Airtel shuts down streaming service Wynk Music; to offer Apple Music at discounted rates

MUMBAI, Aug 27: Bharti Airtel will be shutting down its streaming music service - Wynk Music - ten years after launch, and absorb all its employees in the Airtel ecosystem, said a company spokesperson.

"We can confirm that we will sunset Wynk Music and all Wynk music employees will be absorbed within the Airtel ecosystem," the spokesperson said, soon after Bharti Airtel announced a tie up with Apple Inc to bring exclusive offers for OTT video and music streaming services, Apple TV+ and Apple Music for Indian users.

"Airtel users will have access to Apple Music. Additionally, Wynk Premium users will receive exclusive offers from Airtel for Apple Music," Bharti Airtel spokesperson said in a statement.

Streaming service Wynk Music was launched in 2014 and allows users to download music for offline listening, set caller tunes, listen to podcasts, and stream music in multiple regional languages, among other features.

Airtel announced on August 27 that it has entered into a strategic partnership with Apple to bring exclusive offers for its OTT video and music streaming services, Apple TV+ and Apple Music, in India. The partnership will allow Airtel Xstream customers to access content from Apple TV+ with premium Airtel WiFi and Postpaid plans. Airtel said the addition of Apple TV+ would sweeten the Airtel Xstream fibre offering.

These Apple Music and Apple TV+ offers will be available exclusively to Airtel customers in India later this year.

Sources said that Airtel decided to shut down Wynk's service because it did not make commercial sense to continue running it without a clear monetisation plan. "In India, music streaming monetization is already low. Secondly, Airtel wanted to offer a better service in the music streaming space. Apple is an established player in the global music streaming space," said a person familiar with the matter.

The person said that not just Airtel, the partnership will also help Apple acquire quality subscribers through this strategic partnership. "Under the deal, Airtel will offer Apple Music subscription at a much better and discounted rate than Apple’s pricing. Such plans will remain exclusive to Airtel customers and unavailable through any other telco."

The person added that Apple and Airtel are working on a carrier billing alliance as part of the partnership, which will help Apple monetize its OTT and music streaming services.

In 2023, music streaming apps had a base of approximately 185 million active users. However, only around 7.5 million paid for a subscription, representing just 4 percent, according to an EY-FICCI report released in March 2024.

The EY-FICCI report suggests converting to paid subscribers will be challenging because of numerous free options on major streaming platforms, all music accessible on YouTube, and FM radio in cars and mobile phones. This raises concerns about the low profitability of audio streaming platforms, which may lead to consolidation or platform shutdowns in the medium term.

Airtel had previously discussed acquiring and merging Wynk with Times Internet and Tencent-backed Gaana, but the talks fizzled. Later, Gaana was acquired by Times Group’s subsidiary Entertainment Network India Limited (ENIL) in December 2023 for Rs 25 lakh.

ISRO successfully launches EOS-08 Earth Observation Satellite

SRIHARIKOTA, Aug 16: The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on August 16 launched the EOS-08 Earth Observation Satellite onboard the Small Satellite Launch Vehicle (SSLV)-D3 from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota.

The SSLV-D3 in its third and final development flight lifted off from the first launch pad of the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at 9.17 am.

Seventeen minutes later the EOS-08 satellite was injected into 475 km circular orbit as intended.

“The third developmental flight of SSLV, the SSLV-D3 with the EOS-08 satellite has been successfully accomplished. The rocket has placed the spacecraft in a very precise orbit as planned. I find that there are no deviations in the injection conditions. The current indication is that everything is perfect,” ISRO Chairman S Somanath said after the successful launch.

Somanath said that with scucess of the SSLV-D3, ISRO has declared the development process of SSLV completed.

“We are on the process of transfer of the technology of the SSLV to the industry and for serial production and launch of SSLV, this is a great beginning,” Somanath said

EOS-08 is a first-of-its-kind mission built on a standard ISRO’s Microsat/IMS-1 bus with a suite of advanced payloads for observation in IR range, novel GNSS-R Payload and SiC UV dosimeter.

The satellite carries a host of new technology developments in satellite mainframe systems like an Integrated Avionics system - Communication, Baseband, Storage and Positioning (CBSP) Package, Structural panel embedded with PCB, embedded battery, Micro-DGA (Dual Gimbal Antenna), M-PAA (Phased array antenna) and Flexible solar panel & Nano star sensor etc for onboard Technology Demonstration. The satellite is slated for launch by the SSLV-D3.

The satellite carries three payloads namely Electro Optical Infrared Payload (EOIR), SAC, Global Navigation Satellite System- Reflectometry payload (GNSS-R), SAC and SiC UV Dosimeter, LEOS.

The EOIR payload is to image in Mid-Wave IR (MIR) band and in Long Wave IR (LWIR) band during day and night for various applications like Satellite based surveillance, Disaster Monitoring, Environmental Monitoring, Fire Detection, Volcanic activities and Industrial and power plant disaster.

GNSS-R payload is to demonstrate the capability using GNSS-R based remote sensing to derive applications like Ocean Surface Winds, Soil moisture, Cryosphere applications over Himalayan Region, Flood detection, In-land water body detection etc.

CrowdStrike IT outage affected 8.5 million Windows devices, Microsoft says

NEW YORK, July 20: Microsoft says it estimates that 8.5m computers around the world were disabled by the global IT outage.

It’s the first time that a number has been put on the incident, which is still causing problems around the world.

The glitch came from a cyber security company called CrowdStrike which sent out a corrupted software update to its huge number of customers.

Microsoft, which is helping customers recover said in a blog post: "we currently estimate that CrowdStrike’s update affected 8.5 million Windows devices."

The post by David Weston, vice-president, enterprise and OS at the firm, says this number is less than 1% of all Windows machines worldwide, but that "the broad economic and societal impacts reflect the use of CrowdStrike by enterprises that run many critical services".

The company can be very accurate on how many devices were disabled by the outage as it has performance telemetry to many by their internet connections.

The tech giant - which was keen to point out that this was not an issue with it’s software - says the incident highlights how important it is for companies such as CrowdStrike to use quality control checks on updates before sending them out.

“It’s also a reminder of how important it is for all of us across the tech ecosystem to prioritize operating with safe deployment and disaster recovery using the mechanisms that exist,” Weston said.

The fall out from the IT glitch has been enormous and was already one of the worst cyber-incidents in history.

The number given by Microsoft means it is probably the largest ever cyber-event, eclipsing all previous hacks and outages.

The closest to this is the WannaCry cyber-attack in 2017 that is estimated to have impacted around 300,000 computers in 150 countries. There was a similar costly and disruptive attack called NotPetya a month later.

There was also a major six-hour outage in 2021 at Meta, which runs Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp. But that was largely contained to the social media giant and some linked partners.

The massive outage has also prompted warnings by cyber-security experts and agencies around the world about a wave of opportunistic hacking attempts linked to the IT outage.
Cyber agencies in the UK and Australia are warning people to be vigilant to fake emails, calls and websites that pretend to be official.

And CrowdStrike head George Kurtz encouraged users to make sure they were speaking to official representatives from the company before downloading fixes.

"We know that adversaries and bad actors will try to exploit events like this," he said in a blog post.

Whenever there is a major news event, especially one linked to technology, hackers respond by tweaking their existing methods to take into account the fear and uncertainty.
According to researchers at Secureworks, there has already been a sharp rise in CrowdStrike-themed domain registrations – hackers registering new websites made to look official and potentially trick IT managers or members of the public into downloading malicious software or handing over private details.

Cyber security agencies around the world have urged IT responders to only use CrowdStrike's website to source information and help.

The advice is mainly for IT managers who are the ones being affected by this as they try to get their organisations back online.

But individuals too might be targeted, so experts are warning to be to be hyper vigilante and only act on information from the official CrowdStrike channels.

Trouble For Sunita Williams, Crew After 'Spacebug' Detected At Space Station

NEW YORK, June 10: A new headache has mounted for NASA's Indian-origin astronaut Sunita Williams and the eight other crew members on board the International Space Station (ISS) including those who are currently inhabiting the orbiting station. A superbug lurks inside the city in space the International Space Station.

Scientists have found a multi-drug resistant bacteria named 'Enterobacter bugandensis' which has evolved and become more potent in the closed environment of the ISS. Since it is multi-drug resistant, it is often called a 'superbug'. This bacteria infects the respiratory system.

Spacebugs are not extra-terrestrial life but bugs that have travelled as hidden as hidden co-passengers when they went to work at the ISS.

Ms Williams and her colleague Astronaut Barry Eugene "Butch" Wilmore reached the ISS on board the new Boeing Starliner spacecraft on June 6, 2024, and are likely to spend over a week in the low earth orbiting laboratory before returning to Earth after having tested the new spacecraft she helped design.

The seven other crew members have been living on the ISS for a longer period. Usually, the worry at the ISS is from flying space debris and micrometeorites but bugs that have been carried as co-travellers and now evolved over the last 24 years of continuous inhabitation of the space station are a big new worry.

Writing about the superbugs recently, NASA said strains of the bacterial species E. bugandensis isolated from the International Space Station (ISS) were studied. Thirteen strains of E. bugandensis, a bacterium notorious for being multi-drug resistant, were isolated from the ISS.

Findings from the study indicate under stress, the ISS-isolated strains were mutated and became genetically and functionally distinct, compared to their Earth counterparts.

The strains were able to viably persist in the ISS over time with a significant abundance. E. bugandensis co-existed with multiple other microorganisms, and in some cases could have helped those organisms survive.

The work has been spearheaded by Dr Kasthuri Venkateswaran of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, USA.

Incidentally, he studied Marine Microbiology, at the Annamalai University, in Chennai before joining NASA. In 2023, he discovered a new multi-drug resistant bug called Kalamiella Piersonii which he named after his role model former President Dr APJ Abdul Kalam.

Further research on E. bugandensis was undertaken jointly by JPL and Indian Institute of Technology-Madras, Chennai by a team comprising Professor Karthik Raman, Department of Data Science and AI, Wadhwani School of Data Science and AI (WSAI), Dr Kasthuri Venkateswaran, Senior Research Scientist at JPL, NASA, Pratyay Sengupta, Shobhan Karthick MS, Research Scholars, IIT Madras and Nitin Kumar Singh from JPL, NASA and published in the scientific journal Microbiome.

The researchers point out that astronauts operating in altered immune conditions with limited access to traditional medical facilities face unique health challenges during space missions. Understanding the microbial landscape aboard the ISS is paramount for assessing the impact of these microorganisms on astronaut well-being.

Emphasising the broader implications of the research, Dr Kasthuri Venkateswaran, Senior Research Scientist at JPL, NASA, said, "Our research uncovers how certain benign microorganisms help to adapt and survive opportunistic human pathogen, E. bugandensis, in the unfavourable conditions of the International Space Station. The knowledge gained from this study would shed light on microbial behaviour, adaptation, and evolution in extreme, isolated environments that allow in designing novel countermeasure strategies to eradicate opportunistic pathogens, thus protecting the health of astronauts."

NASA says 'closed human-built environments, such as the ISS, are unique areas that provide an extreme environment subject to microgravity, radiation, and elevated carbon dioxide levels. Any microorganisms introduced to these areas must adapt to thrive. By delving into microbial dynamics in extreme environments, this research opens doors to effective preventative measures for astronaut health.'

Professor Karthik Raman said, "Microbes continue to puzzle us by growing in the most challenging conditions."

Sunita Williams Scripts History As She Rockets Into Space Onboard Boeing Starliner

CAPE CANAVERAL, June 5: Indian-origin astronaut Sunita Williams rocketed into space creating history as the first woman to test a spacecraft on its maiden mission, which she incidentally helped design over the last decade. Ms Williams overflew India on her way to space.

She lifted off onboard Boeing's Starliner spacecraft on the Atlas 5 rocket at 8:22 pm (IST) from the Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. This is her third space flight.

The lift-off happened on the third attempt and was nominal. The Starliner got the correct orbit and will dock with the International Space Station a day later. Today, the US has three crewed spacecraft simultaneously in orbit - the Boeing Starliner, the SpaceX Crew Dragon, and the International Space Station.

NASA says if all goes well the Starliner will dock to the forward-facing port of the station's Harmony module and Ms Williams and her co-passenger Butch Wilmore will remain at the space station for about a week to test the spacecraft and its subsystems before NASA works to complete the final certification of the transportation system for rotational missions to the orbiting laboratory as part of its Commercial Crew Program.

The Starliner has been designed for astronauts by astronauts and is the most modern crew module ever to be flown, NASA said.

Ms Williams, a poster girl for women aspiring to fly into space, flew into the skies in a brand-new spacecraft.

Earlier, the Indian-origin astronaut had spent 322 days in space and held a record for the maximum hours of spacewalk by a woman, before being overtaken by Peggy Whitson.

This time, she makes history as the first woman to fly on a maiden crewed mission of a new space shuttle.

The 59-year-old admitted to being a bit nervous but said she had no jitters about flying in a new spacecraft that she helped design with engineers from NASA and Boeing. "When I reach the International Space Station, it will be like going back home," she said.

The nearly 10-day mission will help the Starliner prove its space-worthiness. It would also prove the team's readiness to get a NASA certification and fly long-duration missions for the US space agency.

The Starliner is much behind schedule and way over the budget, with some saying that the problems plaguing Boeing in its aviation business may be spilling into its space business.

In 2014 NASA awarded a $4.2 billion contract for its making from scratch and ten years later it has not seen even a single successful human space flight. In contrast, Space X which was given a similar contract for the development of Crew Dragon was delivered at an estimated cost of $2.6 billion. SpaceX is already ferrying astronauts to the ISS using its crew module.

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