AI is the future

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“We all sighed when we heard the news, but there were no great emotions.” Sixth Tone picks up the reaction of a photography student from the Communication University of China upon hearing the news. The higher education center, one of the country’s leaders in performing arts and communication, stopped offering five degrees in the branch: photography, comics, visual communication design, new media art and fashion design. Dazhong Wang meets in a table the before and after of your offer. Liao Xiangzhong, Party Secretary of China Communication University declared that the form and content had changed and that now the way of thinking had to change as well. And he pointed to a future where humans and machines distribute tasks: “We need to find solutions and let AI take care of the rest so that students learn.” The small print. In reality, the majors and postgraduate degrees suppressed from the CUC study offer there were 16 in totalwhich include the aforementioned arts, three humanities, six economics and business administration and two sciences and engineering. And more than a cancellation, it is a restructuring seeking to optimize existing programs. So, now photograph is framed within photography and production for film and television. At the same time, in this restructuring, new programs such as intelligent cinema and television and intelligent media have also been launched, laying the foundations to address the arrival and consolidation of artificial intelligence in these areas. Best nearby example: what it does Seedance 2.0. It is not an exception. It is not a decision of a specific rectorate, but a trend that affects several institutions at the same time. By the end of 2025, several Chinese universities had stopped admitting students in arts-related careers, such as echoes China News Service. The CUC thing is not an isolated case: Nanchang University he said goodbye of four artistic careers (of eight in total). Jilin University has been withdrawing arts courses both in 2024 (six) like in 2025 (four). East China Normal University in Shanghai advertisement in the fall that suspended three arts programs. Tongji University communicated last September that would eliminate three arts programs. The China University of Petroleum was more drastic: in his statement announces that all admissions to art studios are suspended. There is a state plan behind. Liao already hinted that this decision is due to an imminent reality for which the Chinese government is already preparing. He Action Plan for the Adjustment and Optimization of Disciplines and Programs in Higher Education It has a triannual nature. This plan works as a kind of legal mechanism that allows universities to cancel degrees with low labor demand while expanding others considered strategic, aligned with national development objectives, such as artificial intelligence, science and data. According to Wu YanDeputy Minister of Education, in 2024 alone, 1,600 new programs were created and almost the same number were eliminated following that strategy. AI is the argument, not the cause. Liao Xiangzhong explains that the great threat of AI is not to replace a specific skill, but to deprive people of their interest and ability to think. And that it should not be considered simply a tool, but rather an assistant, a partner, a competitor and even a completely new collaborative entity. That division of labor between man and machine. This paradigm shift is what China is preparing for with practicality as its flag: in full battle for AI hegemonya drop in birth rate and his huge youth unemployment problem (especially in some races) the Asian giant needs to prioritize its best resource (human resources) where strategically it needs it most. In Xataka | China looks at VET: why more and more generation Z students prefer trades over university degrees In Xataka | China has a huge youth unemployment problem. So much so that some people pay to pretend to work Cover | Yue Wu and Đào Việt Hoàng

the new ones are worth up to 300 euros

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The other day, while I was brushing my teeth, my electric brush made a strange noise. I didn’t give it much importance, but a few days later it happened again and this time it was accompanied by a clear drop in power. Finally what was expected happened: it stopped working. I bought it in 2020 for 17.99 euros, so I am more than satisfied with the service provided. Plus, it caught me just the day Amazon’s spring sales ended, so I ran to look for a replacement. What I found left me quite surprised. A huge (and very expensive) offer It’s been six years since I bought my ill-fated Oral-B Vitality brush. Six years in which I have not found out what was going on in the electric toothbrush market, for whatever reason, it has not interested me either. First of all, I clarify that I went directly to see the Oral-B offer because I was happy with my previous brush, but above all because I still had several heads to use. In 2020 I was aware that there were models much more expensive than the one I chose and in fact this time I went to Amazon with the idea of ​​looking at a slightly more advanced model, what I did not expect was to find these prices. The Oral B spring sale cover The most notable offer on the Oral-B website is the Oral-B iO 10, which cost 299 euros (today it costs 309 euros), but those that followed were not short; 289, 199, some for 129 euros… truly crazy. At what point have electric toothbrushes become a luxury product, I thought. These ultra-expensive brushes have a color screen, magnetic base, travel case with charging function, seven cleaning modes and of course AI, Don’t miss out on AI. I understand that many of these functions will be very practical and have their audience, but personally I am not going to spend three figures on a toothbrush. In addition to prices, there are a lot of models and it is quite difficult to understand what their differences are. Suddenly I found myself looking for comparisons and reading spec sheets. For a toothbrush. The premiumization of the everyday Is a phenomenon that affects all types of products and services. We are seeing it with the gourmet bakeriesthe specialty coffee shops and even with the kebabs. Another establishment that we have seen premiumize recently are the stationery stores. They are traditionally cheap products that are given a patina of luxury and exclusivity to justify much higher prices. With electric toothbrushes, the point is also added techie. In mobile phones we have long since overcome the 1,000 euro barrier and have it normalized, but at the time we also it seemed crazy to us. They have achieved this based on exclusive functions, designs with premium materials and also the phenomenon of aspirational purchase. I didn’t expect that the same thing would have happened with toothbrushes; Providing them with countless functions, they justify paying 300 euros for something as basic as brushing our teeth. The chosen one Seeing the prices and knowing that I was not planning to pay more than 50 euros, my range was drastically reduced. The Oral-B iO 2 was one of the options I considered. Costs 50 euros and it is not the most basic model of all. Among its advantages is that it comes with a travel case and a stand to store two heads, as well as a pressure sensor and timer. I had it in my basket, but I finally ended up buying the Oral-B Vitality Pro, which is basically the same model that I already bought in 2020, but with a couple of new features and a black design. I paid 22 euros and I hope it lasts another six years. Images | Xataka, Amazon In Xataka | The price of housing in Spain is already higher than at the peak of the bubble. But the data has a little trick

birch tar was its own prehistoric “Betadine”

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In recent years, the image of the brute Neanderthal has gone fading based on the different discoveries that are being made. Now we know that buried to their dead, who they made art and? they dominated the firebut we also now know that they were the first in the chemical industry to create the world’s first synthetic glue: birch tar. Although under his ingenuity, this can also be a great member of high prehistoric medicine. The new thing we know. Beyond being a great glue, the Neanderthals could have used this tar as a powerful antiseptic to heal wounds and avoid deadly infections, like the ones we have in our home medicine cabinet. This is something that is known thanks to the research published this March in the magazine PLOS One which has tested the effectiveness of this prehistoric material in healing wounds. To ensure that their conclusions were faithful to the reality of the Pleistocene, the team did not limit itself to analyzing modern samples purchased in the laboratory, but rather they replicated Neanderthal extraction methods. How it was done. To do this, they used techniques accessible to the hominids of the time, such as distillation in primitive clay wells and the condensation of birch bark smoke on stone surfaces. Putting it to the test. Once they had this “Neanderthal-style” tar, they pitted it against several common bacterial strains in the laboratory. And the result showed that he had strong antibacterial propertiesbeing especially useful for attacking bacteria Staphylococcus aureus, which is a bacteria that can cause infections in wounds on the skin. And if we go further, in our daily lives we are also ‘putting up’ with it because it is one of the famous ‘superbacteria’ against which we have fewer and fewer antibiotics to act on. More than a band-aid. If you got a cut or wound hunting 100,000 years ago, a simple infection could be a death sentence. This is why the study suggests that Neanderthals, by manipulating birch bark to make their adhesive, probably discovered its medical benefits empirically. Simply by observing that, by putting it on the wound, they saw how it did not start to look bad. That is why we are faced with a discovery that transforms our vision of the technological resources of the Neanderthals, since we now know that the product was a true ‘multipurpose’ product of the time. Its uses. The first of them is as an industrial adhesive to be able to manufacture composite weapons, but also as an antibiotic and antiseptic against cuts, as if it were our precious ‘betadine’ or chlorhexidine. Now a door is also opening to see its use in our daily lives, although there is still a lot of research ahead on the many open fronts to be able to find any substance that can attack bacteria that they are giving us more headaches. Images | Marc Tremblay In Xataka | Manufacturing materials to produce chips in space is not science fiction. It is a very real plan that is already underway

depends on China to do it

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I don’t need to tell you that the world is becoming a vibrant hornet’s nest with several open fronts. Some explode directly, such as conflict between the US, Israel and Iranand others endure, buried and palpitating, in the form of diplomatic tensions and tariffs. The United States has been and is the dominant world power economically (in terms of nominal GDP) and militarily, but China is moving inexorably to break its hegemony on all fronts. Trump has the main mission of “Make America Great Again” and in the military it involves adopting a more proactive role: we have seen in Venezuela and in Iran but also on a small scale with the boarding of ships. Given this scenario, China is in an uncomfortable position (buys 90% of all the oil Iran exports) that attempts to resolve with maximum diplomatic pressure but without military action. There is a broad business relationship at stake. If it did, the United States would have a lot of problems. Because the relationship between the United States and China is paradoxical: they are geopolitical rivals but at the same time they have a symbiosis economically and industrially. And if the United States wanted to strengthen its military, China would be essential, as evidence this internal report commissioned by the Department of Defense itself. Why is it important. Because we are probably in the greatest moment of military tension between both powers since the Cold War and the United States has been declaring China since “pacing challenge“(for Pete Hegseth, it’s already “pacing threat“): in different defense documents: The pace of the Asian giant is a challenge that threatens the supremacy of the United States. Despite this, its dependence on the military supply chain has not decreased, quite the contrary. If China decided, either in retaliation or on its own initiative, to disrupt its supply chain, the operational capability of the US military would be seriously compromised. Context. The fall of the USSR in the late 1980s was followed by a reduction in defense spending in the 90s, at which time the industry moved in search of economic efficiency in the form of contractor mergers and supplier outsourcing. To where? Towards Asia, something that its base industry also did. Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, China was establishing itself as a global supplier of electronics, semiconductors and critical raw materials. A concrete example that you can see at a glance in this graph: the rapid rise of China in rare earth production and the fall of the United States. Chinese suppliers to the US military. NUMBERS MATTER: DEFENSE ACQUISITION, US PRODUCTION CAPACITY, AND DETERRING CHINA In figures. Govini’s internal report from 2024 leaves some numerical data that supports the serious dependence of the US military on China: 41% of the semiconductors in its weapons systems and infrastructure depend on Chinese suppliers. Chinese suppliers in defense supply chains have quadrupled between 2005 and 2020. US dependence on China in electronics increased by 600% between 2014 and 2022. Graphic that relates American weapons to their Chinese producers. NUMBERS MATTER: DEFENSE ACQUISITION, US PRODUCTION CAPACITY, AND DETERRING CHINA China is the world’s factory. A no-brainer: semiconductors are everywhere, from cell phones to missiles or drones. And China makes more chips than anyone else and also dominates in assembly, although lags behind in advanced chips. Yes indeed, is among your priorities. The United States has attempted to repatriate chip production with its Chips lawbut its consequences will be seen in the medium and long term, not in the coming months. At the moment, its first green shoots are the plant TSMC in Arizona. China is the “mine” of the world. We mentioned it above because it is the clearest example: in rare earths, China is the absolute queen of the industry from start to finish: from deposits to processing. And it’s not just rare earths: it’s also gallium, germanium, graphite, antimonyhe cobalt or the tungsten. Be careful, this does not necessarily mean that it dominates because of the deposits it owns, but because it has set up a powerful refining industry that allows it to control the processing link, so that other countries turn to China for this operation. They are industries that require high investment and low margins, which makes them unattractive for private companies without state support to enter the sector. China knows this and uses it as a currency of pressure in the form of restrictions and locks. In Xataka | The US Navy warns Congress: China is erecting the largest nuclear barrier in its history under the sea In Xataka | China needs chips and the United States needs energy: in the AI ​​race the two great powers have divergent paths Cover | Nick Fewings and Scandinavian Backlash

prohibit entry for 10,000 years with terrifying architecture

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About 10,000 years ago, humans were just beginning to settle and leave the first paintings in caves. Curiously, today many of these messages remain a mystery. Even so, we have built infrastructures whose impact will last longer than the entire known history of civilization, posing an unprecedented challenge along the way: how to leave a mark that not only lasts, but is also understood within a future that is impossible to imagine. In 1980 they added a disturbing fact: And how to prevent them from entering? The origin of the problem. It all starts with an uncomfortable fact: the United States has been generating nuclear waste extremely dangerous (especially the so-called transuranic, coming from weapons and reactors) whose toxicity can last for thousands of years. To manage them, it was decided to bury them in deep geological repositories like the WIPPin New Mexico, a network of galleries excavated more than 600 meters underground in stable formations that have remained intact for millions of years. The plan is to permanently seal these facilities after decades of use and let them remain isolated for at least 10,000 years. The problem arises right after: once any human control disappears, how to prevent someone in the future from digging there without knowing that they are releasing an invisible and lethal danger? The answer. The solution could not be limited to a simple sign, because neither the current language nor the symbols are reliable in such a long term. That is why an approach was proposed even more radical: create a universal communication system capable of surviving the passage of time, aimed at both advanced societies and others that may have lost part of current scientific knowledge. WIPP The birth of “nuclear semiotics”. To address tremendous challenge, the US Department of Energy brought together experts from disciplines as disparate as linguistics, physics, anthropology or even science fiction, giving rise to a completely new field, one they called nuclear semiology. International panels analyzed not only how to convey the message, but also why A future civilization could decide to excavate that place: search for resources, scientific curiosity, archeology or simple ignorance. The conclusion was that the message it had to be redundantbe multi-layered and understandable without depending on a single cultural system. This is how one of the most disturbing texts never conceived by modern engineering, a warning that not only informs, but also try to persuade from the emotional side, something like a sign that says: “move around, there is nothing valuable here, only danger, and it is still very active thousands of years later.” Proposed pictogram to warn about the dangers of buried nuclear waste at the waste isolation pilot plant Architecture of fear. However, the real conceptual leap came later, when it was assumed that the message could not depend only on words or symbols. The solution was something tangible to humans, the architecturalor how to design a fearsome environment that instinctively conveys danger. Thus, proposals emerged such as landscapes of giant thornsoppressive black blocks or deformed terrain sought to activate a universal reaction of rejection, even without rational understanding. In its most realistic version, the project contemplated angular earth bermsgranite monuments, distributed markers and underground chambers with detailed information. In other words, architecture stopped being aesthetic or functional and became something like a primary language, almost biologicaldesigned to provoke an immediate emotional response to whoever is on the planet thousands of years from now (or whatever is left of it). Design of an information center in the waste isolation pilot plant Layered messages. The system that was devised then was not limited to a single type of warning, but rather combined multiple levels of information. From the initial visual impact (for example, a hostile landscape) to universal symbols such as sick human figures, through texts in several languages and buried technical files, all designed to offer different entry doors to the message depending on the visitor’s level of understanding. Not only that. Even if They proposed “time capsules” distributed in depth, durable materials such as granite or ceramics, and scientific references such as maps or periodic tables. The logic: that if one system fails, another can work, something like redundant communication designed to resist not only time, but also oblivion. The most extreme ideas. There is no doubt, the difficulty of the problem gave rise to proposals that were as fascinating as they were disturbing. It was suggested to create a “caste of priests of the atom” that transmitted knowledge through rituals for generations, or even genetically modified animals (the famous “radioactive cats”) so that change color in the presence of radiation, generating cultural myths that warned of danger. Other ideas of what further movies They included flowers with messages encoded in their DNA or satellite networks that issued warnings for millennia. Although many of these proposals never materialized, they reflect the extent to which the challenge forced us to think beyond traditional engineering, entering the realm of culture, narrative, and collective psychology. The big problem. A certain consensus was then reached: even if the message managed to survive, there was no guarantee that it would be obeyed. Historical examples such as tsunami stones in Japan show that warnings can last for centuries… and still be completely ignored. In fact, this precedent introduces an even more uncomfortable doubt: the problem, perhaps, is not only communicating, but convince to the one who interprets it. An imposing architectural structure may arouse curiosity rather than fear, and an ambiguous message could be interpreted as a sign of something valuable. Plus: human history is full of explorations of tombs, ruins and forbidden places, which turns any warning into a double-edged sword. A unique experiment. Be that as it may, and although there is still no definitive design that defines all our nuclear waste and is capable of deterring future civilizations, both the Sandia project and the WIPP repository represent the greatest conscious attempt of humanity to send a message to the deep (and unknown) future. … Read more

After years of absence, Aragón has reintroduced two Iberian lynxes. The question is whether it’s posturing or real help.

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Aragón has become the first autonomous community in the northwest of the peninsula to seek to recover the Iberian lynx. And yes, it is a historical milestone that will go down in the annals of conservation manuals; But the question is another: does it make any sense (on an ecological, social or economic level) to continue putting lynxes where there have not been any for decades or are we in the middle of a political marketing operation that will be expensive? The answer is more complex than it seems. What has happened? On March 17, 2026, Jorge Azcón released the first two copies of Iberian lynx on a farm in Torrecilla de Valmadrid (Zaragoza). They are one year old, the female comes from Portugal and the male from Doñana. “The step taken today is a milestone in the recovery of biodiversity in the community,” explained the acting president. And it is, in a way, the general idea in almost all communities in Spain: the Iberian lynx has become our ‘panda bear’, an animal that we are fond of, a symbol of the country and a social aspiration. Does it make sense to reintroduce the lynx? For the lynx, yes. Although we have come a long way since 2002 (when there were just 94 lynxes confined in Andalusia), we have not yet reached “favorable conservation status.” That is, 3,500 specimens (now there are 2,401) and 750 reproductive females (there are 470). Since it started in 2019, the project LIFE LynxConnect has tried to put into practice a very simple idea: Having many lynxes is of no use if those lynxes are confined to just a couple of places. We needed diverse cores and we needed to connect them together. Above all, because climate change is also affecting the entire national territory. The north of the peninsula is increasingly dry and has larger populations of rabbits: therefore, it has become viable for there to be at least two towns (in Cuenca and Palencia) which are completely outside the recent historical distribution of the lynx. And for the areas where it is released? In the short term, it is also good news. In fact, the Aragon movement cannot be understood without a basic fact: the European funds that help these types of programs (920,000 euros in this case) expired this same year. In the medium or long term, it depends on many factors: fundamentally, because everything depends on the rabbits. Rabbits? What about rabbits? Rabbits represent between 80 and 90% of the lynx’s diet. In fact, these rodents are found in the base of the food chain of more than 30 species. The good news is that, as warned A few weeks ago, the Union of Farmers and Ranchers of Castilla la Mancha “the proliferation of rabbits is a problem that has been going on for ten years, they speak of a ‘plague’ that is threatening olive groves and pistachio and almond trees, and they demand that the populations of these animals be controlled.” The bad thing is that they are not where they should be. The history of Spanish rabbits is complex. Its decline is associated with myxomatosisfirst (mid-20th century); continue with the rabbit hemorrhagic disease in the 80s; and is complicated by the arrival in 2012 of a new variant (RHDV2) that affects populations just when they were beginning to recover. To all these health problems, we must add the changes in the landscape and the disappearance of boundaries, fallow lands and traditional shelters. And the result is that the rabbits have looked for a new home. Thus slopes and roadsides have become tremendously favorable habitats (and even in motion vectors) and areas with constant food (irrigation/crops) are natural attractors of these reduced populations. Farmers fear that the arrival of the lynx will not control the pest and, on the other hand, as it will tighten conservation regulations, it may cause rabbit populations to skyrocket. Are they right? It’s hard to say. But we are going to find out. Image | Jorge Azcón – Government of Aragon In Xataka | Spain, land of (threatened) rabbits: the species has gone from “pest” to being endangered

The answer is Ockham’s razor.

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Every day more than 100,000 commercial flights and, despite the multiple active conflicts in several regions, aviation continues to be one of the means of transportation safer never created. In fact, the probability of suffering a serious accident is less than one in several millions of flights. And yet, today more than ever there arises the same question. The question and the surprising answer. The military escalation in the Middle East has generated the same immediate concern among thousands of travelers: whether it is safe to fly between Europe and Asia in a context where the sky is saturated with drones, missiles and air defenses. However, despite the spectacular nature of the scenario and the feeling of constant risk, the real answer is much simpler than it seems, almost a direct application of the Ockham’s razor: because if flights continue to operate, it is because the direct risk to commercial aircraft is extremely low and carefully managed. A more complex sky, not a more dangerous one. There is no doubt, the war has forced completely redraw flight maps, closing large corridors over the Gulf and diverting traffic to longer, more congested routes, especially over Egypt or the Caucasus. This has multiplied the load of controllers and crews, who operate under reinforced protocols and advance planning, although it does not imply uncontrolled chaos, but rather a highly regulated system that adapts in real time to maintain separation and safety between aircraft. The risk is not where you think. Although drone and missile attacks have reached infrastructure such as airports and urban areasexperts agree that planes in flight are targets extremely difficult to impact. The reasons are varied, but mainly due to its size, speed and the active routes avoid areas direct threat. Because in reality, the most relevant danger lies ashore (airport facilities or falling debris after interceptions), which explains why airport closures and massive cancellations respond more to prevention than to direct impacts on aircraft. Lessons learned. civil aviation drags precedents that have deeply marked their protocols, such as the demolition from flight MH17 in 2014 or similar incidents where anti-aircraft systems mistook civil aircraft for threats. Precisely for this reason, today the operating principle is quite clear: if there is the slightest risk of confusion or intersection with military activity, the airspace closes directly or redirects itself, avoiding repeating past mistakes. The war exists, but the planes do not fly within it. It is the principle that governs everything in commercial aviation. Airlines, far from improvising, operate with intelligence systems, risk analysis and coordination with military authorities that determine what routes are safe at every moment. This means, for example, detours, more fuel consumption and delays, but it also ensures that active flights remain within of “safety bubbles” away from direct conflict, even in high intensity scenarios. The real impact for the traveler. For passengers, the most tangible consequences are not so much safety as disruption that it represents: We’re talking about massive cancellations, longer routes, rising fuel prices and a constant feeling of uncertainty. Added to this is the psychological impact of seeing missiles intercepted or airports temporarily closed, which amplifies risk perceptionalthough the real probability of an incident in flight remains very very low. You feel more than you suffer in the air. Taken together, the current scenario combines a highly visible war with an air system that continues to function thanks to multiple prevention and control layers. The paradox in this sense is clear, because there has never been so much military activity in the skies of the region and, yet, there have never been applied so many mechanisms to keep civil aviation out of it. For this reason, and because it continues to be the safest way to travel, the answer to the great doubt of travelers is not in the intensity of the conflict, nor even in combat drones, nor ballistic missiles, but in the most basic logic: Commercial airplanes simply don’t fly where the war is. Image | PexelsArmed Forces In Xataka | Global air traffic has a problem: Ukraine and Iran have created a funnel that is driving up prices In Xataka | If the question is where Russia is in the Iran war, satellite images leave no doubt: helping to bring down the US

charges every time someone enters a Universal park

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In 1987, while Warner Bros. was trying to sign him to make films for it (something that would not come until the 2001 Amblin co-production ‘AI’), Steven Spielberg signed a deal with Universal that had nothing to do with film. Decades later, that Creative Consultant contract in theme parks brings him more money than any of his films and has gone down in history as one of the most lucrative in the history of entertainment. And the best: it has no expiration date. The origin of the contract. In 1987, Universal Studios didn’t have the money to compete with Warner. What it did have was Sid Sheinberg, the president of MCA, Universal’s parent company, who had been betting for years on a young director whom he had signed when he was barely a teenager and for whom the director had provided hits like ‘Jaws’ or ‘ET the Extraterrestrial’. When Warner launched a financial offensive to snatch up Spielberg, Sheinberg improvised a cashless solution: making his star director a creative consultant for the theme parks Universal planned to build, with a share of the gross receipts. Forever. ELON MUSK VS JEFF BEZOS: STAR WARS How was it known? For two decades, the terms of the agreement were known only to a small circle of lawyers, but came to light thanks to a footnote in the financial documents that Universal presented in 2009, in the midst of the economic crisis. It was then known that Spielberg perceived 5.25% of all gross revenue generated by the two parks built after the signing (Orlando and Japan), an amount valued at up to 70 million dollars annually (approximately 120 dollars per ticket, 2.38 dollars for each ticket sold) and that It later spread to Singapore and Beijing.. Universal Studios Hollywood was excluded because the park already existed before the initial agreement. It doesn’t stop, it doesn’t stop. The key term here is “in perpetuity”: no expiration date. The original text included a clause granting Spielberg 2% of all box office grosses and a portion of concessions, in perpetuity. These are not royalties linked to a specific film or a specific attraction. Spielberg charges for each ticket sold at the parks covered by the agreement, regardless of whether any of his films have a presence there. The financial crisis of the late 2000s put Universal in an uncomfortable position. The agreement included a clause allowing Spielberg to demand a final payment and terminate the contract, which he did. The figure was estimated to be around $200 million. But the studio was building The Wizarding World of Harry Potter and could not afford that payment. Spielberg agreed to postpone it until June 2017 in exchange for an increase in his share from 2% to 5.25% of gross receipts, just as the opening of the Harry Potter zone promised to skyrocket attendance. In 2017 he agreed to continue collecting royalties. Other cases. Spielberg’s deal with Universal has no direct equivalent in the industry. Perhaps George Lucas’ situation with the ‘Star Wars’ franchise, which sold to Disney in 2012 for $4 billionis comparable, but it is still a simple sale of rights. In other words: no matter how much the franchise films make now, Lucas receives nothing. Of course, Spielberg was very smart there: the opening of Epic Universe in Orlando in May 2025 adds a new source of gross revenue to which Spielberg is entitled under his contract. According to the latest estimatesif visitor volume reaches projections from previous expansions, the director’s annual revenue could exceed $100 million over the next few years. What I said: a great business. Image | William Warby

the 106 kilometers of jungle that no country has been able to pave

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If you like driving, throughout the planet there are some roads so legendary that they invite you to travel them at least once in your life. This is the case of the iconic Route 66 that crosses the United States from Chicago to Los Angeles, the beautiful and curvy Romanian Transfăgărășan or the dangerous Highway of Death in Bolivia. But if you have time and you are in America, there is one to explore the continent practically from start to finish: the Pan-American route. The longest road in the world. The Pan-American Highway It has a length of 17,848 kilometers, which allows it to travel across the American continent from north to south: from Prudhoe Bay in Alaska to Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego in Argentina. Of course, the figure corresponds only to the main road, but in reality it is a multitude of roads in different countries and characteristics, so that they adapt their layout to areas such as large cities, the coast or the mountains. If we add the variants and branches, it shoots up to 30,000 kilometers, although the Guinness says simply that it is more than 24,140 kilometers through the 14 countries it crosses. The origins. Although originally was glimpsed like a pan-american railroad, at the Fifth International Conference of American States 1923 when the idea took shape like a highway, given the takeoff of the automobile. However, it would take decades for it to materialize: it was at the Convention on the Pan-American Highway when the 14 countries signed the agreement and Mexico the first country to complete its partback in 1950. To choose which route was the best, the “Brazilian Pan-American Highway Expedition” was a pioneer in the task of traveling the continent choosing the most practical route. Lieutenant Leônidas Borges de Oliveira as mission leader, Francisco Lopes da Cruz as observer and Mário Fava as mechanic left Rio de Janeiro on April 16, 1928 with two Model T Fords and arrived in Washington DC ten years later. In figures. Only those 17,848 kilometers of length of its main road already make it the longest route, followed by others such as transsiberian highway (it only runs through Russia and is about 11,000 kilometers) or the Highway 1 Australian 14,500 kilometres. But there are more impressive figures: It travels through 14 countries and connects 10 state capitals. There is only an incomplete section of 106 kilometers. 23 days, 22 hours and 43 minutes is the record time to travel it by car, which is registered in the Guinness Book of World Records. If you drive 8 hours a day, it doesn’t add up Its highest point is in Costa Rica Hill of Deathat about 3,500 meters high. The exception: the Darien plug. Although the Pan-American Highway runs through America from top to bottom, technically this is not the case: there is a hole in the border between Panama and Colombia, the Darién Gap. This jump on the road is in a mountainous and rugged area in the middle of the jungle. That is, the highway ends in Turbo (Colombia) on one side and in Yaviza (Panama) on the other. Mountains, swamps and a dense jungle have been a compelling orographic reason why you cannot cross America continuously by car without leaving that road. However, there have also been environmental and political problems that have prevented the closure of the route. In 1971, the United States, Colombia and Panama they agreed cover this route and their respective economic contributions. However, after environmental protests and a correction in the cost estimate that practically doubled it, the project was stopped. Today there are no active plans to close the Pan-American Highway. A road full of challenges. This environmental wealth reveals a reality, that of the confrontation between the development of infrastructure and the conservation of the environment, as it passes through unique landscapes. Along its route, the Panamericana crosses tropical jungles, the Andes mountain range, deserts or seismic zones that mean that this was not just another highway construction. Access or weather conditions are a challenge for machinery, personnel and materials. And once built, there is the challenge of maintaining a road network across different countries, budgets and standards. In Xataka | The longest straight road in the world is a mental challenge: 240 km without curves, in the middle of the desert and with truck traffic In Xataka | Yes, the V16 beacons transmit your position in the event of an accident. No, the DGT cannot “spy” on you with them Cover | Joseph Corl, FanHabbo and Seaweege

has unleashed an invasive species that drains its rivers

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If historically there is a star tree species for reforestation and wood production, those are conifers. The pine of all life. We have seen it in the mountains of Galicia, in Euskadi and also in New Zealand. There are no shortage of reasons to choose them: they grow very quickly, they are cheap, they withstand adverse conditions well, they provide versatile wood and their seeds disperse very well. They fulfill their mission of reforestation. Maybe too well: its seeds have a kind of membranous wings that allows them to fly far with the wind, escaping from the plantations. So much so that in New Zealand the “wild conifers” or “wilding conifers” They are already a national problem. what’s happening. That conifers originally planted in managed plantations are escaping from those areas and their control, colonizing open landscapes. As details The New Zealand Ministry of Primary Industry, there are already more than 2 million hectares affected. Before they decided to launch a control program, it was even worse: they were expanding at a rate of 90,000 hectares a year. Why is it important. The fact that there is a pine forest where it shouldn’t brings serious problems: They drain the water. The conifer canopy intercepts water before it reaches the ground, so runoff is reduced, aquifers are recharged less, and there is less water in rivers and reservoirs. The estimated loss is up to 40%. And if there is less water in rivers and reservoirs, it can affect the production of electricity with hydroelectric plants. They affect biodiversity. The introduced species were not native and their rapid expansion displaces native vegetation in one of the most biodiverse countries on the planet. Fires and agricultural production. Its uncontrolled presence reduces the space for agriculture and favors the spread of fires. Why were they planted? This problem that is bringing the New Zealand government to its head began precisely with government programs of the 60s and 70s. At that time the administration massively planted Pinus radiata, Pseudotsuga menziesii and other exotic species with the aim of reforesting areas, avoiding deforestation and protect the inland highlands . In fact, The New Zealand Parliament recognized in 2023 how he had sprinkled with seeds by air. And as we have already seen, conifers are the perfect invader: productive, resistant and fast growing. What could go wrong. The difficult and expensive task of keeping the wild conifer at bay. The oceanic country has been trying to stop wild pines for more than a decade and almost 200 million dollars. In 2015 they approved the strategy against wild conifers with a vision of containment and eradication by 2030 (spoiler: it will not be like that), but the lack of financing has been its endemic evil. With specific injections like the one in 2020 100 million dollarsframed within a post-pandemic job creation project, then even the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment (PCE) of New Zealand has had to write a letter to the president to complain about the lack of means. Without sufficient and sustained funding, the program takes one step forward, another step back: controlled areas are recolonized. Who should pay? The tricky issue about the matter, which touches on elements as critical as water or electricity production, is that it requires an ambitious and continuous plan over time to be effective. The PCE points out explicitly to the state, which promoted plantations and aerial seeding, but also points to the logging industry insofar as it has also benefited from these problematic species, posing a possible tax. On the other hand, and as affected are the energy companies, who are as interested as anyone in solving the problem. In fact, the prime minister has already entered into talks. In Xataka | The Mediterranean Sea is becoming tropicalized: the Balearic Islands welcome an invasive plant that until now was impossible in its waters In Xataka | The US has such a big problem with Asian carp in its rivers that it has decided something extreme: electrocute them Cover | Kerin Gedge

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