will cost $69.99 per month, while the “no ads” package will cost $75.99 every 30 days. If you’re a Hulu + Live TV customer with an existing Disney+ and or ESPN+ subscription, those will roll into the new plan.

Disney previously increased the price of its live TV packages in 2020 when they went up by $10 per month. People never like paying more for a service, but the way in which the company is handling this latest price hike may irk some customers. Disney’s latest earnings report may provide some insight into the company’s motivations. In Q4, the company added 2.1 million Disney+ subscribers, far fewer than the 9.4 million Wall Street had expected it to attract. It’s possible Disney anticipates whatever Hulu subscribers it loses will be worth an increase to its Disney+ customer base.

Female employees at Tesla’s Fremont factory in California face “rampant sexual harassment,” according to a lawsuit filed on Thursday. In a complaint with the state’s Superior Court in Alameda County, Jessica Barraza, a production associate with Tesla, said she was subjected to “nightmarish” working conditions over the past three years. Barraza’s lawsuit describes a factory floor that looks more like “a crude, archaic construction site or frat house” than the site of advanced EV production.

Barraza’s allegations against Tesla are numerous. In one incident, the suit alleges a male co-worker stuck his leg between her thighs when she went to punch in after a lunch break. Amid the harassment, Barraza says her complaints fell on deaf ears. In one instance, she says a supervisor did nothing when she complained of a co-worker staring at her breasts. “Maybe you shouldn’t wear shirts that draw attention to your chest,” her supervisor told her, according to the suit. Barraza told the man she was “wearing a work shirt provided by Tesla.”

“After almost three years of experiencing all the harassment, it robs your sense of security — it almost dehumanizes you,” Barraza said in an interview with The Washington Post, which was the first outlet to report on the suit. We’ve reached out to Tesla for comment. The company does not typically respond to media requests. 

The suit comes one month after Tesla was ordered by a federal court to pay $137 million to a Black employee who said they were subjected to daily racist abuse at its Fremont factory. “We continue to grow and improve in how we address employee concerns,” the company said at the time. “Occasionally, we’ll get it wrong, and when that happens we should be held accountable.” Tesla is appealing the award.

Tesla also isn’t the only EV-maker accused of fostering a toxic workplace for women. Just days before its IPO, Rivian was sued by Laura Schwab, one of its former executives. In her lawsuit, Schwab alleges the automaker fired her after she complained of a “toxic ‘bro culture’” that saw her excluded from meetings and more. “The culture at Rivian was actually the worst I’ve experienced in over 20 years in the automotive industry,” Schwab said at the time.