Month: June 2026

sell more cars than Citroën in Europe

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It is no secret that Chinese car brands They are conquering Europe. For a few years now, the streets have been filled with cars from companies such as BYD, Omoda, Jaecoo, Leapmotor, MG and many others. And it makes perfect sense, since they have come with their entire arsenal at truly competitive prices and loaded with technology. You have to go to last review of the European Automobile Manufacturers Association (ACEA) to really see how much they have achieved in a very short time. And in the case of BYD, the firm has registered more cars than Citroën during the month of May in Europe (specifically in the group formed by the European Union, the EFTA countries and the United Kingdom). According to the agency’s data, the Chinese manufacturer registered 32,380 units compared to 31,665 for Citroën. The difference is small, but it has symbolic weight, since it is the first time that a Chinese brand overtakes such a historic name in European motorsport. In detail. He BYD growth It is being truly groundbreaking, especially outside its domestic market. And in May of this year, its registrations shot up by 136.6% compared to the same month in 2025, raising its market share in the EU+EFTA+UK region to 2.8%, compared to 1.2% a year ago. Citroën, on the other hand, closed the month with a decline of 1.6%. Of course, it should be said that the bypass occurs in the EU+EFTA+UK region, because if we look only at the figures for the European Union, Citroën is still ahead, with 29,227 registrations compared to BYD’s 26,017. But the distance has shortened considerably compared to last year. The driving force behind this expansion has been above all in Italy, France and Germany, where BYD has multiplied its sales, while in the first five months of the year the Chinese brand already has 135,307 cars registered in this region, 145.2% more than in 2025. And BYD is not the only one. Chinese brands as a whole reached a market share of 10.7% in Europe in May, their all-time high, according to data from Automotive News. Chery has skyrocketed its registrations by 244.1% and Leapmotor, backed by Stellantis, has multiplied them by more than five, with a growth of 465.1% in the EU+EFTA+UK region. Even Tesla, although it is not Chinese, has benefited from that same push towards electrification, with an increase of 107.9% thanks to the arrival of the new Standard versions of the Model 3 and the Model Y. Although the tariffs that the European Union imposed on Chinese electric companies in 2024, something that has partially stopped this offensive, Chinese brands continue with overwhelming growth. And now what. The context in which this surprise occurs is that of a European market in full transition towards electrification. According to ACEA data, between January and May 2026, battery electric cars already represent 20% of registrations in the European Union, compared to 15.3% a year ago, while hybrids continue to be the most popular option with 37.8% of the market (in the latter it must be taken into account that the microhybridswith more prominence of the gasoline engine than the small battery as a whole). On the other hand, the sum of gasoline and diesel has fallen to 30.1%. And on this board, increasingly favorable to electrified vehicles, BYD and the rest of the Chinese manufacturers have an advantage due to their specialization in these technologies. Cover image | BYD and Citroën In Xataka | On July 1, buying on Shein, Temu or AliExpress will be more expensive: Europe imposes a fixed tariff of three euros for small packages

Volkswagen needs money and getting rid of its Italian jewels is already on the table

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Ducati, for sale. Reason, here. Lamborghini, for sale. Reason, here. Those are the posters that could hang on the door of the Volkswagen group headquarters in Wolfsburg, Germany. At least that’s what they claim Financial Timeswhere they claim that investment banks are pressuring the automobile conglomerate to get rid of two of its most glittering assets. The company announced a few days ago that plans to lay off 100,000 workers. The notice is the continuation of another threatthis time from December 2024. At that time, the company already claimed to be immersed in a huge restructuring process because, according to its directors, It was “essential to survive”. The result, as we say, was a first threat: 35,000 layoffs. That promotion of incentivized sick leave and layoffs (which later amounted to 50,000 employees) to avoid factory closures is forgotten. At least that’s what I anticipated Manager Magazine just a few days ago. And the fact is that the accounts, they say, do not add up and it will be necessary to raise the level of layoffs to 100,000 employees. In the conversations that revolve around that conversation, another idea has come up: sell. Sell ​​companies that are a flagship of quality and good work within the Volkswagen Group. They explain in Financial Times and collect other German media such as Auto Motor und Sport that investment banks are already putting pressure on Volkswagen’s management to slim down its portfolio. And those indicated are clear: Ducati and Lamborghini. Now that we can To understand why Lamborghini and Ducati would be in the spotlight, the British economic media and the German motor media point to one name: Everllence. Everllence is a company specialized in the production of large engines for very specific sectors such as maritime or energy production. A few days ago the sale of 51% of the company was confirmed in an agreement that was estimated at 7.4 billion euros. A maneuver that, apparently, has been received with very good words by the rest of the Volkswagen Group investors. And the idea, therefore, is to continue. Although they are two of the great jewels of the automobile conglomerate, Ducati and Lamborghini are also attractive in the eyes of a potential buyer. The main incentive for their purchase is that these are companies that obtain enormous economic performance from their products, which establishes part of the future success for whoever is willing to buy the company and, above all, increases the sales value that the German group can obtain. The possible sale of Ducati, in fact, It was already put on the table in 2017 but for now he is still part of the company. In this case, the colleagues explain Motorpassion Motorcycle It would be a sale of the company. In the case of Lamborghini, an IPO would be contemplated. The movement, evidently, would have the intention of raising funds to strengthen the restructuring that the company has advanced. A few weeks ago, the Volkswagen Group already divested itself of Bugatti, a company whose cars require a very high leverage of money since they are vehicles produced by hand in a large part of their process. The company still had a 45% stake in Bugatti through Porsche, after in 2021 it already sold the remaining 55% to the Rimac Group, owners of the car company. super luxury electric cars. In that sale the amount of the operation was not made public but our colleagues from Motorpassion They stated that the figure reached was estimated at around 500 million euros. That investment banks target Ducati and Lamborghini, as we say, is no coincidence. Stellantis, for example, has a problem with Maserati since it is having a very difficult time relaunching the brand but, above all, it is a firm with very little projection in case someone wants to buy it, as explained in the podcast Power Art. And for Volkswagen, getting rid of both companies totally or partially would mean an immediate injection of capital. The question is whether it is a good idea in the long term. In the case of Lamborghini, some models share research and development with Audi such as the Urus and the Q8 or the most recent Audi Nuvolaria spectacular supercar that It exists only because the Lamborghini Temerario already existed. That is to say, Lamborghini is intricate within the rest of the Volkswagen group, it is not like Bugatti which in many cases walked a path parallel to that of the rest of the company. For the Germans, the Italian firm is more than just very high profit margins, it is a test bed and a breath of fresh air for stagnant companies like Audi. Photo | Ducati and Audi In Xataka | You buy a “European car”, you receive Chinese technology: more and more brands from the old continent refit Asian vehicles

Using umbrellas against the sun is the latest fashion in Spain. Science is clear to what extent it really protects us

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It is increasingly common to see how people walk down the street with an umbrella in their hands to protect themselves from the sun. This habit was something that was very internalized among the Asian tourists that we saw in our cities, but with the thermometers breaking records and the sun beating down on the streets, the umbrella is increasingly popular to prevent the sun’s rays from hitting our skin. The underlying idea. As we say, it may be quite logical to cover ourselves from the sun with an umbrella to prevent ultraviolet radiation from freely affecting our skin, something that can cause serious skin problems. But the real question we should ask ourselves here is: does using an umbrella to protect ourselves from the sun really work? It has been investigated. This is something that has already been measured by specialist dermatologists through from a study published in 2013 in JAMA Dermatology. And the results were quite good, since after analyzing dozens of standard hand umbrellas, it was found that they were capable of blocking between 77% and 99% of ultraviolet radiation. But the problem is that not all umbrellas are the same, since the study revealed that black or very dark umbrellas They are the most effective, consistently blocking more than 90% of ultraviolet rays. This is critical, especially for marketers who are already assigning numerical protection factors to umbrellas. as if they were creams. The invisible enemy. The problem of starting to use an umbrella on our streets to protect ourselves can generate a general doubt: can we go outside without sunscreen? Here the resounding answer from dermatologists is no. The key point that the scientific evidence emphasizes is that shade is a partial protective measure. And the sun not only burns us by projecting its rays directly onto our heads from the sky, but there is also what is known as diffuse and reflected ultraviolet radiation. A common effect. To explain this, we must understand that UV rays bounce off the surfaces around us, such as asphalt, sidewalks, pool water, beach sand, or glass in buildings. All that bounced radiation enters through the sides and under the umbrella, directly impacting our exposed skin. This is the same principle that we apply when we go to the beach, where many people, despite being constantly under an umbrella, come home and have several burns on their skin. This is where we clearly see that ultraviolet radiation also attacks despite being under an umbrella. It’s proven. Here a study published in 2017 tested the beach umbrella against a high SPF sunscreen, and the results showed that the group that relied solely on the shade of the umbrella suffered from sunburn. That is why it is always recommended to apply sunscreen before exposing yourself to ultraviolet radiation in order to avoid burns and the rest of the unwanted effects that the sun has on the skin. In Xataka | Science warns of the dangerous success of anti-suncream hoaxes on TikTok: “Despite being a minority, this content is influential”

Tomorrow one of the most acclaimed Marvel superhero series of all time returns to Disney+

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Since the start of its cinematic incarnation, no adaptation of the X-Men had aroused as much expectation as the second season of ‘X-Men’97’which arrives this July 1st at Disney+. After the first season won Best Animated Series at the Critics’ Choice Awards, it became clear that this was not just another animated superhero series. Its secret: an exquisite balance between the nostalgia that it embraces from its very title and its own identity and quality that keep it standing without needing to appeal to the affection of fans. Just two years ago, ‘X-Men’97’ accumulated 4 million views in its first five days, becoming the biggest premiere of an animated series on the platform since ‘What If…?’ Although that has not turned it into a series with a massive following (its content is still a niche bet), its careful animation style, faithful to the original from the nineties but at the same time sufficiently current, has earned countless praise. The proof: the viewing of the original 1992 series on the platform has doubled since the premiere of this ‘X-Men’97’. The argument leads us to an intertemporal mess of those that (literally) make an epoch: from Ancient Egypt, where Xavier, Magneto, Rogue, Nightcrawler and the Beast are, to the year 3960, where Cyclops and Jean Gray meet future versions of their children. Apocalypse is the central antagonist this time, in a season that will have no trouble surpassing the poor live-action version from a few years ago. Among the acquisitions in the cast, Neve Campbell stands out as Polaris, daughter of Magneto. A quick look at the episode titles leads us to guess some of the scenarios and enemies that will be featured this season: there is a ‘Days of Past Future’ that obviously plays with the classic ‘Days of Future Past’); ‘A Force to Be Reckoned With’ introduces X-Force; ‘Rise of Apocalypse’ refers to one of the group’s most fearsome enemies; ‘Weapon X, Lies, and DVDs’ takes us back to Wolverine’s time as Weapon X; ‘Strange Land, Savage Heart’ is a reference to one of the fan-favorite settings, the Savage Land; and ‘The Dead Man’s Hand’ may be a nod to another long-awaited return, that of Gambit. Some confirmed secondary characters are Sabretooth, Mariko, Mental Butterfly, Archangel or Colossus, among many others. In Xataka | Today one of the platform’s most massive hits returns to Netflix: 60 million views and 6 weeks in the top 10

In the midst of an extreme heat wave, the French have started painting their windows with white chalk. It makes perfect sense

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Yes, we are in 2026. Yes, there are air conditioners, very effective fansair conditioners and even paintings ultra-white (literally) with such a reflective capacity that they help refresh the surfaces on which they are applied. And yet, despite all that, in France there are people who are opting for a very simple method to withstand the heat: painting their windows with chalk. So much so that the demand for blanc de Meudona calcareous clay extracted from the quarries of Meudon, near Paris, has been shot in hardware stores. Looking for solutions at 40ºC. In the middle of the heatwave and with the Paris thermometers fooling around with 40ºCthe logical thing is that people start buying air conditioners, fans, fans and ice bags. In France, however, there is another item that has been as or even more in demand these days: the blanc de Meudona white powder made up mostly of calcium carbonate. The new toilet paper. It is so requested that a few days ago Le Parisian dedicated an extensive report in which he explains that there are craft stores that are depleting their supplies of blanc de Meudon and businesses that have run out of stock. Even people who order it online receive it late. “My wife went to all the DIY stores in Auray and couldn’t find it,” confess to Western France Philippe, a Frenchman who had no choice but to go to another town to buy white chalk. There are those who already compare their compulsive purchasing with what they experienced with toilet paper during the pandemic. @daphneblt I have tested the astuce of the blanc de Meudon 🕵🏼‍♀️🥵 Comme vous j’ai vu passer cette astuce partout sur mon fil d’actualité, although je n’arrivais pas à en trouver, tous les magasins étaient en rupture de stock 🫠 Le dosage : 1 dose of pour + 1 dose of water and form a small liquid to apply on the fenêtres to reflect the light (in théorie) ☀️ And the white of Meudon c’est de la craie donc réduire en poudre des craies ou bien utiliser de la poudre d’argile blanche c’est la même chose 👀 Mon verdict: c’est mieux que rien et je suis passée de 36/37 à 35 degrés dans mon appartement parisien sous les toits (cc Yann Barthès 🤠) orienté sud 🤔 Bon c’est mieux que rien, évidemment si vous avez des recos je suis preneuse, parler de l’aluminium qui apparemment colle aux vitres et de la couverture de survie qui visibly réchauffe les voisins d’en face 😭 Bon courage à tous et allez voter en 2027, vu l’état currentuel des choses c’est le geste avec le plus d’impact qu’on puisse faire (avec le fait de manger moins de viande 🥩) ✨🗳️ One of my first thoughts to Bernard Arnault who probably passed all the same since we are on a yacht, on a private jet, in a climatized villa or on a private island. ☠️ #responsibleconsommation #consommermieux #cunning #blancdemeudon #ecoresponsible ♬ are original – daphneblt Why’s that? He blanc de Meudon It is not a new product. On the contrary. It has always been marketed, although it is normally used in houseworksuch as cleaning cutlery or marble. Also it’s usual that merchants use it to cover their store windows during renovations. Basically the blanc de Meudon It is a calcareous material that is mixed with water to form a whitish paste with a milky texture. These two peculiarities (composition and color) have made it a popular and cheap resource to cool homes in the heat of the heat. It is not a new remedy, but in the last month it has gained followers thanks to articles and videos that sell their supposed benefits. Of course, the method is simple: the clay is mixed with water until it forms a paste and then, with the help of a brush, it is spread directly on the windows. The result is not what is called aesthetic, but its defenders say that it helps to refresh the houses. A couple of degrees less. In reality, there is little surprising about it. White surfaces are known to reflect sunlight and heat. In fact, commercial paints can cool at 1.7ºC the opposite side of the surface on which they are applied and there are researchers working on ‘ultra-white’ versions able to reflect 98% of social radiation. Some studies claim that, with an appropriate combination, daytime temperature could be reduced in more than 7.5º. @abou.addict J’ai testedé un truc à 3€ contre la chaleur, maintenant c’est en rupture partout.. Une astuce simple et qui marche partout: dès que tu as une fenêtre exposée plein sud que tu ne peux pas protéger avec des volets ou un store, le blanc de Meudon fait office de bouclier anti-chaleur. On dilute, on apply on the glass, and the remaining piece beaucoup plus fraîche. Ça marche also bien dans une école, une mairie, un bureau ou chez soi: partout où il ya du vitrage qui prend le soleil toute la journée et qu’on ne peut pas équiper autrement. On availability I posted this astuce l’an dernier et elle a fait plus de 600 000 vues, donc on la repartage avant la prochaine vague de chaleur (et pendant qu’on en trouve encore, parce que ça part en rupture de stock). #canicule #cunning blancdemeudon maisonfraîche #fraicheur ♬ âm thanh gốc – Coach sportif – Coach sportif “An excellent option”. Added to these advantages are those offered by calcium carbonate. “Chalk is primarily composed of CaCO3. It absorbs very little sunlight, even in the visible range, which gives it its white color. Additionally, it does not absorb UV radiation and very little near-infrared light, making it an excellent choice,” comment Xiangyu Li, Purdue researcher, told the BBC. On the France3 channel they assure that only covering the windows with blanc de Meudon can be earned between two and three degrees of indoor comfort. It is not the same as an air conditioner, although it is also much cheaper. … Read more

rehire old employees

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A few years ago, Ford plunged headlong into automating its production chain. It wanted its artificial intelligence systems to check each part and detect faults before the vehicle left the factory. On paper, it seemed like the perfect plan; in practice, A.I. showed some problems more complicated to correct that translated into an increase in recalls of their cars. The Ford reliability problems Not only were they not solved with the investment in automation, so the company had to thoroughly analyze the problem and, now, they believe they have found the ideal solution: rehire former engineers to fix AI goofs. The mistake of trusting everything to AI. Charles Poon, vice president of hardware engineering at Ford, acknowledged that “we mistakenly thought that just by introducing artificial intelligence and incorporating the design requirements we had, we would get a high-quality product.” It wasn’t like that. The problem wasn’t just in the technology they were using. He was in what he had been taught. An AI is worth what its training data is worth, and Ford had left out the people who could bring the most knowledge and experience to that training. As I collected Bloombergthe company acknowledged that it left aside the knowledge of its most senior engineers in key phases of the process. The veterans “with gray beards” return. Ford’s response was to rehire many of the engineers it had laid off to bring back all that knowledge. In the last three years it has incorporated 350 engineers with experience in product development and quality control. Kumar Galhotra, Ford’s chief operating officer, pointed out that these specialists “look for weak points,” and above all, find solutions before they become a real problem for the customer. Their mission was not to replace AI, but to occupy the place they should have adopted from the beginning: to be supervisors of the AI’s work and to correct it when its results were incorrect. In addition, these expert employees are in charge of training new talents, ensuring generational change. Something that was especially concerned to the CEO of Ford. The change is noticeable in the quality figures Did you compensate for this change in direction with the incorporation of engineers as supervisors of that automation? The numbers say yes. Ford went from place 15 among generalist brands in 2023 to lead that category in 2026. It improved by 41 fewer problems per 100 vehicles compared to the previous year. Ford was the brand that experienced the greatest progress among all non-premium brands. Three models, the F-150, Mustang and Super Duty, topped their segments for the second year in a row. Only Porsche and Genesis were ahead of Ford in the general reliability ranking prepared by the JD Power studiowhich measures failures detected in the first 90 days of use. Less guarantees, fewer revisions, more savings. The improvement in quality is also noticeable in Ford’s bottom line. Jim Farley, CEO of Ford, spoke of hundreds of millions of dollars saved thanks to the drop in warranty costs. The company expects to close the year with billion of dollars in operational savings, in part thanks to this quality work. Even so, Ford remains the brand with more security calls in the USA. In 2025 alone it issued 153 recalls, almost double the previous record held by General Motors. These notices affected almost 13 million vehicular. The latest data suggests that Ford has managed to change its dynamics by improving reliability figures. In Xataka | Henry Ford: “I would rather 20,000 employees be happy and well fed than a few become millionaires” Image | ford

At the age of 15, he built an ocean generator with a PVC pipe and 10 euros. A decade later, it continues to spark interest in the sector

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It was 2015 when a high school student from Boca Raton, Florida, presented to a jury of scientists a prototype built with parts that anyone could find in a hardware store. Your project He was trying to solve how to generate electricity where power lines do not reach, taking advantage of the movement of the sea. There was no laboratory or company behind it, just 12 dollars in budget (about 10 euros at the current exchange rate). Interestingly, his idea is the principle on which an entire emerging marine energy industry is built. Who is he and what did he do?. Hannah Herbst was 15 years old when she devised BEACON (Bringing Electricity Access to Countries through Ocean Energy), a probe capable of transforming the movement of ocean currents into electricity. The device earned him the title of “America’s Top Young Scientist” and $25,000 in the 2015 Discovery Education 3M Young Scientist Challenge, after competing against eight other finalists at the 3M innovation center in Saint Paul, Minnesota. How it all started. As Herbst shared at the time, she maintained contact by postal mail with a nine-year-old girl in Ethiopia, who lived with almost no access to electricity. “I can’t even imagine a day without light,” came to declare Herbst herself told Business Insider when recalling their conversations. She wanted to build something that could bring energy to communities like her friend’s, without depending on expensive infrastructure or conventional electrical grids. This is how your invention works. The mechanism is easy to explain precisely because its beauty lies in its simplicity. A 3D-printed propeller is placed on one end of the device; When the water current makes it rotate, a system of pulleys transmits that movement to a Pelton wheel, a type of hydraulic turbine widely used in engineering, connected to a generator. All housed inside a PVC tube. This means that clean and continuous electricity can be obtained, without depending on the sun or the wind. Herbst tested the prototype on the Intracoastal Waterway of Boca Raton, where he managed to light LED bulbs. It is not that Herbst suddenly provided a new physical principle, but it is very interesting how his proposal took that physical principle to a much smaller and cheaper scale. It didn’t stop at a school fair model. With the help of Jeffrey Emslander, a 3M scientist who served as a mentor during the summer before the contest, Herbst wanted to take his idea to a larger scale version. According to picked up Business Insider’s calculations suggested that the expanded design could generate enough electricity to charge three car batteries in less than an hour, enough energy to power water desalination pumps, blood centrifuges in rural clinics, or coastal navigation beacons. Why does it matter? More than ten years later, this approach (small, autonomous and cheap devices for areas where installing a conventional electrical network does not pay off) is exactly the direction that the marine energy industry is taking. The United States Department of Energy estimates that the technical resource available in US waters equals approximately 57% of all the country’s current electricity generation, according to data from its Hydropower and Hydrokinetic Office, although it warns that the technology is still in an early stage of development. Between the lines. Turbine technology for marine currents already existed and was being researched on an industrial scale long before Herbst put it into practice. Although what is striking is that the direction in which the sector is now moving, with smaller, modular devices designed for areas without an electrical grid, instead of gigantic and centralized turbines, coincides with the idea that that teenager intuitively applied in her garage. In this sense, several companies already operate under this same approach, although on a very different scale. ORPC (Ocean Renewable Power Company) has deployed a hydrokinetic device in Igiugig, Alaska, since 2019 to supply that remote community, and is preparing new projects in rivers in Louisiana, Canada and France. Ocean Motion Technologies develops small wave generators controlled by artificial intelligence to power ocean sensors. and Hydrokinetic Energy Corp. works in turbines that take advantage of the Gulf of Mexico current. On the other hand, it should be noted that Herbst has never intended to patent his invention or keep it exclusive. “When I finish developing it, I’m going to release it openly… everyone in the world will be able to have access to the bill of materials and the data that I got, everything necessary to make this device,” explained Herbst to Fast Company magazine in 2015. And now what. Herbst has continued to broaden his horizons ever since. He trained in information systems at Florida Atlantic University, years later developed an antibacterial bandage inspired by shark skin and, now in the field of medical technology, created AutoTQan automatic tourniquet designed to save lives in severe bleeding situations. In fact, she is currently listed as founder and CEO of this medical initiative. Cover image | Medill News Service In Xataka | Europe has found an energy vein for the next decade: North Africa

Science suggests that we are ignoring ultradian rhythms

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We have been hearing about the circadian rhythmsand we know well that the blue light from screens before sleeping is bad or that the melatonin sends at night to induce sleep. However, there is a second biological clock that is much less talked about, but which dictates exactly why at 11:30 in the morning we feel invincible, but when 1:00 p.m. arrives we cannot keep our eyes open to work. These are the ultradian rhythms. Its foundation. Far from being an invention of productivity gurus, the existence of these rhythms is deeply rooted in our physiology and hormonal secretionespecially during sleep. But the important thing is that understanding them will not give us superpowers, but according to scientific and neurobiological literature, it does explain how the brain “battery” works. What are they? To understand ultradian rhythms, we must travel to the 1950s and focus on Nathaniel Kleitman, the pioneering researcher who discovered REM sleep. At this point, Kleitman and his team realized that we don’t sleep in one uniform stretch, but rather our night is divided into cycles that last between 90 and 120 minutes. During each cycle, we go through several stages, such as light sleep, deep sleep and also REM sleep. Once we reach this we start again, and this is what is known as the ultradian rhythm. It is maintained. Logic could make us think that this cycle remains only in sleep, but here Kleitman postulated the Basic Rest-Activity Cycle (BRAC). With this theory on the table, it was proposed that this same 90-minute clock does not turn off when we wake up, but rather that during the day our brain continues to operate in waves. In this way, we can see that we have peaks of high alertness and concentration of about 90 minutes, followed by valleys of fatigue of about 20 minutes where the body requires a rest to recover. A hormonal issue. Something that is well known is that the secretion of hormones is not done continuously like an open tap, but in pulses or “peaks” that are synchronized with these 90-minute cycles. For example, growth hormone is essential to repair our tissues and its maximum peak is linked to the stages of deep sleep that occur in the first ultradian cycles of the night. This means that, if these first 90-180 minutes of sleep are disturbed, the body will not repair itself in the same way. Respect the ultradian rhythm. Among the tips we can follow to control these cycles is the 90/20 rule at work. And if we assume Kleitman’s BRAC cycle, the optimal window of mindfulness lasts about 90 minutes and then we enter a moment of fatigue where we do not perform in the same way. That is why it may be best to work for 90 minutes and then take a real break away from the work screen, for 15-20 minutes to reset this cycle. But the moment of waking up is also essential, since feeling tired when getting out of bed usually occurs because the alarm went off in the middle of the slow wave sleep phase or deep sleep. That is why calculating the hours of sleep in blocks of 90 minutes increases the probability that we will wake up at the end of these cycles and be able to get up with much more energy. Images | Vitaly Gariev In Xataka | Neither red light makes you sleepy, nor white noise is magic: what science says about the trend of “hacking” the bedroom

The Wangiri scam only needs one thing to work: your curiosity

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Someone calls you on your cell phone suddenly and hangs up right away, before you can react. You look at the screen and see an unknown number, so immediately you wonder who was calling you and why. The impulse is often to call back. And that’s probably a really bad idea. The Caller’s Trap. This scam became famous a couple of years agobut now it seems to be coming back strongly and it is good to remember how it works. This is a scam known as ‘Wangiri’ (ワン切り), a Japanese term that literally means “one ring and hang up.” The mechanics of fraud are as old as it is effective: An automated system launches thousands of random calls a day, lets the phone ring once or twice, and immediately hangs up before the user has time to respond. The bait of the missed call. The goal of scammers is to play on your curiosity or fear that you have missed some important communication. When you see the notification on the screen, many people can act impulsively and they call back to find out who was trying to contact them, which leads them directly into the fraud. If you call back, it will be expensive. The real danger is in calling back: without knowing it, what happens is that you will be calling a special rate number abroad that is not included in any mobile operator rates. Cybercriminals often camouflage numbers with strange international prefixes from countries like Albania (+355), Bosnia, (+387), or Ivory Coast (+225) that are very difficult to recognize. waiting music. And when the call is initiated, scammers activate systems to keep the victim on the phone as long as possible. For this they use fake voice recordingssimulate that the call is on hold or play sounds of a busy line. Every second you listen to those loops, the cost of the call goes up significantly and without you knowing it. A volume business. Although the amount charged to each victim may be small, the scam ends up being a million-dollar business when carried out on an industrial scale. Cybercriminals use bots and automated systems that make millions of attempts daily at dawn or at unusual times to maximize the probability that the user will not reach the cell phone in time. It’s easy to avoid the scam. The scam is simple and effective for impulsive users, but there is a very simple way to avoid it: never return a missed call from an unknown number. And much less if it has an international prefix other than +34 of Spain. If there is really an emergency, that person will contact you again or will leave a message via SMS or WhatsApp. If you have already fallen into the trap. For those who have been victims of the scam, the ideal is to act quickly. The first thing is to check the accumulated consumption in the application of your mobile line and immediately contact your telephone operator. Save the scammer’s number, write down the exact time of the call and ask your company to preventively block charges for premium rate numbers before processing the report. In Xataka | Not even bank security is infallible: the five techniques of cybercriminals to access our money

One of the most famous western phrases is in a Clint Eastwood film, but it was improvised by one of his companions

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An actor who, a priori, did not have to say any dialogue, fired four shots and uttered a phrase that sixty years later is still quoted in all Western stories. But that phrase wasn’t in any script. What’s more, the actor who pronounced it was not even the protagonist of a legendary spaghetti western work: ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly’. What’s happening. Tuco (Eli Wallach) is taking a bath when an old enemy surprises him with a revolver. Tuco shoots through the bathwater, cloudy with dust and soap, gets up and blurts out: “When you have to shoot, you shoot, you don’t talk.” According to Wallach himself, the scene I had no dialogue; It was he himself who improvised the phrase on the spot, and both Sergio Leone and the rest of the team laughed so hard that they kept it in the final cut. It is significant that the phrase was only uttered on two occasions: one during filming, in 1966, and another a year later, when dubbing the scene in the studio. How it got there. The actor used to say that Leone had signed him for his role as the bandit Calvera in ‘The Magnificent Seven’. However, what actually convinced Leone was a specific moment from ‘The Won of the West’, from 1962. Wallach recalled that his agent told him about “an Italian director who has seen your Western films”, to which he responded skeptically that he did not believe that Italian Western existed. However, he changed his mind when Leone showed him a sequence from ‘Death Had a Price’. All yours. Once he won the role, Leone let him do practically whatever he wanted with Tuco: the straw hat, the leather knee pads, the gesture of crossing himself at full speed several times in a row, it was all Wallach’s idea. Also he improvised almost the entire armory scenedespite having no idea how to assemble a revolver, and the real bewilderment of the clerk who was explaining the parts to him was captured on camera. Eastwood’s jealousy. The star of what would be the third film in the Dollar Trilogy worked in a much more contained manner, and his final presence on screen was much more dependent on editing. The script distributed the narrative weight between three characters for the first time, and he was not happy about that. In fact, Clint Eastwood he was close to turning down the roleuncomfortable with Tuco having more footage and better lines than him. He negotiated $250,000 and 10% of the profits in the United States before accepting. The film would end up grossing more than 38 million dollars with a budget of just 1.2 million, a success that consolidated both Eastwood’s status as an international star and Leone as a leading author of the genre. However, his fears were more than justified: decades later, it is Wallach’s improvisations that are most frequently cited when discussing the film. That’s what the classics are: untamable. In Xataka | “They were not used to silence”: when Clint Eastwood set foot in Spain for the first time in 1964, he was marked forever

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