Found on Mars: clean, accessible water ice

PLUS: Silicon Valley sex parties, deadly mudslides, and a dramatic change to Facebook's News Feed. [View this email in your browser](#SPCLICKTOVIEW) [logo]( [[WIRED Magazine]1.12.18]( If we’re ever going to send humans to Mars, we’re going to need water—whether it’s for drinking and growing food for settlers, or to convert into hydrogen to fuel the trip home. Scientists have long known that the Red Planet is home to plenty of water ice, but they haven’t been able to gauge its purity or potential for mining. Until now. As science writer [Robbie Gonzalez]( reports, researchers have discovered eight sites on Mars where, thanks to land erosion, [vast quantities of ice are available](. And that ice is looking incredibly pure. It’s going to take a lot of work to drill down to the ice and analyze its composition, and we likely won’t know much more until 2020, when NASA and the European Space Agency are slated to launch new Mars rovers. But the very existence of the ice is cause for celebration: If it is indeed as pure as geologists suspect, human survival on Mars becomes a whole lot more plausible. As Gonzalez writes, “optimistic timelines put our arrival on the Red Planet sometime during the 2030s. Where we land, how long we visit, and what we bring along will all depend on the resources that await us—and how hard we’ll have to work to get them.” Also: A [Silicon Valley sex party]( (or just “nerds on a couch?”), [deadly mudslides]( and a [dramatic change]( coming to Facebook’s News Feed. Space Scientists Discover Clean Water Ice Just Below Mars’ Surface By Robbie Gonzalez It’s not just the volume of water they found (it’s no mystery that Mars harbors a lot of ice in these particular regions), it’s how mineable it promises to be. And what’s more, the ice looks pretty damn pure. Tech Culture ‘Sex Party’ or ‘Nerds on a Couch?’ A Night in Silicon Valley By Erin Griffith Elon Musk: “If there are ‘sex parties’ in Silicon Valley, I haven’t seen or heard of one. If you want wild parties, you’re in the wrong place. Obviously. That DFJ party was boring and corporate, with zero sex or nudity anywhere. Nerds on a couch are not a ‘cuddle puddle.’” surveillance A Clever Radio Trick Can Tell If a Drone Is Watching You By Andy Greenberg They can see what the drone sees, pulling out their recognizable pattern from the radio signal, even without breaking the drone’s encrypted video. Autonomous Vehicles GM Will Launch Robocars Without Steering Wheels Next Year By Alex Davies This robo-chariot, a modified all-electric Chevrolet Bolt, doesn’t have pedals either. This is GM’s truly driverless debut, a car that will have to handle the world on its own. No matter what happens, you, dear human passenger, cannot help it now. [advertisement]( [Powered by LiveIntent]( [Ad Choices]( [WIRED Magazine Subscription] Get Wired Don't Let the Future Leave You Behind. Get 12 Months of WIRED Magazine for Just $10. SUBSCRIBE NOW Disaster How a Mudslide Becomes a Deadly Tsunami of Rocks and Sludge By Adam Rogers These scientific insights are coming just in time for more and more people to build more and more houses at the feet of those eternally liquefying mountains. Social Media Facebook News Feed to Favor Content from Friends, Family By Fred Vogelstein “News Feed will generally rank news stories lower than opinion pieces, and complicated, nuanced topics lower than simple ones. The cynical will have a hard time wondering if a side benefit of this ranking change is that more publishers will pay Facebook to ‘boost’ their post to additional readers.” robotics Please Do Not Assault the Towering Robot That Roams Walmart By Matt Simon At over six feet tall, it roams the aisles, blasting shelves with light and snapping photos. In two minutes, it can image 80 feet of aisle, capturing a whopping 2 terabytes of raw data scanning a 100,000-square-foot-plus store. Photo Gallery CES 2018 in Photos: A Glimpse of the Gadget Zaniness By Wired Staff The helper robots are a neat trend, but we just wish manufacturers would stop giving their robot children such expressive eyes. Internet Culture The Strange History of One of the Web’s First Viral Videos By Joe Veix The clip also serves up prime conspiracy fodder. Freeze and enhance: The computer is unplugged. The supposed Angry Man, on closer inspection, is smiling. Was one of the first viral videos—and perhaps the most popular viral video of all time—also one of the first internet hoaxes? [advertisement]( [Powered by LiveIntent]( [AdChoices]( [WIRED Magazine]( [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [Pinterest]( [Youtube]( [Instagram]( This e-mail was sent to you by WIRED. To ensure delivery to your inbox (not bulk or junk folders), please add our e-mail address, wired@newsletters.wired.com, to your address book. View our [Privacy Policy]( [Unsubscribe](#SPCUSTOMOPTOUT) Copyright © Condé Nast 2018. One World Trade Center, New York, NY 10007. All rights reserved. This email was sent to {EMAIL} [why did I get this?]( [unsubscribe from this list]( [update subscription preferences]( WIRED · 520 3rd St, Third Floor · San Francisco, CA 94107 · USA