Month: May 2026

this is how our body really perceives excesses with alcohol

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Theory (and experience in some cases) tells us that when we overindulge in alcohol, the next day is literally hell. However, despite being one of the most common afflictions in many societies, science continues to reveal the exact mechanisms that are activated in our body when the party is over. And far from being a simple problem of dehydration, the “morning after” is a complex chemical, immunological and cognitive breakdown. A body map. Here science has wanted create a map with all the effects that there are on the body after a drunkenness, and for this the Catholic University of Leuven used a simple mobile app to be able to monitor a total of 34 young adults who are habitual drinkers. Through this app, participants could cross-check questionnaire data, indicate the intensity of their hangover and even the quality of their sleep. But in addition, users pointed out the exact areas that hurt, felt weaker or numb in real time to clearly see that a hangover is more than a slight headache or having a dry mouth the next morning. The result. Once all the participants had painted the areas where they experienced these physical sensations, the truth is that it was quite clear what was happening in the muscles. And in general terms, it was seen how the pain mainly affected the temples of the head or even the stomach discomfort that was felt as a hyperactivation of motility. But at the other end of the spectrum we have the deactivation effect, which were areas painted with cold colors that signaled numbness or heaviness in the extremities. Although the fascinating thing about these “hangover maps” is that they are not purely psychological, since here science shows that these maps have real physiological correlates. That is, the areas that participants color align with measurable physical alterations, such as modulation of heart rate and visceral signals. He leaves the laboratory. Traditionally, tests on the effect of alcohol have been done in a laboratory, analyzing all the variables that could change, but the reality is that no one drinks in such a measured way in the real world. That is why now going out into a much more real environment gives you a naturalistic touch which offers much higher validity. Now an authentic representation of the multi-systemic hangover experience is literally being captured, balancing scientific rigor with the reality of how alcohol consumption occurs in our daily lives. A risk pattern. Behind this study of hangovers lies a key neuroscientific concept, which is called interoceptive phenomenology. This is nothing more than our brain’s ability to perceive and process the body’s internal signals, so mapping how we feel alcohol and a hangover is of great help in identifying a risk pattern for alcoholism. The key is in the literature that suggests that the way in which these physical sensations are processed is directly linked to our vulnerability to addictions. Here, interestingly, people who don’t have as many physical effects during a hangover may be at higher risk of developing an alcohol use disorder, since it may not feel too bad for them to draw a line. And this can be essential to be able to detect early in the future this serious problem that can literally destroy a life. Images | wirestock at Magnific In Xataka | There are scientists dedicated for decades to studying hangovers: what thousands of drunken binges (analyzed) have concluded afterwards

The most opaque business in Silicon Valley has just published its best results. This is exactly what Palantir sells

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Palantir has published some quarterly results that have surprised even its most optimistic analysts: revenues of $1.63 billion in the first quarter, 85% more than a year before. The company has also raised its annual forecast to almost 7,660 million. These are numbers that place Palantir in another league. And yet, many people don’t know exactly what they do. That is not an accident when it comes to this company, with such a specific type of activity. The context. Palantir has been building data analysis software for more than twenty years for governments and institutions that prefer not to make the headlines: the CIA, the FBI, the Pentagon, the United States immigration services… The company was founded in 2003 by Peter Thiel, the investor who also put money into Facebook and which today orbits in the power constellation. Trumpian, and by Alex Karp, its CEO, a notably eccentric figure with a PhD in Social Theory from Frankfurt. The combination of American intelligence money (In-Q-Tel, the CIA’s venture capital fund, was one of its first investors) and German university campus philosophy perfectly defines the moral ambiguity in which the company lives. In detailand. Palantir’s business has two legs. The first, and the one that is growing the most, is the American government: 687 million dollars in this quarter alone, 84% more than the previous year. The second leg is the commercial business with private companies, which has grown even faster (133%) to 595 million. But to understand how Palantir makes money you have to understand what it sells: Palantir Gotham It is its star product for governments and defense. It integrates dispersed data sources (satellite images, interceptions, movement logs, social networks, intelligence databases, etc.) and turns them into a coherent map that an analyst can interrogate. That is, it transforms oceans of noise into manageable information environments on which to make decisions. The screenshot that heads this article is an example. Palantir Foundry It is the business version. It does the same thing but for large companies: it unites data from different departments, cleans the information and allows automated workflows to be built on it. Maven AI It is their most recent and most controversial product. It is a command and control system that analyzes battlefield data and identifies targets in real time. The Pentagon is in the process of making it an official program of the American army, which would guarantee succulent long-term contracts. Between the lines. CEO Alex Karp This week he addressed his shareholders to explain to them that “the United States remains the constant core of the business. And that business is exploding.” Palantir’s rise is directly linked to increased defense spending, escalating geopolitical conflicts, and the growing use of AI in military contexts. In other words: when the world becomes more dangerous, Palantir makes more. Its business model is, to some extent, a barometer of global tension. Yes, but. Palantir Stock fell 1.5% in the aftermarket despite the good results, and they have accumulated a drop of around 18% so far this year. Investors have two questions without clear answers. The first: is 85% growth sustainable? The second, the most uncomfortable: what happens if the administration changes, if defense priorities change or if Congress tightens spending? A company whose main engine is a single client (the US government) has a concentration of risk that does not appear in the metrics they boast about. The money trail. The perennial debate about Palantir is not the financial one but the ethical one. The company has been at the center of some controversies for its work with ICE (the American immigration service) in identifying undocumented people, and for the role that its tools have played in military operations in different parts of the world. Karp does not shy away from these questions: he openly argues that the West needs companies willing to do this work, and that those who refuse simply leave the field open to others. It is an argument that its investors accept without many questions. And the results, for now, prove them right. In Xataka | AI is crucial for the US military. So he’s naming OpenAI and Palantir leaders as lieutenant generals Featured image | Palantir, Xataka with Mockuuups Studio

clean Windows of so much garbage

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Over the last few years, Microsoft has flooded Windows 11 of AI-based functions. Many of these tools have not gone down well with the community, not to mention the invasive advertising that has surrounded the operating system all this time. The result of this strategy without clear direction has led to fed up users, a damaged reputation and a nickname that has gone viral: “Microslop”. Now the company wants to regain the trust of users, and its own CEO has had to come out and say so in public. The problem has its own name, and it is “Microslop”. In recent months, Microsoft’s obsession with integrating AI into absolutely everything (Windows, Edge, Bing, Notepad, the Start menu) has generated great rejection from users. On social networks there are already many who nickname the company “Microslop”, a play on words between Microsoft and the term AI slop (content of dubious quality generated with artificial intelligence). The company tried to delete the term blocking it on their official Copilot Discord server, which sparked even more controversy and ended up forcing them to close that server directly. As we mentioned a couple of months ago, the maneuver was a perfect example of how to aggravate a problem instead of solving it. Recall: the straw that broke the camel’s back. Microsoft’s flagship feature for Windows, which promised a kind of AI-based PC photo memory, became the symbol of everything that was going wrong: an intrusive feature, with serious privacy implicationslaunched without anyone asking for it. She wasn’t the only one. Notepad, one of the simplest and most beloved Windows tools, also received AI functions that many users considered nonsense. The community responded, among other things, creating third party applications to eliminate all that unwanted content in one fell swoop. And in fact, if you want to eliminate everything you don’t like about Windows 11 suddenly, there is a tool that we have recommended in this house more than once: Win11Debloat. Pavan Davuluri was the first to admit it. In March of this year, the head of the Windows division published a text on the official blog of Windows acknowledging the existence of “pain points” regarding the AI ​​functions integrated into the operating system, and committing that the company will only integrate artificial intelligence where it is “truly meaningful.” He also promised an overhaul of the Feedback Hub, the tool for users to submit suggestions, to make it easier for complaints to better reach internal teams. what he said Satya Nadella. During Microsoft’s fiscal third quarter earnings call, the company’s CEO stated that Microsoft is carrying out “the critical work needed to win back fans and strengthen engagement” with Windows, Xbox (which also has its own now), Bing and Edge, and that in the short term the priority is “quality and better serving core users.” Nadella cited improvements such as better performance on devices with low RAM and a faster Windows update experience. The situation is quite serious in itself, and the fact that Microsoft’s own CEO has come to the fore to calm the waters in this way is an indication of this. Inside, the project is called Windows K2. According to they count From Windows Central, there is an internal initiative underway under that name whose objective is to undertake profound improvements in performance, reliability and user experience. It will not come as a big update with its own name, but as continuous and gradual improvements. The File Explorer, one of the elements most criticized for its slowness, is one of the priorities. So are the taskbar and greater control over widgets and the news feed, two of the most controversial additions to Windows 11. There are reasons for optimismeither and for skepticism. as well they point From TechRadar, it is striking that Nadella mentions Bing and Edge in the same breath as Windows when he talks about recovering ordinary users, since they are precisely the two tools that Microsoft has been trying to sneak into the operating system for years without anyone demanding them. On the other hand, the promise to reduce advertising and banners within Windows, something that Davuluri also included in his March commitment, will be the real test of cotton. And now, let’s see if there are facts. Microsoft has 1.6 billion active Windows devices per month, a figure that Nadella took the opportunity to remember at the same conference. That means that no matter how much Linux or macOS gain ground in the public debate, Windows remains the dominant operating system on the desktop. But that position of strength does not guarantee fidelity. The company knows this, and that is why this discourse towards quality and user feedback is more about necessity than strategy. We will have to wait to find out if the company is serious about it. Cover image | Microsoft and Wikimedia Commons In Xataka | The MacBook Neo is the biggest existential threat to the Windows laptop market. And the manufacturers have no answer

This is the new Movistar Plus+ plan that you can even share with a friend

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The more options a company gives us, the better. Movistar Plus+ has been offering all its content for a monthly or annual subscription for a long time, although just a few weeks ago it added its Free Plan. Did it seem like little to you? Well, a new option has just been released: it is a plan that we can subscribe to for only 4.99 euros. Without permanence and whatever operator you are. Monthly subscription to Movistar Plus+ – Cinema and Series The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Less than five euros without permanence and regardless of which operator you are This streaming platform is one of the most complete that we can choose today. The reason for this is that, in addition to offering a lot of movies, series or documentaries (many of them original and exclusive to the platform), it also broadcasts football and other sports in general. But, What if you don’t like them? Well that’s where this new plan comes in. What exactly does it offer? This plan, which, remember, only costs 4.99 euros per month, remove sport from the equation. In other words, it gives you access to movies, series and documentaries of all kinds, as well as more than 70 television channels. In addition, it maintains three key attributes of the 9.99 euros per month: we can subscribe regardless of the operator, it has no permanence and we can share it with a friend without problems. And you only need a card and an email. There is a lot to do with this plan. For example, if we focus on cinema, there are films awarded at the Goya (such as ‘Sundays‘ or ‘Dinner’) or Oscar winners (such as ‘The Sinners‘ either ‘Weapons‘). And series? There’s the newcomer ‘I always sometimes‘, as well as ‘Empathy’ or the final season of ‘Outlander’. Furthermore, the good thing is that this plan does not replace the one that the platform was offering. If you prefer to have matches like the next Bayern Munich-PSG or the Clásico next weekendyou will also be able to see them on Movistar Plus+ for 9.99 euros per month. In this case, you also have the option of taking the annual plan (which is worth 99.90 euros) and save two months. Some of the links in this article are affiliated and may provide a benefit to Xataka. In case of non-availability, offers may vary. Images | Movistar Plus+ In Xataka | Movistar Plus+ activates its Free Plan with complete programs and a lot of content, regardless of which operator you are In Xataka | Movistar Plus+ for non-Movistar customers: what it is, how much it costs, channels, additional services and how to contract it

set a flight ceiling

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In 2025, just over 33.8 million of passengers. The one from Ibiza scored 9.1 and the one from Menorca 4.2. Although this enormous flow of travelers includes both residents and people who fly for family, work or study reasons, a good part are tourists who want to spend their vacations on the islands. That makes Aena terminals the great gateway to the Balearic Islands. Also in the new goal of efforts to prevent mass tourism from devouring the archipelago. In fact, there are those who are already talking about setting a flight ceilingjust as it has been proposed to reduce the limit of tourist placesthe vehicle entrance or the cruises. What has happened? What the Balearic Islands want have more weight when deciding what to do with their airports. A few days ago your Parliament gave the green light (with the votes of PP and the Més formation) to a proposal which reinforces the voice of the autonomous community in the management and planning of Aena’s infrastructure. To go ahead, the measure must still obtain the approval of Congress, something that is by no means guaranteed, but it shows a key objective of the Balearic Government: to prevent its airports from continuing to be an unlimited drain for mass tourism. What exactly do they want? The original proposal It started from the eco-sovereignty Més formation and has moved forward after incorporating amendments proposed by the PP, the party that heads the regional Government. Its objective is very simple: to give more weight to the Balearic authorities when deciding what happens to its airport network, in the hands of Aena. It is not about transferring ownership of the terminals, which now depend on the State, but about moving towards a “co-management” when it is time to set rates, frequencies or operational capacity. Aena already works with coordination committees in which different administrations sit, but they are only advisory bodies. That is, the airport manager does not have to follow their recommendations. In the Balearic Islands they want to apply two big changes to that model. First, reinforce the weight of regional institutions in the archipelago. Second, that their reports are binding in certain cases. Why is it important? Because beyond reinforcing the capacity of the Balearic Islands to decide what happens with one of its great entry and exit doors, the proposal has a much more specific objective: to become a tool to combat tourist overcrowding. In fact, that idea flies over the original textpresented by Més per Mallorca and Més Menorca in 2025. “Airport policy conditions the balance between visitors and residents, to the extent that the intensity of the flow of tourists and the average period of stay impact human pressure on the islands and, therefore, the satisfaction of residents with tourism and of tourists with the destination,” collect the initiative. Do they argue something else? “In recent years, an evident disconnection between tourism policy and airport policy has been revealed, which has resulted in a progressive increase in the number of flights and arrivals to the Balearic Islands, in a context of containment of the number of tourist places,” affects Més’s proposal, which states that one of the objectives of the new organization would be to set a “ceiling” of flights, passengers and merchandise. The training recalls that the Balearic airports have gone from moving 31.9 million travelers in 2014 to 47.4 in 2024. 48% more in ten years. Is the debate settled? No. Although the proposal has gone ahead in the Balearic Parliament thanks to the PP amendments that have rethought part of the original document (a red line What remains is the binding nature of the committee’s decisions), there is still a process that is as necessary as it is complex: the approval of Congress. Vox has already rejected the proposal in the Autonomous Chamber and PSOE and Unidas Podemos have opted to refrain. The truth is that the Balearic initiative is even more ambitious than the recently agreed between the central government and the Basque Country, which involves creating a “bilateral body for collaboration, coordination and management” focused on the three airports in the region. What makes the Balearic Islands different? From Mes it is alleged that the fact that the Balearic Islands is an archipelago gives even more relevance to airport traffic management. Mallorca, Menorca and the Pitiusas are, however, more than just part of an archipelago. They are also a destination they pass through every year. millions of visitors and in which tourism leaves one of lime and another of sand: although the sector moves billions of euros also has stressed the residential market and caused friction with the local population, who already has gone out into the street to protest against overcrowding. Més herself has demanded in the past curb uncontrolled touristification. Do you only look at airports? No. The debate on the overcrowding of the Balearic Islands and the measures to limit it has also extended to the tourist places of the archipelago, the vehicle entrance or the cruise traffic. In its original proposal, Més focuses, however, on the “complete disconnection” between these initiatives and the activity of the island airports. “The existence of these seat ceilings has not translated, in any case, into a containment of the flight schedule, which has been growing year after year, even in high season,” argues. Now the region wants to provide itself with a new tool that gives it greater control over its terminals. Images | James Stevenson (Unsplash) and Wikipedia In Xataka | Europe is back in “February 2020”: Lufthansa has canceled 20,000 flights and it is just the beginning of the crisis

This is the robot that the creator of the Roomba has been wanting to develop for 30 years

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Colin Angle, co-founder of iRobot, left the company in a somewhat abrupt manner after the breakdown of the Amazon agreement. However, the topic of home robotics has never disappeared from his mind, and in fact it has returned with a somewhat peculiar proposal. Does not clean floors. It has four legs, moving ears and is designed to make you get attached to it. The story behind the return. Angle left iRobot in 2024, after the failure of its sale to Amazon and after almost three decades at the head of the company. Shortly after, he founded Familiar Machines & Magic with Ira Renfrew and Chris Jones, two iRobot veterans. Last week at the Wall Street Journal’s Future of Everything conference, he unveiled his first creation: a furry-looking quadruped robot they call “Familiar.” According to they counted told the WSJ, the choice of name comes from modern European folklore, where the term was used to describe supernatural animals that accompanied witches. What exactly is it. The truth is that it is difficult to classify. He does not speak, he is not a smart speaker with legs, and it is not a typical robotic pet either (despite having a similar size). It has 23 degrees of freedom that allow you to move your head, neck, ears, eyes and eyebrows. It walks on all fours at a calm pace, cannot climb stairs or grab objects, and its communication with the user is completely non-verbal: it meows, purrs and expresses emotions through its body and face. “By design, you will avoid giving factual advice on things that perhaps you shouldn’t give factual advice on,” explained Angle to The Verge, in a direct reference to the problems that chatbots based on large language models have. Its face has been designed unrelated to any specific animal, and this decision is deliberate, because if the robot looked like a dog or a cat, the user would bring preconceived expectations that the robot might not be able to meet. So, yes, it is a somewhat complicated pet to describe. What technology does it have inside? According to those responsible, the Familiar works with the chip Jetson Orin from Nvidia and a small, custom multimodal AI model that processes vision, audio, language and memory directly on the device, without sending data to the cloud. It has a camera, microphone and a touch-sensitive touch casing. It can work without an internet connection. Morgan Pope, creative director of the company and former researcher at Disney Research, points out in an interview with IEEE Spectrum that were two recent advances that made the project viable: the use of reinforcement learning to achieve fluid movement without very expensive hardware, and the Generative AIwhich, in his words, “is perfect here because it creates the plausible assumption of intelligence, which helps the character feel coherent and alive.” What is it for and who is it for? Curiously, the Familiar is not intended as a toy or as a home assistant. Its purpose, according to the companyis to reinforce healthy routines and actively accompany its user. Angle focuses above all on families with small children, older people who live alone or people who want to better manage their well-being. The robot observes, learns and acts. The example that has been given is that, if it detects that you have been looking at your mobile screen for too long, it will try to get you to pay attention to it. Or if someone comes into the house carrying bags and in a hurry, they will know how to stay still and not get too angry. AI is not designed to always obey you. “Training him to obey you perfectly would break the illusion that he has his own personality,” Angle explained. to IEEE Spectrum. The goal is for the robot to have its own goals, not to execute orders. A history of failures. The trajectory of companion robots for the home has not been very encouraging to date. Jibo, Kuri, Anki Vectorhe Aibo original from Sony… they all promised something similar and they have all ended up being discontinued. The common denominator of their failures always ends up being the same: entertaining the first few days until they are forgotten in a closet. Angle thinks AI can change the equation here. “If this ends up being a toy, we will have failed. If it is a creature you want in your world, we will have succeeded,” counted to The Verge. We have questions. The robotic mascot presented at the WSJ event was a prototype that they controlled partially remotely, but Angle promise which will hit the market completely autonomously in 2027. The price, for now, is vaguely described as “similar to the cost of having a pet”, a range so wide that in practice it says nothing. On the other hand, carrying a camera and microphone always on around your home raises some questions about privacy. Although the team states that data is not shared in the cloud, these are issues worth keeping in mind. And now what. Familiar Machines & Magic has brought together talent from Disney Research, Boston Dynamics, MIT, Bose and Sonos. Angle has been wanting to build artificial life for thirty years since the time when iRobot’s original name was, precisely, Artificial Creatures Inc. The technology that did not exist then now exists. So now we need to know if they can materialize that promise into something that people want to have in their living room. Images | Familiar Machines & Magic In Xataka | The end of Nvidia in China seems to be very near: its current market share is 0%

Spotify and Apple Music have a problem with AI-generated music. And the real musicians are paying for it

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Music generated by AI has flooded the large platforms of streaming without anyone having asked for it. Deezer says it detects 75,000 AI tracks uploaded every day, and the number is growing. Spotify has uploaded 75 million songs of that type in the last twelve months. And Apple Music recognizes that more than a third of everything that comes to it is “100% AI”. Why is it important. It is not only a quality problem for the catalog or the reputation of the platform, but also an economic problem. Spotify, Apple Music and most platforms operate with a proportional distribution model (pro-rata): each artist receives a percentage of the total pool royalties equivalent to your reproduction quota. The more AI songs that accumulate listeners (even if they are fraudulent, generated by bots) the more it dilutes what a real musician earns. Between the lines. Although more and more music of this type is uploaded, almost no one listens to it, at least on purpose (sometimes AI songs sneak into algorithmic discovery lists). The problem is not the demand, which does not exist, but the brutal and increasing amount that distorts the algorithms and erodes the income of real artists even though their songs are still the ones that people do want to hear. Someone is uploading music that no one asks for to collect money that they do not deserve because the listeners arrive via bots. And that is money that the real artist stops earning. The background. The most extreme case, at least documented so far, has been that of Michael Smith, an American businessman who between 2017 and 2024 generated more than 10 million dollars in royalties wearing Suno and other tools to create hundreds of thousands of songs and armies of bots to play them automatically. That was the first case of fraud streaming with AI criminally prosecuted in the United States. According to the accusation, it accumulated 660,000 views a day. One billion views and zero fans. Yes, but. The platforms are already facing this wave. Deezer has been the most aggressive: it has implemented AI automatic detection, excludes those songs from algorithmic recommendations and has demonetized 85% of its views. Bandcamp has outright banned AI-generated music. Apple Music has begun to roll out its ‘Transparency Tags‘ (optional for now), and Spotify has released a verification stamp ‘Verified by Spotify‘ to ensure there is a human behind every artist profile. The problem is that both Spotify and Apple have opted for voluntary systems: it is the labels and distributors who must declare whether they have used AI. Nobody who lives off fraud is going to do it. There is an important distinction: It is one thing for a musician to use AI as a tool within their creative process (to refine a lyric, generate a base, experiment with sounds…) and quite another for an entire song to come out of Suno or equivalent with a pair of prompts and without real human intervention. The platforms, at the moment, do not distinguish between one thing and another. And Spotify has also left a door open by noting that “the concept of artistic authenticity is complex and rapidly evolving,” which in practice means that AI artists could end up being verified one day. Featured image | Xataka In Xataka | Science has measured how music impacts us during exercise: choosing the right Spotify list is essential

‘The Devil Wears Prada 2’ is simply a very long advertisement for fashion brands

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Twenty years ago, the click of heels echoing through the offices of runway It was enough to make us tremble and laugh in equal measure. The original 2006 film emerged as a scathing critique, a sharp portrait of a frivolous world ruled by a toxic, hilarious and biting boss. However, two decades later, the industry has decided to betray its own work. The relentless public relations campaign of The Devil Wears Prada 2 suggests that the story’s original satire has been “defanged” and deliberately sanitized. What was once a clever mockery of the fashion industry is today a giant, shameless promotion for luxury brands like Dolce & Gabbana, Balenciaga and Dior. The sequel has been stuck in an uncomfortable limbo, torn between the hypocritical sanitization of its own mythology and the absolute glorification of that amoral universe that, paradoxically, gave it success in the first place. The film as a luxury catalogue. The hype that has surrounded this sequel is unprecedented, transforming the plot into a mere vehicle to sell products and experiences. As the criticism of Le Mondeproduct placements and cameos They are much more elaborate than the script itself; the parade of outfits orchestrated by the wardrobe department matters far more than any narrative thread the film attempts to weave. disney has worked for years to secure partnerships with top-tier brands, with the goal of building the best marketing program ever launched. Executives boast of having created a “fashion collection” where each brand fits perfectly. And the celluloid is the least important thing; the premiere has been conceived like a huge playground for advertisers. We see Starbucks create menus inspired by characters, while giants like Diet Coke, Samsung and Lancôme engulf the narrative of the universe runway. The paroxysm of this bargain sale reaches pharmacy productsstamping the movie logo on Tweezerman brand nail clippers; an ordinariness that the real Miranda Priestly would never have tolerated. When consumption devours fiction. The industry has crossed the Rubicon: brands no longer make a simple product placement In essence, they now demand a “full narrative participation”. The film’s intellectual property has been hijacked as a long-term sales strategy. All this perfectly represents what the philosopher Guy Debord defined in his work The Society of the Spectacle. For Debord, “the spectacle is capital in such a degree of accumulation that it is transformed into an image.” The film is no longer fiction, it is a commercialized social relationship, mediated by images designed to sell. The world we see on screen is purely and exclusively the world of merchandise, confirming that all human and social life has been reduced to simple appearance. The spectator enters the cinema believing he is consuming culture, but becomes a “consumer of illusions”where the merchandise is the only thing that is actually real. Visual coldness: cinema without soul. This commercial colonization requires a corresponding aesthetic, that is, aseptic and prefabricated. Today’s romantic comedies have no soul because They operate under financial profitability algorithms. We’ve lost the real, imperfect characters of the ’90s and ’00s, replaced by mannequins holding cell phones. On a visual level, the screen oozes coldness. Modern films abuse darkness and blur, using shallow depth of field and an excess of digital effects (CGI) that make environments appear a plastic decoration. For the theorist Fredric Jameson, in his essay on postmodernismthis cultural phenomenon reflects a new “lack of depth” (depthlessness) and a “fading of affections” (waning of affect), where the flat surface and the culture of the image or simulacrum replace historical reality and genuine emotion. The film looks dead because, narratively, it is. The nostalgia trap. Where does this model take us? Directly to a “capitalist necromancy”. Hollywood, mired in an alarming creative drought, resurrects dead franchises like cultural zombies, stripping them of their original risk to squeeze the box office. We’re stuck in what Jameson calls “nostalgia mode.” in the magazine The Drum They argue that this extreme dependence of brands toward nostalgia is diluting genuine emotional connections, trapping culture in an amnesiac loop unable to imagine anything new. As he explains Mackenzie Groffcommodified nostalgia is a trap that deceives us into believing that the lost past can be recovered simply through consumption. It is the era of “pastiche”, a term that Fredric Jameson uses to describe the neutral imitation of dead styles or masks of the past. Unlike the original parody, which had a critical and satirical purpose, the pastiche of this sequel is a “blank parody” lacking conviction, condemning us to consume a mirage of our own past through prefabricated pop images. They sell us the illusion of recovering the comfort of the 2000s, but they only give us a purchase receipt. The triumph of ‘fandom’. Despite the obvious lack of soul and visual flatness, the machinery works. The paradox is that the general public continues to buy the illusion. The sequel has achieved an outstanding rating A- in Cinemascore, far surpassing the rating that the original installment obtained from viewers. The premiere sparked a wave of massive digital conversationdemonstrating that talent (Meryl Streep, Anne Hathaway) and nostalgia are unmatched organic communication assets that brands know how to capitalize on perfectly. psychology behind this blind success: fan phenomena (the fandom) provide avenues for escapism, emotional regulation, and identity formation. These parasocial connections with fictional worlds and characters are deeply satisfying for an audience seeking refuge from an increasingly uncertain world. The triumph of the two-hour spot. The real tragedy is that the machinery works. The public, anesthetized by the fan phenomenon, continues to flock to theaters, seeking refuge in nostalgia from an uncertain world, and giving outstanding ratings to a product designed in a boardroom. The sequel to The Devil Wears Prada It is the definitive and obscene triumph of our era. We no longer laugh at consumerism; We give in to him. Today we gladly pay for a movie ticket to sit in the dark and binge a 120-minute infomercial. If the film is perceived as empty, it is not due … Read more

With the Find X9 Ultra, OPPO has an ambitious plan to conquer the heart of Spain. And its CEO has told us what it is

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From the offices of OPPO In Madrid, at the top of a building very close to Plaza de Castilla, you can see an old water tank from the Canal de Isabel II. It is a huge concrete structure inaugurated in the middle of the last century that today, no longer in use, functions as one of the visual “landmarks” of the square. It is very big, about 40 meters high, but it is very far away. I take one of the OPPO Find X9 Ultra that’s on the table, I open the camera, zoom in 10x and take a photo. The result is impressive. The camera returns an image full of details: the contours of the concrete, already worn, the advertising signage that floods its dome, the brutalist curves that the tower draws. All this from inside an office and interrupted by a large window. I look towards the back of the room, where there are some boxes of snacks and pastries ready for breakfast. There are tiny inscriptions on the side, so I repeat the process: I open the camera, zoom in 10x and take another photo. The sharpness is extraordinary. There is no pixelation or noticeable distortion or digital zoom artifacts in the drawing of the letters, nor a great chromatic distortion with respect to what my eyes see. “What we want to do with the Ultra is not just another incremental improvement, we want it to be an alternative to your professional camera,” he explains to me. Kevin ChoCEO of OPPO in Spain since last summer. “It would be like buying a camera with a built-in phone and not the other way around, right?” I ask him. “That is, camera firstmore than a phone with an interesting camera.” Looking at the wide range of tools on the table, it’s hard not to agree. The launch of the Find X9 Ultra in Spain marks a milestone for OPPO: for the first time, the company launches its top-of-the-range phone in Europe, something reserved until now for Chinese consumers. OPPO has not spared any details: the Ultra incorporates an ambitious 300 mm teleconverter equivalent in 35 mm and 13x format that is attached to the phone’s gigantic lenses to multiply the camera’s possibilities. Why has OPPO made such a determined bet for photographyWithout a doubt the most notable aspect of a Find X9 Ultra full of attractive features and specifications? “There is a very marked polarization in the market,” explains Cho. “Around 30% or 40% of buyers continue to opt for devices under 200 euros, or even second-hand, but what we are also seeing is an expansion of the premium segments. It is the same trend month after month: premium sales are growing.” (Xataka) Cho introduces a key word: “premiumization.” The market polarization of the mobile phone is neither new nor surprising for anyone who has paid attention to the dynamics of recent years. Many consumers tend to hold on to their devices for longer, as a result of the large investments they must make, which is why they demand more performance and quality from their products. This gap, also present in markets such as the car, has forced almost all brands to recalibrate their strategies. OPPO’s ambitious plan “We don’t want transactional volumes,” Cho continues, “you know, competing on price. We want to make sure we bring products that can create value for the consumer.” According to Cho, OPPO is facing its second wave of expansion in the European market: after a consolidation of the brand and sales in recent years, it is time to grow not so much through raw numbers as through loyalty in the segments. more exclusive of the market. And for that you need a product up to the task, hence the arrival of the Find X9 Ultra. A landing that, however, has required adaptations. Since his arrival in Spain, Cho has promoted a change in OPPO’s methodology, especially regarding the consumer: “We are doing studies to understand consumer preferences and to define our strategies.” Refers to focus group and surveys with more than 4,000 respondents, a very large sample that exceeds those that the brand was doing until then. Cho is clear that the only way to compete in the premium segment is by going to the user, or, in his words, “winning the heart and brain of the consumer.” (Xataka) The approach is ambitious, as are its objectives. When I ask him where he would like to see OPPO in five years in Spain, he answers without much hesitation: “As the number one brand.” The Find X9 Ultra is the first stone of a long road ahead, a way to “test the roof” of OPPO in Europe. His first steps have consisted of relearning and readapting the lessons of the chinese marketwhere OPPO is a brand with a lot of penetration and experience in the premium segments, for Spain and Europe. Before the launch on the old continent, OPPO has had to make some adjustments in terms of operating system and memory to adapt them to local needs and preferences. Given the constraints of such a competitive segment Like the premium one, OPPO has two other arguments to win over the consumer: its operating system, ColorOS, and the battery. Cho boasts leadership in the second area and widespread user satisfaction in the first: “In China, our operating system has consistently been our main selling point for the past three years.” In Spain, the Ultra works on Android, like the rest of the market, but Cho highlights the interoperability and customization of OPPO: “We have been working on inter-device and inter-ecosystem interoperability for some time, so that you can use the phone with a Windows computer or a Mac.” (Xataka) Camera, battery, operating system… The elephant in the room that needs to be addressed is AI. Is there the definitive angle for a mobile phone brand to be more attractive than its competition? Cho’s answer is not direct but clear: OPPO’s strength is … Read more

It has taken us 30 years to find 6,000 exoplanets. TESS just found 10,000 candidates in one fell swoop

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Since the first exoplanet was detected in 1992, have been discovered 6,273 planets outside the solar system. However, detection methods have become so refined that that number is expected to skyrocket in the coming years. Just look at the list just presented by a team of scientists from Princeton University, which includes more than 10,000 new candidates. Many may not be exoplanets when they are reviewed, but the fact that so many candidates have been found is already a good sign. A very well spent first year. This new list It comes from the analysis of the first year of data from NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Exploration Satellite (TESS). In total 11,554 possible exoplanets have been found. However, 411 of them were only captured in one transit, so their orbital parameters could not be calculated. Another 1,052 had already been confirmed as exoplanets in the past. The remaining 10,091 do make up a list of possible exoplanets that had not been noted before. Transi what? Transit is one of the most useful methods of exoplanet detection. Typically, it is much easier to detect the star around which a planet orbits than the planet itself. After all, stars are bigger and brighter. However, observing the star itself can give us data on the existence of planets orbiting it. And when these pass between the star and the telescopes that observe it, their light is interrupted. Like when a cloud passes in front of the Sun or a very large moth flies in front of a light bulb. We know that planets revolve around their stars with a fixed period. For example, it takes the Earth 364 days to orbit the Sun. When these light interruptions are seen cyclically, it can be assumed that there is a planet orbiting the star. That’s what TESS detects. The advances of TESS. Until now, exoplanets have been searched around very bright stars. However, TESS has the ability to also study stars with weaker illumination. This allows us to do a much more complete analysis of the sky and find many more candidates for exoplanets. In fact, a lot of data is generated at once, so it has also been necessary to use a machine learning algorithm to analyze it all and find the real candidates. It must be confirmed. There are other reasons why a star’s light could be interrupted. For example, eclipsing binary stars either solar activity itself. That is why the next step, once a list of possible exoplanets is found, is to analyze them carefully to rule out those other possibilities and check which ones really are. It can still improve. These scientists are now ready to also begin analyzing data from the second year of TESS observation. In this case, some changes have been made in the study methodology, such as studying stars that are observed at different times of the year. This way, exoplanets with a long period can also be detected, which sometimes go unnoticed if they are not observed at the right time. When the period is very small, they pass many times between the star and the telescopes, so it is easier detect traffic. If the period is long, it is difficult to detect them if you do not look at the right time. With this in mind, the study’s authors hope to double the list of candidates. If this time there have been more than 10,000, the next time we have news about TESS there could be many more. Image | POT In Xataka | How the solar system was formed: for the Earth to be born, a star had to die first

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