Technologies

Gayle King Defends Recent All-Female Blue Origin Flight After Critics’ Jabs

The celebrity passengers landed safely, but Jeff Bezos nearly face-planted, and Wendy’s tweeted jokes at Perry.

An all-female crew went briefly to space for an 11-minute flight on Monday. The criticism that followed has lasted much longer.

Pop star Katy Perry, author and former journalist Lauren Sanchez, aerospace engineer Aisha Bowe, bioastronautics research scientist Amanda Nguyễn, film producer Kerianne Flynn and CBS host Gayle King were on Blue Origin’s successful NS-31 flight this week.

The crew rolled to the launchpad in Rivian electric trucks and took an elevator up to board the crew capsule. Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos, Sanchez’s fiancé, personally escorted them to the rocket. The flight lasted about 11 minutes. Perry sang What a Wonderful World during the flight, although choppy audio made it difficult to hear the women at times during the livestream.

This was the first all-female spaceflight since Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova’s historic solo spaceflight in 1963. Tereshkova was the first woman in space.

Bezos was waiting to greet the crew at the landing site and apparently stepped in a small hole and fell, almost landing on his face. Social media replayed the moment over and over.

Wrote one X user, «Excuse me while I watch Jeff Bezos faceplant a million times.»

Criticism — and defense — of flight

The criticism began even before the women took off. On the Today show on April 3, actor Olivia Munn dissed the event.

«There are so many other things that are so important in the world right now,» Munn said on the show. «What’s the point? Is it historic that you guys are going on a ride? I think it’s a bit gluttonous.»

For some reason, fast-food chain Wendy’s, known for its witty tweets, took aim at Perry after she landed. First, Wendy’s tweeted, «Can we send her back?»

The company also tweeted a photo of Perry kissing the ground after returning to Earth and captioned it «I kissed the ground and i liked it.» (Perry’s 2008 song I Kissed a Girl contained the line «I kissed a girl and I liked it.»)

Then, when another X user asked, «She was only up there for like 10mins, right?» the Wendy’s account responded snarkily with, «don’t short change her it was 11 minutes.»

But the women defended their flight.

«I’m not going to let you steal our joy, but most people are really excited and cheering us on and realize what this mission means to young women, young girls and boys too,» King said in a press conference after the return.

And Bowe, the aerospace engineer, defended the scientific part of the trip.

«We advanced science today,» Bowe said. «More people are going to be able to do meaningful research with Blue Origin because we collected data. And it wasn’t just plant biology — we studied human physiology, we contributed to the knowledge base of what people know about women. … We are inspiring the world right now.»

Watch Katy Perry visit space

The New Shepard spacecraft launched from West Texas at about 8:30 a.m. CT on Monday. Relive the mission through Blue Origin’s livestream replay on YouTube.

Does New Shepard reach space?

There’s an ongoing debate about what represents space. For example, everyone agrees the International Space Station is in space, but commercial rocket rides like what Blue Origin operates fall into a gray zone. One benchmark is the Karman line, an imaginary line 62 miles above the Earth’s surface.

NASA recognizes that «there’s really no clear boundary between where Earth’s atmosphere ends and outer space begins» but says most scientists recognize the Karman line as the transition point to space. So unless you want to get into a nitpicky argument, Perry and the others made a brief visit to space during their flight.

The women experienced weightlessness after the spacecraft passed the Karman line. The return trip involved a gentle parachute-assisted landing of the capsule.

This was the 11th human flight for the New Shepard program. Blue Origin had previously flown 52 people into space, including Star Trek’s William Shatner, Good Morning America host Michael Strahan and Bezos.

Technologies

Google’s Pixel 10A Is Coming to Japan With an Exclusive Blue Edition and Special Wallpaper

This model comes with creatively designed stickers and a special look for Pixel’s 10th anniversary.

Don’t be blue: Google is releasing an Isai blue edition of the Pixel 10A to celebrate the Android phone line’s 10th anniversary, setting it apart with its own sticker set, specialized wallpaper and custom icons. But it’ll only be available in Japan.

Announced Tuesday on the Google Japan blog, the Isai blue Pixel 10A has a dark blue look and includes bonus decorations designed in collaboration with Japan’s Heralbony art company. These include an exclusive bumper case and stickers for customization.

This edition of the Pixel 10A will arrive in Japan on May 20, following the April 14 release of the Pixel 10A in its original colors of lavender, berry, fog and obsidian. The Isai blue model costs 94,900 yen, which roughly translates to $595, and includes 256GB of storage.

This makes it slightly less expensive than the US model’s 256GB edition, but it comes with a number of fun extras at no additional cost.

Google’s creation of a country-specific model for Japan may also reflect strong sales in that market. In 2023, the IDC analytics firm (via 9to5Google) reported that the Pixel 7 series accounted for 10.7% of the country’s market share, a 527% increase from 2022.

Technologies

Can’t Wait for New Emoji? Here’s How to Create Your Own on iPhone

Apple Intelligence-enabled iPhones can create custom emoji in a few easy steps.

Apple brought new emoji to all iPhones when the company released iOS 26.4 on March 24. The new emoji include «🫍» orca, «🫪» distorted face and «🫈» hairy creature — or as we might normally call it, Sasquatch. According to Emojipedia, there are 3,953 emoji with more on the way, including a pickle. But there’s no emoji for a dog wearing pajamas, a plate with burgers and fries and many other things. But if you have Genmoji on your iPhone you can create these emoji and many more.

Apple released iOS 18.2 in 2024 and the company introduced its own emoji generator, called Genmoji, to Apple Intelligence-capable iPhones at that time. The Unicode Standard, a universal character encoding standard, is responsible for creating new emoji, and approved emoji are added to all devices once a year. With Genmoji, you don’t have to wait for new emoji to appear on your iPhone each year. You can just create them as you need them.

Read on to learn how to use Genmoji on iPhone to create your own custom emoji. Just note that only iPhones with Apple Intelligence, like the iPhone 17 lineup, can use Genmoji at this time.

Note: The new emoji may not display correctly for Apple users whose devices aren’t on a 26.4 software version.

How to make custom emoji

1. Open Messages and go into a chat.
2. Tap the plus (+) button next to your text box.
3. Tap Genmoji.

You can then type a description of an emoji into the text box near the bottom of your screen and tap the check mark on your keyboard to enter that description into Genmoji. You can also tap different suggestions and themes that are right above the text box. And with iOS 26 or later, you can also combine and use emoji to create others rather than describing a new emoji or using suggestions.

Your iPhone will generate a series of new emoji for you to pick from according to your description, and you can swipe through these new emoji. When you find the one you want, tap Add in the top right corner of your screen and the new emoji will be available to use as an emoji, tapback or a sticker. Now you don’t have to wait for the Unicode Standard to propose, create and bring new emoji to devices.

For more iOS news, here’s what to know about iOS 26.4 and iOS 26.3. You can also check out our iOS 26 cheat sheet for other tips and tricks.

Technologies

Save Over 20% on This Handy 10,000-mAh Anker Nano Power Bank

Keep your devices charged on the go with this Anker Nano power bank, now down to just $46.

We’ve just spotted the Anker Nano 45-watt portable power bank for just $46 at Amazon right now. This saves you $14 — a 23% discount on its list price. Though it’s $6 more than the lowest-ever price we saw during Black Friday, it’s still a solid discount when you take the rising cost of tech accessories into account. It also matches the lowest price we’ve seen in 2026. It comes in four colors: black, green, pink and white. They’re all on sale for the same price.

This Anker Nano portable charger weighs approximately 8.2 ounces and measures a compact 3.21×1.99×1.42 inches. Despite its small size, it has a retractable cable and supports fast charging in compatible Apple, Samsung, Google Pixel and other smartphones. It also has a large 10,000-mAh capacity and a smart display so you always know how much juice is left in your power bank.

The Nano can charge an iPhone 17 to up to 50% battery in an estimated 20 minutes, and is powerful enough to charge tablets and laptops. Need to charge your devices while charging your power bank? You can do so safely thanks to pass-through charging so you’ll never have to go without battery life.

We’ve also compiled a list of the best power banks for iPhones and for Android, in case this deal isn’t quite a fit for you.

Why this deal matters

If you travel, have a long commute time or are otherwise always on the go, a portable charger can help you keep your devices fully powered. This 45-watt Anker Nano power bank is compact, includes a loop that lets you keep track of it easily and has a built-in cable so you don’t have to keep up with extra cords. Amazon’s $14 discount makes this a solid deal for anyone looking for a compact power bank.