usatoday24

with smuggled NVIDIA chips, according to The Information

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The Chinese artificial intelligence startup DeepSeek would have been training his next model with thousands of NVIDIA Blackwell chipsthe most advanced on the market and whose export to China is expressly prohibited by the United States. So The Information states itciting six sources close to the company, who claim that the chips would have arrived in the country through smuggling. ANDl alleged smuggling scheme. According to the media, the chips would have been acquired legally through data centers in countries where their sale is allowed. Once installed and inspected by NVIDIA or its authorized distributors such as Dell or Super Micro Computer, the servers would have been disassembled and the components would have been shipped to China in separate pieces, passing customs under false declarations. This method would allow no trace of the end user to be left. The response of NVIDIA. The company has flatly denied these accusations in a statement: “We have not seen any evidence or received notices of ‘ghost data centers’ built to deceive us and our OEM partners, which are then dismantled, smuggled and rebuilt elsewhere.” NVIDIA adds that, although this type of smuggling “seems implausible,” it investigates any information it receives about it. Why Blackwell chips are so valuable to DeepSeek. NVIDIA’s Blackwell processors began shipping in the final quarter of 2024, with companies like Google, Microsoft, and OpenAI being the first to receive them. These chips include specialized hardware to accelerate sparse computing (Sparse Computing), executing this type of calculations up to twice as fast as traditional methods. According to The Information, DeepSeek would have been using a technique called “sparse attention” that activates only certain parts of the model to respond to requests instead of the entire model, which significantly reduces inference costs. Blackwells would be especially useful for this approach, although their application in larger models is proving more complicated than anticipated. Geopolitical context. US President Donald Trump came to boast to Chinese leader Xi Jinping that Blackwell chips are “10 years ahead of any other chip” and that he would not allow China access to them. However, this week Trump authorized the sale of H200 chips from NVIDIA to China, a generation before the Blackwells, although Beijing is still considering whether to allow its acquisition. Of course, this measure could reduce demand for smuggled Blackwell chips in the Asian country. lThe difficulties of enforcing restrictions. Most NVIDIA chips are manufactured in Taiwan and sold through a complex network of distributors around the world. Jacob Feldgoise, analyst at the Center for Security and Emerging Technologies at Georgetown University account to the media that “the burden of proof to enforce and prosecute chip smuggling cases is quite high. Clear and convincing evidence is needed.” DeepSeek remains silent. The Chinese startup has not responded to the allegations. Previously, DeepSeek had trained its models with older NVIDIA chips: 10,000 A100 units stored by its parent company, hedge fund High-Flyer Capital Management, before US export restrictions took effect in 2022. The company’s research documents from last year indicated that they also had used hopper chipsthe generation immediately before Blackwell. DeepSeek faces several sticks from Washington: in April, the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party published a report calling the startup “a profound threat” to American national security, accusing it of illegally using export-controlled NVIDIA chips. Qregulatory repression. NVIDIA confirmed this week that it has developed a verification technology location through software that could indicate in which country its chips operate, although it has not yet been launched. This tool would use the computing capabilities of your GPUs to monitor the performance and location of the processors. The company has clarified that this is read-only software that does not allow NVIDIA to remotely control the chips or disable them. “There is no off switch,” the company said. Cover image | DeepSeek, Xataka with Mockuuups Studio and NVIDIA In Xataka | If anyone thought that Europe had no role in the race for AI, Mistral has something to tell them

either you tell him how much money you earn or there is no pension

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Social Security will apply from 2026 more rigorous control on non-contributory retirement and disability pensions, activating a mechanism already provided for in the regulations. The key is simple: those who do not submit the annual income statement during the first quarter of the year will stop receive your pension until they regularize the situation. In this way, the Administration ensures that all recipients of these aid really continue to meet the economic requirements to receive them. Differences between contributory and non-contributory pension. First of all, it is worth making an important qualification in this new measure. As and how do they clarify from La Moncloa, contributory pensions are granted to those who they have quoted enough throughout their entire working life. The legal age, the years of contributions and the contribution bases determine the final amount of that pension. Once that pension is recognized, the annual personal income they do not modify the law. Instead, the non-contributory pensions They work differently since the beneficiary has not provided prior contributions. They are precisely designed for people who have not had a sufficient working career to access a contributory benefit, or have not contributed directly. In this case, the decisive element is not the working life, but the lack of resources to survive. The system only guarantees this aid as long as the beneficiary can demonstrate that they continue to meet the financial requirements. Social Security improves the verification system. In 2026, no requirement is added that was not already contemplated in the existing regulations, but Social Security has reinforced the mechanism that is responsible for verifying the requirements of beneficiaries. If they cannot be verified due to lack of data, the benefit is no longer paid. He article 368 of the Social Security Law establishes that “the beneficiary must present, in the first quarter of each year, a declaration of the income of the respective economic unit of which he is a part, referring to the immediately preceding year.” That is, the beneficiary of the benefit has the obligation to demonstrate annually that his or her family income meets the requirements to receive it. This certificate must be sent to the Administration through a form available in the IMSERSO portalthe body that coordinates this type of benefits with the different autonomous communities. The regulations leave no room. The existence of the pension depends on the beneficiary periodically demonstrating that he or she is still in a situation of financial need. This is the reason why the system requires that the declaration be delivered during the first quarter of the year. That is, between January 1 and March 31. The failure to comply this procedure It has also been regulated for more than three decades and is included in the article 16.2 of Royal Decree 357/1991. “Failure by the beneficiary to comply with the obligation to submit the annual income declaration will result in the suspension of receipt of the pension.” In other words, if this income is not reported, Social Security will stop paying the benefit. Suspension does not eliminate the right. However, the suspension included in the regulations does not imply the loss of the right to receive it. It means that payments are stopped until the person presents documentation and proves that they meet the requirements. From that moment on, the Administration checks the declared income and, if the requirements are maintained, reactivates the payment of the pension. Reactivation may include payment of arrears, but with a limit: they can only be recovered up to three months prior to the date on which it is regularized. Starting in 2026, Social Security will apply without exception the suspension of payment when the income declaration is not submitted within the established period. It is an operational change, not a legal one. The regulations already existed, what changes is the level of control and monitoring. Hence, the annual declaration is not a formality, but rather a condition for receiving the non-contributory pension. In Xataka | The Government’s latest idea in labor matters: a “flexible” leave that allows you to work at the same time Image | Social Security, Unsplash (Jordy Muñoz)

the questions you have sent us (and their answers) about this sound bar

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The downside of any television is usually always in the sound, and therefore, to enjoy movies and video games to the fullest, it is usually advisable to invest in a sound bar. An example of a good alternative is JBL BAR 1300MK2the brand’s high-end bar. We have been testing it for several days, and now we bring you a video with all the answers to the questions that you have been sending us about it to our Instagram profile. JBL BAR 1300MK2 Q&A We start the video talking about their channels. The JBL BAR 1300MK2 has a 11.1.4 configurationwhich are distributed between the central bar, two removable satellites and a subwoofer. In total we have 8 front speakers and another four upwards in the center bar. The satellites have three each, and the subwoofer has a double speaker. We also talked to you about the wireless features of this bar, with the peculiarity that the wireless ones are the two satellites so you can place them wherever you want at all times. The body of the bar does have to be connected via HDMI to the TV. Then we do an express round, where by answering several short questions we tell you that it has 2470W peak power, its Dolby Atmos support or its many wireless compatibilities with technologies such as Chromecast, AirPlay, Alexa Multi-Room Music or Spotify Connect. The sound bar has 4 HDMIs, being an eARC. Another thing we talked to you about is its sound quality and its sensationstelling you about the experience we have had testing. Be careful with content with surround sound, because that is where it shines the most. And we end up talking to you about other aspects such as the vibrations of the bar, how you can control it with the remote or with the mobile application, the options of this app, and many other aspects of the bar. But the best thing is that you watch the full video to see all the answers we give to the questions you have sent us. This content is a collaboration and sponsorship between Xataka and the brand, but there is no agreement on the script or the selection of the topics. The editorial content is created entirely by Xataka.

OpenAI knows that it needs to continue generating memes and virals. That’s why she’s willing to pay Disney a lot of money for her content.

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Disney and OpenAI have announced a three-year licensing agreement that will allow users to create short videos featuring more than 200 Disney, Marvel, Pixar and Star Wars characters through soraOpenAI’s AI video generation platform. The operation includes an investment of $1 billion by the Mickey Mouse company in the AI ​​startup. Change of sight. Disney has gone from sue AI platforms like Midjourney for unauthorized use of its characters to become OpenAI’s first major content licensing partner. The company also sent a cease and desist letter to Character.AI in September for the same reason. This change in strategy gives clues to Disney’s move, choosing to monetize and control the use of its intellectual property instead of trying to stop it completely. What users can do. Starting in early 2026, according to OpenAI, Sora users will be able to generate short videos for social networks with characters such as Mickey Mouse, Iron Man, Darth Vader, Elsa, Simba or Groot, as well as iconic costumes, accessories, vehicles and settings from these franchises. From ChatGPT, users will also be able to create static images of these same characters using text instructions. The agreement expressly excludes the faces and voices of real actors. The business model behind the agreement. OpenAI need viral content to maintain the attention of users, and in recent months it has made it clear to us that this route is its current main source of income to attract more users who want to go through the hoops of its subscription plans. Disney characters are precisely the type of content that fits this vision. That is why the company is willing to pay to license this intellectual property. Disney as a corporate client of OpenAI. Beyond the license, Disney will become a “major customer” of OpenAI, under the terms of the agreement. The company will deploy ChatGPT to its employees and use OpenAI APIs to build new tools, products and experiences, including functionality for Disney+. In fact, perhaps the most striking thing about the agreement is that a curated selection of videos generated by Sora It will be available to play from the streaming platform. Investment and purchase options. Disney will provide $1 billion in equity investment and will receive warrants to acquire additional stakes in OpenAI in the future. The transaction is still subject to negotiation of definitive agreements and approvals prior to closing. Commitments on responsible use. Both companies say in the joint statement that they will maintain “robust controls” to prevent the generation of illegal or harmful content, respect the rights of content creators and protect the use of people’s voice and image. OpenAI is further committed to implementing age-appropriate policies and other safety measures on the service. The vision of the CEOs. Bob Iger, CEO of Disney, assures that “the rapid advance of artificial intelligence marks an important moment for our industry” and defends that collaboration will allow “extending the reach of our narrative in a thoughtful and responsible way.” For his part, Sam Altman, head of OpenAI, affirms that the agreement “shows how AI companies and creative leaders can work together responsibly to advance innovation.” What’s coming now? It remains to be seen if this licensing model extends to other studios and large content owners. Everything indicates that it certainly will not be the only large company to take advantage of this type of agreement. The litmus test will be when all the content in Sora is released and if it gains enough traction on networks for OpenAI to consider it a small victory in its quest for make ChatGPT a profitable tool for your business. In Xataka | Quietly, a country is becoming a technological power thanks to data centers: India

Since Iryo and Ouigo compete with Renfe, we have had ultra-cheap high-speed tickets. Everything has an end

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There is a problem in the supply of high-speed trains in Spain. We believed that with the arrival of competition to Renfe we ​​would see ticket prices reduced. This has been the case during the last four years and in different regions, but now the three operators have begun to raise their rates in most corridors during the third quarter of 2025, according to the latest report of the National Markets and Competition Commission (CNMC). The change of trend. In the Madrid-Barcelona corridor, the busiest in the country, prices rose by an average of 25% compared to the same period in 2024. Iryo led the increases with an increase of 52.9%, placing the average ticket at 63.82 euros. Renfe AVE raised its fares by 13.3% to 70.58 euros, while Ouigo, traditionally the cheapest option, increased its prices by 20.2% to reach 51.86 euros on average. The context that explains the rise. The withdrawal of Avlo, Renfe’s ‘low cost’ brand, from the Madrid-Barcelona corridor in September after cracks were detected in the bogies of its Avril trains, has reduced the supply of tickets economical on the most popular route. This has caused the remaining operators to adjust their rates upwards. Despite the increase in prices, tickets are still 26% cheaper than before the liberalization of the sector in 2020, as indicated by the CNMC. The exception: Andalusia. In this Autonomous Community, the evolution is different. The entry of Ouigo in January 2025 on the Madrid-Seville and Madrid-Málaga/Granada routes caused a price war which has kept rates down. On the Madrid-Málaga route, only Iryo raised prices (+2.6%), while Renfe AVE lowered them by 8.9% and Avlo by 15.3% to compete with the 32.54 euros on average offered by the French operator. In Madrid-Seville, the average price fell by 2.8% despite the fact that individual operators such as Iryo (+12.5%) and Renfe AVE (+0.9%) did make their tickets more expensive. The Levantine corridor. Regarding routes to the Valencian Community, these show moderate increases. In Madrid-Valencia, prices rose by 1.3% to 30.56 euros on average, the cheapest ticket on the entire network. In Madrid-Alicante, the increase was 1.5% to 37.96 euros. Iryo was the one that increased its fares the most on both routes (with increases of 24.6% and 23.9% respectively), while Ouigo maintained its low price strategy with slight reductions. The thing is about profitability. The Minister of Transport, Óscar Puente, has been publicly demanding this price increase in recent months, going so far as to accuse Ouigo of operating at losses and dragging Renfe into an unsustainable dynamic. And while the rest of the operators have been gaining ground, we are now at a point where they are looking for the economic viability of their operations, and that is where the price increases come in. The balance of passengers. Despite price increases, demand remains robust. High speed will reach almost 40 million travelers in 2024, 77% more than in 2019, before liberalization. In the third quarter of 2025, routes such as Madrid-Málaga/Granada (+17.7%), Madrid-Seville (+13.2%) and Madrid-Alicante (+8.9%) reached record passenger numbers. Only Madrid-Barcelona registered a slight decrease of 0.3%, possibly weighed down by the withdrawal of Avlo and the increase in fares. The future of the sector. After four years of aggressive offers by the rest of the high-speed operators, the sector seems to be entering a phase of maturity in which it seeks to attract travelers without losing sight of the sustainability of the business. Renfe maintains a market share of 62% in most corridors, although in Madrid-Valencia it is already at 50%. It will be very interesting to know the figures in the coming quarters to know how the panorama evolves. Cover image | Jose Garcia Nieto In Xataka | High speed in Madrid is at risk of collapsing. And that’s why Adif wants to send her to Parla

Buying tickets for Rosalía’s tour has been chaos for everyone. Except for Banco Santander clients

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The sale of tickets for the concerts in Madrid and Barcelona Rosalia have generated the expected collapse. An apocalypse of people running out of tickets, waiting at the seventy-something thousand stall in a virtual queue, and a lot of resellers rubbing their hands. We had the precedent of Bad Bunny, but not only have we not learned, but we have made it worse with an exclusive pre-sale that has left those who have approached through the general sale almost without tickets. He ritual than usual. Frozen screens, virtual queues that exceeded 50,000 people and the frustration of thousands of fans who after hours of waiting were left without access to the many seats available for pre-sale last Tuesday the 9th for the eight Rosalía concerts scheduled in Madrid and Barcelona between March and April 2026. Just 48 hours later, the general sale on Thursday the 11th replicated the same scenario, but much faster: all the tickets sold out in a matter of minutes. The immediate result was predictable: platforms resale offering seats for up to 1,200 eurosmore than ten times its original value. The bank account as an entrance to culture. In September 2023, the Banco Santander launched SMusica platform that links financial services with exclusive offers linked to concerts and musical events after close deals with relevant industry brands, such as Live Nation (owner of Ticketmaster), Universal Music, the Los 40 radio network and festivals such as Primavera Sound and Mad Cool. The mechanism is as simple as, in its essence, exclusive: Bank customers get early access to tickets 48 to 72 hours before the rest of the public. In practice, this means that when the general sale opens, most of the best-located seats (and sometimes all the capacity) have already been purchased. For her part, Rosalía simultaneously activated an “Artist Presale” through prior registration on her website. In this way, two privileged channels were generated before the official sale. But… how many tickets went to pre-sale? There are no official public figures. However, an expert (Chema Lamirán, director of the Master in Digital Marketing at the European University of Valencia) provides data about the usual operation of this system: “as a general and ethical rule of the industry, a quota should always be reserved for general sales.” According to their analysis, between 15% and 20% of the total capacity is usually reserved for general sales. But “in phenomena like Rosalía, where demand exceeds supply by 10 or 20 times, that 20% flies in seconds, giving the sensation that there were no tickets.” This would explain why in social networks comments abounded like this one: “They’re making fun of us, they must have sold all the Lux Tour tickets in the pre-sale, otherwise I can’t explain it.” The system also established differentiated limits: a maximum of two tickets per person in the Santander pre-sale compared to four in the general one, which in theory should leave more seats available for the general public, but in practice it barely makes a difference when the demand is so disproportionate. The precedent of Bad Bunny. May 8, 2025 marked a turning point in public perception of the ticketing system in Spain. What began as the announcement of three Bad Bunny concerts ended up becoming twelve dates spread between Barcelona and Madrid, an improvised increase on the fly while the Ticketmaster website collapsed under the weight of hundreds of thousands of simultaneous users. At 12:45, fifteen minutes before the official start of the pre-sale, the platform began to display errors 503 and 500, leaving buyers trapped in a digital limbo where virtual queues exceeded 400,000 people. But the technical chaos It was just one dimension of the problem. The OCU filed a formal complaint before the Ministry of Consumer Affairs after documenting how an entry initially announced at 79.50 euros It ended up costing 269 euros by including management fees (€36.50), “suggested” donations (€3.30) and additional VIP charges (€150). FOMO and banks. The phenomenon of concerts, without a doubt the “place to be” (and one of the few entertainment sectors that not only enters into crisis but also grows without apparent roof), extends its appeal to entities such as banks. The concerts of Rosalía or Bad Bunny are not considered as recitals for fans, but rather as massive events to which one must go, with the music being only a circumstantial element. The essential precedent of Taylor Swift (whose Eras Tour generated in Spain similar episodes of uncontrolled demand) has established a pattern where megaconcerts are perceived as unrepeatable events that banks, always on the hunt for young customers, are willing to take advantage of. In Xataka | Rosalía has entered her Catholic phase: she is only the latest in a long list of Spanish artists and filmmakers

There are a lot of people going to libraries to look for books that don’t exist: an AI invented them

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Junk content made with AI is sneaking into every corner of the internet: it is ruining the authenticity of Etsythe Wikipediait confuses us search for an apartment in Idealista and of course plague social networks. He ‘slop’ of AI is reaching the real world, specifically libraries. What is happening. They tell it inScientific American. There are people going to libraries and archives in search of books or scientific articles that do not appear anywhere for one reason: they do not exist. International Red Cross has alerted to the situation and blames AI tools such as Gemini, ChatGPT or Copilot. They assure that “These systems do not conduct research, verify sources or collate information. They generate new content based on statistical patterns and, therefore, may produce invented results.” In Xataka He "AI slop" turned into art. A Chinese creator is copying the absurd aesthetics of generative AI, and it’s hilarious Fed up librarians. The research director of the Virginia library estimates that at least 15% of the queries they receive through mail are about documents and works generated by ChatGPT and similar tools. “For our staff, it is much more difficult to prove that there is no single record,” he says. A Bluesky user recounts a similar experience when a student asked him to find a series of references. After searching for a while without success, he asked the student where he got the list from and he confessed that it came from Google’s AI summaries. Made-up dating isn’t something that started happening the day before yesterday,In 2023 there were already discussions about it. Seattle University found that it is often very difficult to verify these invented quotes. The reason is that AI usually gives titles of magazines or books that exist, but what does not exist is the chapter or issue where the information is found. What it does is mix information to make it seem convincing, when in reality it is a dead end. AI and books. Invented references are not the only problem, there are librarians who also They criticize books created entirely with AI for being “incredibly bad” and we have recently learned of the case of South Korea and the resounding failure of its AI school book program. On the other hand we have the copyright problem. As with works of art, books too have been used to train AI without compensating their authors. A group of authors sued Anthropicfor this reason, but The judge ruled in favor of the company. {“videoId”:”x8jpy2b”,”autoplay”:false,”title”:”What’s BEHIND AIs like CHATGPT, DALL-E or MIDJOURNEY? | ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE”, “tag”:”Webedia-prod”, “duration”:”1173″} Papers on AI, made with AI. In an article by Futurism They said that a consequence of the AI ​​slop is that the papers that investigate AI themselves are made with AI. It is estimated that the number of papers on AI has doubled in recent years and journals such as NeurIPS have had to ask doctoral students to help them review them. There is a specific case of a researcher named Kevin Zhu who has participated in more than 100 papers in one year, an exorbitant figure for experts. To no one’s surprise, many of these papers are a real disaster full of made up quotes, blatant errors and sometimes hidden text to manipulate the review systems themselves. hallucinations. That AI invents things is quite common, they are the In AI jargon it is known as hallucinations and one of the weak points of language models; The advances are enormous, but the reality is that We still can’t trust AI and it is necessary to verify the information. Hallucinations are often the reason why those who use AI in their jobs are caught, such as the consulting firm Deloitte, which delivered a report to the Australian government that contained references to completely fabricated reports. Image | Cottonbro studio, Pexels In Xataka | The birth of an anti-reading movement: more and more people admit to using AI to summarize books (function() { window._JS_MODULES = window._JS_MODULES || {}; var headElement = document.getElementsByTagName(‘head’)(0); if (_JS_MODULES.instagram) { var instagramScript = document.createElement(‘script’); instagramScript.src=”https://platform.instagram.com/en_US/embeds.js”; instagramScript.async = true; instagramScript.defer = true; headElement.appendChild(instagramScript); – The news There are a lot of people going to libraries to look for books that don’t exist: an AI invented them was originally published in Xataka by Amparo Babiloni .

UFOs are out there and the Government knows it

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It seemed that the times of documentaries about ufology and sightings of flying saucers had passed away, but nothing like a bit of conspiracies and encounters in the third phase to liven up the sales charts. This documentary, without support from any entertainment corporation, has climbed to the top of the best-selling and rented charts in just a few days. A truly strange phenomenon. What happened. Just two days after its launch for sale and rental on Prime Video in the United States (at the moment it is not with the platform’s general on-demand rate) the documentary ‘The Age of Disclosure’ established an unprecedented brand: No other non-fiction release had generated as much revenue in a comparable period. The film directed by Dan Farah toppled the brand held until then by ‘Free Solo’, the acclaimed Oscar-winning documentary about ropeless climbing by Alex Honnold and which you can watch on Disney+. The record. ‘The era of disclosure‘ not only dominated specific documentary categories, but simultaneously held the number one and two positions on the overall platform-wide sales and rental charts during its first eight days of availability. The truly amazing is that this commercial dominance occurred in direct competition with releases from major studios such as ‘Mission: Impossible – Final Judgment‘, ‘One battle after another’ and ‘Tron: Ares’, among others. What is it about? Dan Farah, who had produced things like ‘Ready Player One’, made his directorial debut with this project that took three years to complete, always under strict secrecy. After passing through festivals and a very limited exhibition in theaters at the beginning of the year, it began to arouse unusual interest (reflected in figures such as a trailer with 22 million views) and ended up on Prime Video. It raises the existence of a clandestine government program that for eight decades would have recovered and attempted to reverse engineer technology of non-terrestrial origin. Farah maintains that the main world powers maintain a silent competition to decipher these artifacts. The list of interviewees, totaling 34 people familiar with the subject, includes Marco Rubio, current Secretary of State of the United States; Kirsten Gillibrand and Mike Rounds, both senators active on intelligence committees; and James Clapper, former Director of Intelligence under the Obama administration. turning point. Renewed interest in UFOs has a specific date and explain massive success of the documentary. On July 26, 2023, the House Homeland Security Subcommittee organized a session in which David Gruschformer Department of Defense employee, declared under oath that during the exercise of his official duties he had received information about the existence of an initiative lasting several decades dedicated to recovering and studying ships of non-human origin. Grusch claimed to have conducted interviews with approximately forty people linked to these projects over a four-year period, who provided him with photographic evidence, official documentation, and classified accounts. The most shocking moment of his appearance came when, questioned by Congresswoman Nancy Mace, he confirmed that authorities with first-hand knowledge had informed him of the recovery of non-human biological materials in some of these alleged accidents. Not everyone is happy. The reception of ‘The Age of Disclosure’ puts the fracture between critics and public. On Rotten Tomatoesonly 30% of professional reviews rated the work favorably, while the public gave it a notable 92%. Among the fiercest critics are that of The New York Times which adopts a particularly skeptical stance on what the documentary tells or The Hollywood Reporterwhich posits that the documentary treats the claims as established facts and do not require additional corroboration. In Xataka | The countries that most believe in the visit of aliens, arranged in a curious graph

Smart glasses find their “iPhone moment” in China. The key to your success: payments

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In China, AI glasses allow you to pay by looking at a QR code and giving a voice command. Alibaba itself launched its Quark for $268, integrated with Alipay for payments and Taobao for purchases. Xiaomi presented its glasses with AI in June and they became the third best selling in the world in the first half of 2025, despite being available for only one week. The Chinese market for smart glasses is growing exponentially in the second half of the year, according to a study by BigOne Lab. Why is it important. After more than a decade of unfulfilled promises, smart glasses have finally found their reason for being. And it is something as prosaic as paying without taking your cell phone out of your pocket. AND It’s working in China like nothing else has before. in this sector. From the adoption for payments, the rest of the value proposition is built. The context. China’s digital infrastructure, where even the elderly use their smartphone for everything, facilitates adoption. QR codes are in all shops and Meta does not operate in China without a VPN, which has left the field clear for local companies to experiment without direct competition. Yes, but. The price is determining. Chinese glasses cost between 200 and 300 dollars, a price not too high. Xiaomi, RayNeo, Thunderobot, Kopin, Baidu and Alibaba compete in the Chinese domestic market. The payment functionality does not require very sophisticated screens or complex optics. All you need is a basic camera, voice recognition and connection to the payments ecosystem. This makes production much cheaper. The big question. Will we see something similar in Europe with Bizum? Mobile payments here are less ubiquitous than in China, but Bizum has achieved enormous penetration in Spain. If businesses adopted Bizum QR codes, as some already do, smart glasses could find their practical use here as well. The European ecosystem has advantages: stricter privacy regulation, greater consumer trust in traditional banking systems, and a population accustomed to incremental innovations. But it doesn’t have the density of QR codes that makes China the perfect terrain for this experiment. Between the lines. Chinese companies are not just developing hardware. They are creating the use case that justifies wearing smart glasses all day, and instead of looking for something spectacular and complex, they have found something much simpler and everyday: not having to take your phone out of your pocket. Rokid boasts that its glasses are not tied to a single generative AI model: they work with OpenAI, Llama, Gemini and Grok. They also offer simultaneous translation into English while someone speaks in Chinese. But none of that matters as much as the payment feature. And now what. Meta dominates the global market with a 73% share in the first half of 2025, according to Counterpoint. His success with Ray-Ban Meta This is explained by a design that is almost indistinguishable from normal glasses. In addition, Western manufacturers maintain advantages in chips. But Chinese companies have obvious advantages: many brands and models, rapid iteration, and the ability to adapt quickly to market changes. In Xataka | The POCO F8 Pro and F8 Ultra are a great change of direction for the brand. We spoke with POCO to find out what awaits us now Featured image | Xiaomi

forgot three Boeing 747s in Kuala Lumpur

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According to official data, More than 80 million passengers pass through airports such as the Adolfo Suárez Madrid – Barajas airport each year, while more than 19 million travelers pass through the Josep Tarradellas Barcelona – El Prat airport each year. With that volume of passengers, it’s not strange for people to lose things. The undersigned lost a jacket he loved forgotten at the Berlin airport. However, at least usually someone loses a 70 meter object long and 200 tons in weight, like those weighed by the three Boeing 747s that someone forgot in 2015 at the Kuala Lumpur airport (Malaysia). The three forgotten Boeings For more than a year, these giants of more than 70 meters long, they remained parked in a corner of the international airport in the Malaysian capital as if they were a simple lost object, accumulating fees and attracting the attention of the ground teams who saw them every day without anyone taking responsibility for them. Over time, that It stopped being just a curious anecdote among the runway operators and became a real administrative problem for the airport management through which more than 70 million passengers pass through each year. The airport space management company was obliged to reserve that space for the three aircraft, assume their tariff costs and try to clarify who was responsible for those three. Boeing 747‑200two configured for passengers and one for cargo. The most striking thing about the case is that they were not small planes within the reach of any user with a flight license, but rather they were three Boeing 747‑200which in its passenger version It can exceed 400 seats and reached a price of about 39 million dollars in the early 1980s. Even so, these three units, identified with the registration plates TF-ARM, TF-ARN and TF-ARH, were immobilized for more than a year and without anagrams or marks that related them to any of the companies that usually operated at that airport. Whose planes are these? Tired of accumulating debt and dust in equal measure, Kuala Lumpur airport authorities set out to find the planes’ owners. According to pointed Bloomberg, the first information indicated that one of the aircraft had carried out cargo tasks for Malaysia Airlines, which had rented it to the Icelandic Air Atlanta Icelandic. Given the impossibility of locating a clear owner through the usual means, the airport administration decided to resort to a method as simple as it is forceful: post an ad in the local newspaper Star Newspaper to ask the “missing” owner of the planes to come by the airport to pick them up. The message of the advertisement was clear: “If you do not collect the aircraft within 14 days from the date of this notice, we reserve the right to sell or otherwise dispose of the aircraft in accordance with the Civil Aviation Regulations 1996 and use the money raised to offset any expenses and debts owed to us under those regulations,” stated the published notice. As and how I collected Guardianthe Kuala Lumpur authorities had decided to take action to get rid of the three aircraft, and were preparing the ground to sell them to the highest bidder. “We have been in communication with the supposed owner, but he has not responded to us to remove the aircraft. That is why we are carrying out this process to legalize any action we want to take,” Mohd Isa, the contact person who appeared in the announcement, told the British newspaper Zainol. The case took a turn when the Swift Air Cargo company, a freight transport company, stated that those planes were theirs and that they had not “forgotten” them, but rather that they were in the middle of a purchase operation from a Hong Kong company that had not yet been resolved. From that moment on, what seemed like a simple case of inattention turned into a dispute over who was really the legal owner and who should be responsible for their particular “parking ticket.” Boeings rose to fame It is not usual for three aircraft the size of these Boeing 747s to be “forgotten” on the runway of an international airport, which is why the three aircraft were made famous all over the world. Since finally It was not possible to clarify who the real owner was.the airport carried out its threat and sold the devices to the highest bidder. According to published LuxuryLaunchesNowadays, airplanes have a very different use than that for which they were designed. One of them, the TF‑ARMwas transferred to Nanchang, in China, where it ended up becoming a valuable setting for training practices for students of the Jiangxi Aviation Technical and Vocational School. The TF-ARN has become a tourist curiosity in northern Dinghai District in Zhoushan He TF-RNA traveled to Zhoushan, in China’s Zhejiang province, and was transformed into a leisure attraction, while the TF‑ARH He didn’t go too far from that airport. It was taken to the Freeport A’Famosa Outlet shopping complex in Malacca (Malaysia), where it was converted into a curious space which combines a cafeteria, a shopping area under the name “Coach Airways”. The third Boeing 747 is a cafeteria next to a shopping center in Malacca (Malaysia) In this way, the three jumbo jets that for more than a year remained forgotten at Kuala Lumpur International Airport, adding unpaid fees of several million, ended up finding a second life as a tourist attraction, practical classroom and commercial experience, far from the initial idea that they would end up reduced to scrap metal. In Xataka | Saudi Arabia bought one of the most advanced Boeing 747s in the world: it will end up being scrapped after only 16 flights Image | Flickr (Slices of Light)

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