Month: May 2026

we are too comfortable with it

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The entire world has been subject to American technological power for decades. Their companies and services have become the de facto standard in the industry, but in recent months the panorama has changed. Countries around the world are realizing that their interests and those of those companies are not always aligned. Structural change now seems inevitable, and that means one thing: abandoning US technology. Or rather, try. The UpScrolled case. In just one week the Australian platform UpScrolled has surpassed the million users. The growth has occurred after the unknowns posed by the new situation of TikTok, which will now operate in the US as part of a consortium led by Oracle. This sudden success, although modest, shows that there is a market looking for alternatives, they detail. in Rest of World. I want to have my data secure. Last year Donald Trump signed an executive order. It sanctioned the International Criminal Court and its main person in charge, British lawyer Karim Khan, for having issued an arrest warrant against Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli Prime Minister. Everything indicates that Microsoft canceled the email account Khan, and he reacted by migrating his account to the Swiss provider Proton Mail, which has more than 100 million users around the world. If Microsoft can “silence” a senior international official, governments take note. France leads the charge. In the European Union, the French government has prohibited its public officials the use of American technological solutions. The measure seeks to protect the integrity of its communications, and the French country is promoting local options like TomTom or Here for navigation and Visio for video calls. The EU wants to support these solutions through the DMA, but here the objective is not only economic, but strategic. Relying too much on Silicon Valley is proving to be dangerous. Made in India. 6,500 km away from Paris, in New Delhi, Indian leaders are moving in that same direction. They are actively supporting the use of the Zoho office suite as an alternative to Google Docs, and they also have their own messaging platform, Arattaiwhich competes with WhatsApp. In reality, India has been promoting your digital sovereigntyand it is not the only one on the Asian continent. In Japan we have examples like Line and in South Korea KakaoTalk triumphs, they are already absolute leaders and areas that the American Big Tech have not managed to reconquer. Powerful knight is a gift of money. Although local alternatives exist, there is a first major obstacle: financing. Most technology startups depend significantly on venture capital, and here Silicon Valley investment companies dominate the landscape. If governments want real technological sovereignty, they must promote those investment ecosystems that also compete with North American firms. AI as a loophole. There is an option to get around those obstacles: the availability of open weight AI models like those offered by China. These LLMs are capable of helping to develop their own software ecosystems that compete or at least are valid alternatives for the governments that take advantage of them. AI is another battlefield in which the US is investing in a big way, yes, but those open models that especially come from China are an avenue to explore. Regional superapps. We are also seeing how there are local platforms that manage to compete with those that the US has managed to turn into true empires. In Southeast Asia there are cases such as Grab (Singapore) and Gojek (Indonesia) that have driven out of business or largely displaced the almighty Uber. They have done it by creating their own map systems and payments, but above all they have achieved this by understanding the needs of their markets better than foreign competitors. The Canadian journalist Paris Marx, usually critical of Silicon Valley, made a good review of European alternatives to various US technological platforms. The real challenge: comfort. Although alternatives exist and in some cases are very relevant, all of them require extra work that most people are not willing to do. Resistance to change plays a leading role here, and the reality is that users are usually comfortable with the products and services they already use. Geopolitical arguments that are persuasive at the government level may not be as persuasive among end users. Infrastructure? And then there’s the other problem: these services and platforms are still almost absolutely cloud-centric, and for something to work in the cloud you need data centers that support such operations. Europe, Asia and the entire world have celebrated time and again when Microsoft, Amazon or Google installed a data center in their countries, but what they probably did not realize is that these data centers were, in some way, poisoned. Now it is much more difficult to react, and avoiding that dependency will take years and a lot of money… if that ever happens. In Xataka | Europe no longer trusts Google. That is why several start-ups are designing an independent payment system on Android

The C919 was born to stand up to Boeing and Airbus. Data shows how close (or far) you are from achieving it

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If you have made a medium-haul flight in recent years, it is most likely that you have traveled on an Airbus A320 family or Boeing 737 family aircraft. It is the unwritten rule of many of these journeys: two industrial giants and a market that for decades has seemed almost closed to any applicant. China has been trying for years to gain a foothold in that segment with the C919, its single-aisle aircraft developed by COMAC. And the latest data suggests that the project is beginning to leave behind the phase in which it could only be read as a promise. This jump can be seen in the operational data collected by Flight Master and citated by China Dailand. In April, the C919 completed 3,190 flights, 117.9% more than in the same month of the previous year, and some aircraft recorded up to 10.7 flight hours per day. The accumulated figure also helps measure progress: as of April 30, 2026, the aircraft had exceeded 42,000 commercial flights since its entry into service. While the data does not make the C919 an immediate global rival to Airbus and Boeing, it does show that the program is moving forward. Let’s look back for a moment. The C919 made its first flight test on May 5, 2017, was delivered for the first time in December 2022 and officially entered commercial service in May 2023, with a route between Shanghai and Beijing. Since then, its network has gradually expanded until connecting 29 airports: 28 in mainland China and one in Hong Kong. As we can see, this is a domestic expansion, but it clearly no longer plays the experimental role. C919 flies more and more, but still depends on key parts Okay, but how many airplanes really sustain that growth? According to China Daily, at the end of April China Eastern Airlines operated 15 units of the C919, Air China had 11 and China Southern Airlines had 10. The distribution between the three large Chinese airlines reinforces the presence of the model in the local market. However, the figure forces us to put the progress in perspective: the fleet is still small compared to the usual volumes of Western competitors. That is why the key is not only in how many C919s there are, but in what performance they are giving in operation. According to Flight Master, since the beginning of 2026, 88.5% of C919 activity has corresponded to operations with at least four daily sectors. Zhu Keli maintains that the use of the plane is already close to that of comparable models more common single aisle, which translates into a sign of greater maturity in maintenance, crew scheduling and ground services. The limit appears when you look beyond the daily operation. IBA Group pointed out in August 2025 that international certification continues to advance slowly and keeps the C919 largely focused on the Chinese market. The consulting firm recalled that the European Aviation Safety Agency had confirmed in April 2025 that the validation of the plane would require at least three to six years from the technical familiarization phase. This schedule does not prevent the program from gaining volume within China, but it does help to understand why its international leap is more complicated. LEAP -1C, the Western engine used by the Chinese Comac C919 The most delicate vulnerability is in the engine. The C919 that flies today uses the engine LEAP-1C of CFM International, a joint venture of GE Aerospace and Safran, and that dependence has already proven to be more than a technical issue. Last year, let us remember, the geopolitical and commercial tensions they altered the production of the program, with a temporary suspension of the supply of that engine. IBA Group also identifies the dependence on imported engines and avionics as a relevant limitation. China is trying to close that gap with political support, planned production and more control over critical parts. According to SCMPthe national plan for 2026-2030 places among its priorities the increase in production, the stability of the supply chain and the advancement of the CJ-1000A engine, called to reduce foreign dependence on the C919. IBA Group adds that even if that engine enters service later this decade, matching the performance and reliability of Western engines will be a multi-year process. That’s the real measure of the program: the plane is already flying more regularly, but its industrial maturity is still being built. Images | Comac In Xataka | The Comac C919 symbolizes China’s aerial dream: the trade war threatens to clip its wings in mid-takeoff

With the RAM market impossible, the inevitable happened: counterfeit DDR5 tablets

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Make a reference to ‘The Simpsons‘At this point it’s complicated because the new generations may not get it, but there is an episode in which Springfield declares the dry law and, when they knock it down, the mayor asks the mafia how long it will take for alcohol to flood the city. The answer: five minutes. And that is exactly what is happening now with the RAM memory: where the market does not reach, counterfeiters enter Because after the DDR5 memories that are really DDR2 come the DDR5 memories with plastic chips. In short. The truth is that I did not imagine that we would reach a point where there would be well-crafted scams with all the intention of deceiving buyers of a RAM memory stick, but the truth is that we have been there for a few months. It was at the end of 2025, at a time when the RAM crisis was beginning to tighten (but it was far from the current moment) when it was reported that an Amazon Spain buyer received a kit of supposed DDR5 memory from Ireland that was nothing more than a DDR and DDR2 chip with a sticker on top. It was quite tacky, but you realized it instantly and you could always claim a refund because Amazon covers it in these cases. The problem is that there are scams that may be a little more ‘worked’ and that involve unsoldering the chips from a RAM tablet and replacing them with plastic parts. This is what, as we see in Digital Trendshas just happened to some users in Japan, who report the sale of memory tablets that do not correspond to previous generations, but are carefully designed to appear to be legitimate RAM when, as we say, it is a PCB with imitation chips. Or directly the entire pill being fake. An example of an auction stick ram. He original message It has moved a lot on Twitter and describes a full-fledged scam. Through stores like Yahoo Japan, users sell used RAM sticks as “junk” or “untested” in batches and at affordable prices. This is a practice that is also done with processors that we can find in stores like Wallapop and it may work… or it may not. That is why there are those who risk buying. In this case, a frog came out. The SO-DIMM modules (for laptops) had stickers that looked legitimate from Samsung or SK Hynix, but were nothing more than labels cloned from real memories used to cover the supposed chips. Instead of being DRAM memory as such, these are modules made of fiberglass that obviously do not work. In some cases, there are real circuits, but they correspond to lower-grade recycled chips. The important thing is that, be it one case or another, it is obviously not what you are paying for, but they are made well enough so that a person without knowledge cannot identify why the new memory module they have paid for does not work. Even a quick inspection can fool someone who has changed a few of these pads. It is no longer that they clone real stickers with their serial number and so on, but rather the dedication to produce those fiberglass “chips” screen printed like a legitimate one. One supposedly made by SK Hynix Another from Samsung (with SK Hynix chips, curiously…) One of the chips made with fiberglass Meteoric. Unlike the December 2025 fake RAM case, these pills are being sold in auctions on Yahoo Japan and there are already users with the fly behind their ear, which causes them not to bid and the modules to no longer be sold. But in the end it is the consequence of a market that is really impossible and in which scammers enter with promises of components at better prices than those we can find on the market first-hand. Because building a PC today is extremely expensive due not only to RAM that has been able to increase up to 400% in some cases, but for some SSDs that have also explodedgraphics cards that are beginning to be scarce and segments such as processors and the motherboards that are moving to the hoarder we’ve been talking about for months: AI hyperscalers. As I say, with prices through the roof, scams appear. with head. And (again, I didn’t think I had to give recommendations to avoid falling into a scam when buying a RAM pill), the important thing here is to have common sense. It really is like any other scam attempt: if the thing is too good to be true, we have to tune our antennas to see if they want to sneak it in. The first thing is to buy in stores and platforms that provide certain guarantees to the customer, but also look closely at the photos, compare serial numbers and ask for more photos from the seller if we are not 100% sure. And if the price is very good and we are not convinced by the explanation that the person may not know the market situation, ask as much as possible and do not trust the first thing they tell us. The RAM with a sticker that appeared in December last year. Image from VideoCardz. In the end, it is curious, but buying second-hand memory pills can become something that validates criminology, just like buy retro games on cartridge through Wallapop. Images | Taki, ri In Xataka | Nothing will be the same again: the price increase of the Nintendo Switch 2 in less than a year draws a new horizon

Apple has let a wonderful product be on assisted breathing

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Those who have (have) tried the Apple Vision Prothey are clear: it is one of the most impressive technological products in all of history. The ‘wow’ effect is inevitable, and in those first minutes when you wear them it seems impossible not to believe that a product like this should have a brilliant future. That this sensation fades is equally inevitable, and just over two years after its launch it is worth asking what could have gone wrong in a product as amazing as this one. Price, of course, is one of the factors. But not the only one. The Vision Pro as an engineering tragedy. Apple has gone from trying to revolutionize the way we entertain and work to leaving the project in the second (or third) plane. The hardware is impeccable, but the high price and lack of native content and applications have turned these $3,500 glasses into a niche product. Dangerously modest sales. It is estimated that Apple has sold about 600,000 units in total of the Vision Pro, a ridiculous figure when compared to traditional iPhone sales and which is also very far from the sales of the iPad or the Apple Watch. Initial projections were optimistic, but demand ended up plummeting and Apple actually ended slowing down in production and changing the product roadmap. He hasn’t completely retired, of course, but everything he’s done sounds like the Vision Pros are on life support… or so it seems. The updates keep coming. Although there are criticisms in other sections, something that is undeniable is the attention that Apple continues to put into solving existing problems and adding new features through the new versions of your visionOS operating system. It is true that in many cases the new features are modest, but they certainly show that Apple is not neglecting that part of its product’s life cycle. The future is not Pro, but (maybe) Air. Apple ended up renewing the original model that was presented in February 2024, but the Vision Pro (2025) They were a modest update. In fact, the revision seemed more intended to clean up the inventory of components than to propose an ambitious evolution. It seemed almost pure commitment. It is inevitable to think that Apple prefers to focus on other products and segments, but that has not prevented rumors from appearing about a new and future revision of these glasses. The curious thing is that They will no longer be Pro, but Airand Apple is even looking for engineers with the theoretical intention of proposing a change of direction. That relief is expected —cheaper?— by 2027 or 2028. We will have to be patient. Few native apps. Apple boasts of having more than a million applications available for the Vision Pro, but there is fine print there. The vast majority of those tools are rescaled iPad apps that float in 2D windows. The offer of native applications to take advantage of this interesting concept of spatial computing is scarce, and there is also no “killer app” that has managed to sell these glasses. Not only that: Netflix or YouTube didn’t appear at launch, although at least YouTube did launch its native version in February 2026. That the majors in the entertainment segment did not offer that support was another nail in this disturbing coffin. Lack of content is a condemnation. But what is really problematic is that even though we are dealing with an absolutely wasted product. The photo demonstrations and especially the immersive video made us dream of a future in which we could also virtually “attend” live events from home. Concerts and sporting events seemed to be ideal to be enjoyed on the Vision Pro, but two years have passed and the offer of “spatial” content natively it is as visually spectacular as it is anecdotal. A design that was born lame. One of the fundamental problems with the Vision Pro has been in its design from the beginning. The ergonomics of the product were poor from the beginning, and in fact it could have been worse: the “flask” in the form of a battery with cable that is necessary for its operation was a solution to avoid greater evils, but it was not exactly an ideal option. The ergonomics were not perfect either, and this was confirmed by the fact that with the Vision Pro (2025) Apple provided a different headband with two support and grip zones, much more suitable for long sessions of use. Eyesight, what for?. Another of the Vision Pro’s mistakes has been the Eyesight technology, which Apple proposed as the solution to a problem that the company itself invented. Apple sacrificed weight, battery and complexity (in addition to cost) with that external screen that no one asked for and that is barely visible in normal light conditions. This cosmetic solution was intended to prevent one from losing “connection” with their surroundings when wearing the glasses, but it has probably been the most ridiculed feature of the device. He tried to avoid that feeling of total isolation, but the truth is that this product inevitably isolates the user. Not even Apple conquers the XR market. In many ways Apple tried to overcome what virtual reality glasses offer, but the reality is that the advantages of Vision Pro are too expensive. The Meta Quest 3 have made it clear that for 500 euros you can have 70 or 80% of the experience, for example. Those who have tried to compete with Apple directly, such as Samsung with its Galaxy XRthey have also ended up leaving the product something abandoned and with hardly any distribution. In both cases, these glasses end up becoming an exclusive $3,500 (or $2,000) virtual external monitor. The experience is fantastic, yes, but that has not been enough to convince users and developers. The Vision Pro as the “Lisa” of our generation. The technical milestone achieved by Apple is undeniable. The amount of technology built into the Vision Pro is astonishing, and it … Read more

Neighbors in Chile tried to stop an Amazon data center. Justice has left a clear message with its decision

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Artificial intelligence has been part of our lives for a long time, often almost without us stopping to think about what is behind it. We use it as if everything were happening in an invisible layer: models, algorithms and, perhaps, servers in some remote location. But we can also look at it from another perspective. The infrastructure that supports that world is very real: it has a location, consumes resources, requires permits, involves enormous investments, and can also alter the environment of those who live nearby. That is one of the great debates that is beginning to accompany the rise of AI: the cloud also has neighbors. They lost the case. A specific case leads us to Huechurabanorth of Santiago de Chile, where Amazon plans to build a data center. The initiative had received a favorable Environmental Qualification Resolution in July 2024, but not everyone was convinced that the project had been evaluated accordingly. That concern reached the judicial route through a claim presented by Patricio Hernández Valenzuelaa resident of the area, and the Second Environmental Court resolved on April 9, 2026 to reject ita decision that leaves the data center in a position to move forward. A very specific concern. Hernández questioned whether the environmental evaluation of the project had not adequately taken into account a possible high voltage line that, according to his approach, would be necessary to power the data center. The criticism was not minor: if both infrastructures were linked, they had to be analyzed together. For residents, not doing so meant leaving relevant impacts on the environment out of the analysis. The key to the failure. The court’s reasoning involves clearly separating both pieces. The ruling concludes that the data center and the eventual high-voltage line cannot be considered to form a single initiative, among other things because the Amazon project does not include that infrastructure as part of its design. Furthermore, the planned electricity supply does not depend on its own installation, but on the network managed by third parties, which reinforces the idea that these are different projects. Without joint evaluation. Once the existence of a project unit has been ruled out, the court concludes that an integrated environmental assessment is not appropriate. The sentence explicitly states it: “it has been proven that between both initiatives there is no relationship of functional interdependence that conditions their execution.” This nuance is key, because it implies that the data center can operate using the available electrical infrastructure, without the need to subject its viability to a future high voltage line which, in any case, would have to be evaluated separately if it were to be considered. Beyond the legal debate. The Amazon project has very specific dimensions on paper. The data storage center in Huechuraba is designed to operate for 30 years, with an estimated investment of 205 million dollars. It would be built on an area of ​​10.9 hectares, with a construction of 21,350.07 square meters, in the street of Américo Vespucio 1055. From the company, collects Reutershave pointed out that the design of the infrastructure focuses on minimizing energy and water consumption, and maintains that the plan met environmental requirements. Chile as a hub. The Huechuraba project is not an isolated initiative within Amazon’s strategy. Amazon Web Services has proposed an investment of more than 4,000 million dollars in Chile over 15 years to build, operate and maintain its infrastructure in the country. The idea is to turn Santiago into its third major center in Latin America, after São Paulo and the central region of Mexico. Factors such as connectivity through fiber optic cables are added to this context. The concern of those who live nearby. Beyond the investment and digital infrastructure they promise, data centers are often accompanied by very specific concerns: high electricity consumption, use of water for cooling, heat or noise generation, and their fit into environments that, in many cases, have environmental or community value. Google did not have the same path. The case of Amazon is not the only one that has gone through this type of debate in Chile. Google had obtained initial approval in 2020 to build a $200 million data center in Cerrillos, southwest of Santiago. However, the project’s journey was different. In February 2024, the Second Environmental Court decided to partially reverse that permissionand months later the company announced that it would not continue with the initiative as it had originally been proposed, opting to start a new process from scratch for a project in the same location, but with a redesign based on air cooling. Electricity enters the scene. If we broaden the focus, the debate is not limited to a specific project, but to the system’s capacity to absorb this type of infrastructure. A Systep reportpublished on September 23, 2025 with data from the National Electrical Coordinator, indicated that, taking 2025 as a starting point, the electrical demand of data centers in Chile could increase by 270% in five years. The same projection places this consumption at around 1,207 MW in 2030. These figures help to understand why the energy issue has become one of the central axes when talking about the expansion of the cloud and AI. Images | Xataka with Nano Banana In Xataka | In 2024, Big Tech spent absurd amounts of money on AI. In 2025, they managed to spend 77% more

China wants to do a “CAT scan” of the Earth, and to do so it has launched a hyperspectral satellite to see what the eye cannot see

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A Kuaizhou-11 rocket put into orbit On March 16, Xiguang-1 06, the most advanced commercial hyperspectral satellite that China has sent into space. The satellite is capable of analyzing the chemical composition of the Earth’s surface with great precision, opening up a whole range of possibilities. What a hyperspectral satellite allows. A conventional satellite captures images of the planet in a similar way to how a camera does. A hyperspectral satellite, on the other hand, is able to distinguish the unique spectral signature of plants, tissues and other objects on Earth, which allows, among other things, to prevent crop losses, locate mineral deposits or monitor the state of the environment. While a normal satellite can identify a forest from space, one equipped with hyperspectral technology can differentiate between different types of trees and even determine the health status of each of them. The key is that these sensors capture dozens or hundreds of bands of the electromagnetic spectrum simultaneously, something that provides spectral information so detailed that it often produces results impossible to obtain with multispectral satellites or other types of observation systems. The satellite. The Xiguang-1 06 was developed by Xi’an Zhongke Xiguang Aerospace Technology Group and launched aboard the Kuaizhou-11 Y7 rocket from the Jiuquan launch center in Gansu province. It is the first commercial hyperspectral satellite in orbit with full spectral coverage in the 400 to 2,500 nanometer band (from visible to shortwave infrared) and operates with 26 independent spectral bands. In practical terms, that means it can “see” far beyond the human eye, detecting mineral compositions, differentiating healthy crops from diseased ones, and tracking changes in ecosystems that would be invisible to any other system. According to Kou Yiminchief engineer at Zhongke What is it for in practice? In the provinces of Sichuan and Yunnan the satellite monitors crop growth high value such as tea and traditional Chinese medicinal plants; in the mining areas of the northwest of the country, it issues early warnings about geological risks such as landslides. But the potential reach goes much further. Hyperspectral technology can analyze phytoplankton levels in the oceans, detect fuel spills from ships, measure methane leaks in energy facilities or monitor polluting materials from mining ponds before they reach nearby soil and vegetation. It can also locate mineral deposits such as gold under the surface, identifying the presence of chemical elements in its composition such as copper. one of many. Xiguang-1 06 is one more piece of “Xiguang-1”, a constellation that contemplates a total of 158 satellites: 108 general purpose hyperspectral remote sensing, 40 specialized in carbon emissions monitoring and 10 specific function. The goal is to complete the in-orbit network by 2030, forming a “full spectrum in 100 bands” observing system with more than one hundred operational satellites. To understand its scale, Xiguang-1 06 was one of eight satellites that traveled aboard the same Kuaizhou-11 rocket at the March 16 launch. What’s behind. Until a few years ago, hyperspectral remote sensing from space had been a field almost exclusive of government missions. In recent years, however, commercial companies have begun to emerge launching their own constellations of hyperspectral satellites. China, with Zhongke Xiguang at the helm, is one of the actors that has risen the fastest in this sector. The company also has the “CAS Xiguang Remote Sensing Cloud” data platform, considered the first hyperspectral data platform from China. The stated goal is to become the world’s largest hyperspectral constellation, with applications already covering agriculture, forestry management, oceanography, carbon monitoring and mining. Cover image | China Daily and Richard Gatley In Xataka | The origin of the “blue moon” is actually a translation error: how a “betrayal” ended up giving the satellite its name

the new family operating system that prioritizes mental health over extracurricular activities

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A drawer full of tupperware mismatched that threatens to overflow when opened. A costume from the school function forgotten for weeks in the back seat of the car. A mother laughing out loud with her children in the middle of a living room where the cushions serve as a military fort, blatantly ignoring the fluff in the hallway. It might seem like a portrait of an overwhelmed family, but it is, in reality, the image of a silent revolution. For the past two decades, the gold standard of parenting seemed to have a name: Mother Tiger. Inspired in Amy Chua’s controversial book In 2011, this model required parents—especially women—to act as CEOs of their children’s future. The ultimate goal was to optimize their success through packed schedules, tutoring, fluency in three languages, and an immaculate diet. But the mothers have said enough. Faced with unsustainable levels of exhaustion, a new generation is deciding to get off the wheel. They claim their right to live with dirty dishes in the sink and to accept that a grade of “Good” (a B) on the report card is more than enough. The Beta Motherand this new family operating system is showing that, sometimes, the best way to protect your children’s future is to simply leave them alone. The rebellion of the imperfect As stated an extensive report on The Wall Street Journalthese acts of daily “renunciation” are adding forces to become a “discreet feminist revolution.” The American newspaper illustrates this paradigm shift through women like Sophie Jaffe, a mother from Los Angeles who allows her 13-year-old son to do parkour around the city or set your own schedules, as long as you respect the curfew. “I see what happens to children who are overly controlled,” Jaffe tells the newspaper. “I’d rather them be out making memories than sitting in front of a video game.” In internet culture and popular psychology, this profile has been called a “Type B” mother. The magazine TODAY includes the explanations of psychotherapist Colette Brownwho defines these mothers as “relaxed, very patient, women who don’t mind chaos.” According to Brown, the rise of this profile on social networks is a direct response and a frontal rejection of pressure from the tradwives (traditional wives) and the toxic perfectionism of Instagram. Mothers like Katie Ziemer summarize this philosophy with a lapidary phrase: “I’m Type B, of course my house doesn’t look like a museum. I prefer my children to have fun playing in the mud rather than watching television.” The spectrum, however, has nuances. For those women unable to let go of control completely, the publication The Bump marks the emergence of a middle ground: the “Type C” mother. Coined by content creator Ashleigh Surratt, it defines “recovering perfectionists.” They are women who maintain non-negotiable structures (such as sleep schedules or medical appointments), but who apply strategic neglect to the rest. As one of them relates: “They have their shirts clean, even if they are not hanging in the closet; I know exactly which pile they are in.” This rebellion towards the imperfect is not born of whim, but of absolute collapse. Sociological data show that the demands on parents have multiplied exponentially. Recently in Xataka we documented how parents millennials Today they dedicate four times more time to their children than the generation of the baby boom. And the economist Corinne Low confirms in WSJ that, paradoxically, after the massive entry of women into the labor market, the time they dedicate to children’s tasks has skyrocketed (from 14 minutes a week of help with homework in 1975 to more than an hour today). Globally, the family scaffolding is creaking. A study published in the scientific journal Healthcare reveals alarming rates of burnout (burnout syndrome) applied to motherhood and fatherhood: it affects 8.9% of fathers in the US, 9.8% in Belgium or 9.6% in Poland. And they bear the worst part. Although in countries like Spain leave has been equalized to 19 weeks, recent studies indicate that 78% of mothers declare themselves overloaded, assuming the invisible weight of the “mental load.” As researcher Eve Rodsky warnsmen today “help”, but women continue to be the directors of the project, managing their partners as if they were kind subordinates. Science dictates sentence But this maternal collapse is not the only collateral damage. If all this enormous sacrifice had guaranteed the well-being of the minors, the story would be different. But scientific evidence has shown exactly the opposite. Parenting under the “helicopter” model—flying over children to spare them any frustration or failure—is destroying them. Academic journals are blunt. A meta-analysis published in the Journal of Adult Development, which reviewed 53 independent studiesshowed that paternal overprotection is directly associated with an increase in internalizing problems (such as anxiety and depression) and a sharp decline in self-efficacy and academic performance of young people. Along these lines, an investigation of Journal of Youth and Adolescence showed that excessive parental control directly threatens the satisfaction of adolescents’ basic psychological needs, especially their sense of autonomy. The real-life result is a drastic increase in adolescent psychiatric admissions and alarming rates of suicidal ideation linked to the inability to manage frustration. Preventing a child from tripping deprives him or her of the neurological development necessary (specifically in the prefrontal cortex) to learn to stand up. However, we must take a broader look. How it contributes The Conversationthe phenomenon of hyperparenting is the psychologization of an enormous social problem. In other words, it is easy to criticize the mother who calls the university to review her child’s exam, but we ignore the macroeconomic context. Parents subject children to academic training programs almost from preschool because they perceive a wild and stagnant job market. When you compete with millions of graduates to obtain a halfway decent job, the anguish of ensuring the child’s future becomes a suffocating control. Furthermore, getting off the wheel has a high emotional cost. The publication Bolde documents the “B side” of being a Beta mother. These … Read more

The Solar Impulse made the dream of the solar airplane a reality. Now it has ended up destroyed after an accident

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There was a time when the Solar Impulse 2 It seemed like it came from a simple question: how far can a plane go if we leave out conventional fuel. The answer was not a commercial product, but an experimental aircraft powered by solar energy and batteries that ended up flying around the world. That is why the news has a special charge. That plane that symbolized a different way of imagining aviation has ended crashed in the Gulf of Mexico during an autonomous test. The coup came on May 4. According to Aviation Safety Networkthe Solar Impulse 2 was conducting an autonomous test flight when it lost power and ended up crashing into the water. The least bitter part of the news is that there were no injuries or deaths, something important because the plane was already flying without a crew in this new stage. The most symbolic part is another: the device that for years turned a technological promise into something visible has been reduced to the remains of an accident. Behind the project was Bertrand Piccarda figure marked by a family tradition of explorers: his grandfather Auguste Piccard was a pioneer of the depths and his father, Jacques Piccardarrived at the Mariana Trench. In 2003 started to imagine a solar aircraft capable of going around the world to draw attention to the “sustainable energy“First came Solar Impulse 1, with its initial flight in 2009and then the final jump. The plane that converted the sun into flight energy What is striking is that this ambition was not based on a gigantic machine in the traditional sense. The Solar Impulse 2 had a huge wingspanabout 71 meters, higher than that of a Boeing 747, but it weighed around 2.3 tons thanks to its carbon fiber structure. The energy came from 17,248 photovoltaic cells distributed throughout the plane, with a maximum power of 66 kW to drive four electric motors and charge four lithium-ion batteries. The moment that made it more than a technological oddity came in 2016. That year, the Solar Impulse 2 completed the first trip around the world of a fixed-wing plane powered entirely by solar energy, a journey that It lasted for more than 15 months. Bertrand Piccard and André Borschberg, co-founder of the foundation, alternated at the controls during the tour. It was not a demonstration of speed, of course: the plane was moving between 31 and 62 miles per hour, slowing down during the night sections. After that feat, the story changed tone. In 2019, the Solar Impulse Foundation announced the sale of the plane to Skydweller Aero for an undisclosed amount. The Spanish-American company did not view the project from exactly the same place as its creators: its interest was in exploring the potential of the aircraft as a surveillance and communications platform, a very different destination from the original message of energy awareness. With Skydweller the technical transformation of the device also began. After incorporating numerous modifications, the plane completed in Spain his first autonomous flight in 2023and the following year it carried out its first completely unmanned operation at Stennis International Airport, near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. The company’s stated goal was to develop a fleet of solar aircraft capable of non-stop flights at certain latitudes, between Miami and Rio de Janeiro. The ambition was evident: almost continuous operations for military and commercial contracts, at a much lower cost than satellite-based options. A huge promise that has ended underwater. Images | Solar Impulse (1, 2, 3, 4) In Xataka | While we all look at Iran, something is moving in the Arctic Circle: Russia is sending bombers with missiles

12 premieres this week on Netflix, including the return of one of the platform’s most successful franchises

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We cross the midway point of May, and we do it in a big way, with two premieres that are among the juiciest of this week in streaming: the return of ‘Berlín’ with a second season that recovers the most filigree and elegant side of ‘La casa de papel’, and ‘Flow’, one of the best animated films of recent years. And it is not the only thing that the most popular platform has in its portfolio this week. series Berlin and the Lady with an Ermine The second installment of the, for now, only spin-off of ‘La casa de papel’ announced by Netflix (we will have to see what those already announced next steps are in the franchise expansion) takes us to Seville: a great Andalusian businessman commissions Berlin, again played by Pedro Alonso, to steal ‘The Lady with an Ermine’, the famous painting by Leonardo da Vinci that arrives in the city for an exhibition. Berlin believes that it is better to rob the thief himself, and sets up his usual gang: Michelle Jenner, Tristán Ulloa, Begoña Vargas, Julio Peña Fernández and Joel Sánchez, who are joined by Inma Cuesta as an unpredictable and temperamental Sevillian. Premiere: Friday, May 15 Nemesis More robberies, more suspense and more tension with this series about the confrontation between two men who, despite being on opposite sides, share more than they imagine: an obsessive detective and a sophisticated thief expert in high-profile robberies. But they both share something that makes them more similar than they want to admit: they want to protect their families using the only means they know. Matthew Law and Y’lan Noel lead the cast of this series co-directed and produced by Mario Van Peebles. Premiere: Thursday, May 14 Other series Devil May Cry (Season 2) – Tuesday, May 12 Secrets of sport – Tuesday, May 12 Gallitos (T2) – Wednesday, May 13 Between father and son – Wednesday, May 13 Soul mates – Thursday, May 14 The Middle – Friday, May 15 The SUPERgeeks – Friday, May 15 Movies flow One of the most extraordinary and celebrated animated films of recent years, premiered in Cannes in 2024, and winner of the Golden Globe for Best Animated Film and the Oscar in the same category, becoming the first Latvian film to win an Academy Award. It stands out for being completely rendered with the free and open source software Blender, and for not containing any dialogue. The film tells the story of a cat, a dog, a capybara, a ring-tailed lemur and a secretary bird who travel together through a surreal, dreamlike landscape flooded by water, in a world in which human beings have disappeared. An allegory about cooperation in days of adversity, more than necessary in these times. Other movies Marty, Life is short: The documentary – Tuesday, May 12 The crash – Friday, May 15 In Xataka | Netflix premieres today the dystopian series that has risen to the throne of the best in history in six seasons

A new search method detects dozens of possible planets with two suns that had gone unnoticed by us

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Nowadays, more than 6,000 planets are known which, like ours, revolve around a star. On the other hand, only 18 planets have been found that orbit a binary system, with two stars. For this reason, they are considered a rarity. They are so rare that the best known of them all is Tatooine and, far from existing, it belongs to Star Wars fiction. However, a team of scientists from the University of New South Wales has decided to change the method we use to search for planets. In doing so, they have suddenly found 27 candidates for planets with two suns. An underused method. The method that have used These scientists know as apsidal precession. It was already used in the past to characterize binary star systems. However, until now it had not been used to check if there is another object, such as a planet, within that same system. Broadly speaking, it consists of locating possible changes in the eclipse calendar of the two stars. If these changes cannot be explained with general relativity or stellar physics, there must be something disturbing their movements. This is how, thanks to the TESS telescope, 27 candidates for circumbinary planets (with two suns) have been located, although it will still be necessary to confirm which ones are really planets. Stars playing hide and seek. Eclipses occur when, from the position of the telescope observing them, one star interrupts the light of the other. In a known binary system, these eclipses are predictable. Therefore, if we see something that doesn’t add up, there could be a planet in the way. TESS typically relies on the transit method to detect exoplanets. It detects periodic disturbances in a star’s brightness, which could indicate that a planet is crossing between it and the telescope. However, if the planet has an irregular orbit that is not in the telescope’s line of sight, it may go unnoticed. However, with this new method that is not a problem, because you do not have to see the planet or the changes in the brightness of the star. It focuses rather on the gravitational effects that affect its two stars. It doesn’t matter that its orbit is not visible to us. It’s just the beginning. This team has detected 27 candidates for circumbinary planets in a total of 1,590 two-star systems analyzed. That means about 2% of these systems could host planets. If this is true, thousands more planets could soon be detected. For a long time, exoplanet detection would have been highly biased. Artist’s representation of a system with two stars A great variety. The smallest possible circumbinary planet that has been detected has a mass similar to that of Neptune, while the largest is 10 times more massive than Jupiter. The closest one is 650 light years away from us, while the furthest one is 18,000 light years away. There are candidates in the northern and southern skies. In short, there is a great variety. That also supports the hypothesis that there are a wide variety of planets out there that, until now, have been invisible to us. And now what? Now it will be necessary to check which of those 27 candidates are really planets. Some stars, such as brown dwarfs or white dwarfs, could also alter the eclipse calendar of the binary system. Even black holes could do it. Therefore, it must be ruled out that it is any of these phenomena. To resolve this question, another instrument will be used, the Anglo-Australian telescope from Coonabarabran. With it these other very massive objects could be detected. If no plausible explanation is found, it would be concluded that it is a planet. What we can learn. Having techniques to detect another totally different type of exoplanet gives us much more information on planetary formation. There could be planets similar to Earth, whose only difference is the existence of two suns. Some of them could even host life or have hosted it in the past. The range of possibilities would open up greatly. About half of the stars in the universe are found in binary or multi-star systems. And all of that is still unexplored. Image | Star Wars | NASA/JPL-Caltech/T. Pyle In Xataka | There is only one chance in 11,000 years to reach the planet Sedna. Some Italians want to use this nuclear engine

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