Mobile Tech & Gadgets

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

50 years later, the Soviet fire of the “Gates to Hell” is going out. And it’s not good news

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In 1971, in the heart of the Karakum Desert, a group of Soviet engineers observed how the ground was sinking under his feet after a failed drilling. What came next was not an immediate evacuation or closure of the area, but rather an improvised decision that, according to who witnessed itseemed like a quick solution to a specific problem. That choice, taken almost as another technical procedure, would end up having consequences that no one at that time was able to anticipate. The eternal fire goes out. During more than half a centurythe Darvaza crater has burned relentlessly in the middle of the desert, becoming an almost permanent image of inexhaustible fire that seemed to defy any natural logic. However, the most recent data show a clear change: the intensity of the flames has fallen drastically in recent years, losing more than 7% of its strength. What for decades was a constant spectacle begins to weaken, altering the perception of a phenomenon that many considered eternal. The origin between legend and Soviet heritage. The birth of the crater is still shrouded in all kinds of stories and uncertainty, although the most widespread and feasible version points to the accident. during Soviet drilling in search of gas in the sixties or seventies. According to this theory, the ground collapsed when it reached a pocket of natural gas and the engineers they decided to set fire to the site to prevent the release of toxic gases, convinced that it would be extinguished in a short time. Thus, what was going to last weeks lasted for decadesfed by an underground network of gas that never stopped flowing, giving rise to one of the best-known anomalies of the energy legacy of the former Soviet Union. From remote curiosity to global icon. Over time, the crater went from being a geological oddity to becoming a almost mythical destiny for travelers and explorers, despite the difficulties in accessing Turkmenistan. Its image, a gigantic burning cavity in the middle of nowhere, has fueled so much adventure tourism like internal propagandato the point of being used by country leaders as a symbol of power or control. The experience of approaching the edge and feeling the direct heat of the fire has reinforced its reputation as a unique place in the world. The attempt at control and doubts about its decline. For its part, the Turkmen government has years trying to control emissions from the crater, and attributes part of the recent weakening to new drilling nearby plants intended to extract gas. However, the independent analyzes They suggest that the loss of intensity could have begun before these interventions, which opens the door to natural causes that are not yet fully understood. This nuance introduces a key and dangerous uncertainty: it is not clear whether the end of the phenomenon responds to human action or to a change in the geological system itself. The unexpected twist: less fire does not mean less problem. Yes, because although At first glance, the reduction of the flames could seem like good news from an environmental point of view, the reality it is more complex. Fire acts as a mechanism that transforms methane (much more powerful as a greenhouse gas) into carbon dioxide, reducing its impact in the short term. If the flames subside, more methane could be released directly into the atmospherewhich would make progressive shutdown a potentially bigger problem. A fragile balance that is still active. Despite its weakening, the crater remains activewith visible flames and constant emissions that remind us that the phenomenon has not disappeared. The huge amount of gas accumulated underground suggests that the fire will not be completely extinguished in the short term, maintaining that strange balance between natural spectacle, industrial legacy and environmental problem. Thus, half a century later, the symbol of eternal fire begins to change, although its disappearance does not necessarily imply a more favorable end for the rest of the planet. Image | Stefan Krasowski, Tormod Sandtorv In Xataka | China’s first pipeline network is 4,000 years old and something revolutionary: it was built without the need for kings or nobles In Xataka | About to close, this remote mine in the Polar Circle has found a 2 billion-year-old yellow diamond that weighs 158 carats

The European Union is very clear about the future of its network infrastructure: there will not be a single Chinese device

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Europe is intensifying its battle against Chinese equipment, both in its electrical network and in its telecommunications infrastructure. The European Commission has again recommended earlier this week the exclusion of Huawei and ZTE equipment by local telecommunications operators, paving the way for a review of the Cybersecurity Regulation in which it is proposed mandatory elimination of high-risk suppliers. A new touch. The European Commission has started the week with a reminder: member states must exclude Huawei and ZTE equipment from their telecommunications network. In January of this year, Europe published a draft establishing the mandatory withdrawal of “high-risk suppliers”, posing a formal veto on Chinese telecommunications companies. It is a particularly sensitive issue in Spain, where communities like Catalonia have ignored European recommendations and they have renewed again recently with companies that use Huawei equipment. The Generalitat case. Last March, the Generalitat of Catalonia renewed its contract with XCAT. A budget of 127 million euros to maintain Huawei as the main equipment supplier, despite the EU notice and challenges from Telefónica and Cellnex that paralyzed the process for a few weeks. {“videoId”:”x9gqo70″,”autoplay”:false,”title”:”YOU ARE NOT GETTING THE MOST OUT OF YOUR MOBILE if you are not using AI like this”, “tag”:”Webedia-prod”, “duration”:”617″} In addition to the Catalan case, practically a third of Spanish 5G networks are from Huawei, with an estimated replacement cost between 400 and 1,000 million euros. Beyond. It is not the only measure that Europe wants to implement against Chinese suppliers. The Commission also wants to protect itself in relation to renewable energies, vetoing access to community funds to those projects using converters made in China. “Our risk assessments have confirmed threats, including manipulation of electricity production parameters, interruption of electricity generation and even unauthorized access to operational data. In practice, this could mean a blackout, a remote blackout of Member States’ networks leading to nationwide power outages.” As with the network infrastructure, according to the Commission, this measure responds to a shield for security reasons, applicable from next November 1. Again, a blow to the giant Huawei, one of the main suppliers of solar inverters in Spain. In Xataka 6G is not being developed to improve mobile speed: it is geopolitics and China is going with the accelerator to the table The Chinese response. China is no stranger to the measures being prepared by Europe, and has made it clear that it considers these proposed acts to be discriminatory and harmful to trade. Without detailing his plans, he has made it clear that he will take countermeasures. The Swedish case. Decisions have consequences, and Sweden is a country that knows very well what happens if you ban Huawei on your telecommunications equipment. In 2020, the country banned the use of telecommunications equipment from Chinese manufacturers under the argument of national security. Although a priori this was a lifeline for Ericsson, the consequences were just the opposite. China retaliated, and China Mobile expelled Eriscsson from its network infrastructure, going from 11% market share to 2%. In case Europe hits China again. In Xataka | There is a crucial technology for the deployment of AI and China is also securing the lead: 6G (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 The European Union is very clear about the future of its network infrastructure: there will not be a single Chinese device was originally published in Xataka by Ricardo Aguilar .

raw power, outstanding camera and large capacity battery

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If you were waiting for the moment to make the jump to a high-end mobile phone, now is a good time to do it thanks to this offer that Amazon has. He Xiaomi 17 (the latest flagship launched by the Chinese manufacturer) has dropped in price and has gone from costing 1,099.90 euros to 899.99 euros. Although yes, it is a flash offer, so it will be available for a limited time. XIAOMI 17 – 12+512GB Smartphone The price could vary. We earn commission from these links A mobile phone with a Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 processor that offers plenty of power The heart of this Xiaomi 17 is he Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 (accompanied by 12 GB RAM and 512 GB of internal storage). In addition to being 30% faster than its predecessor, it has made a giant leap in thermal efficiency thanks to the 3D IceLoop system. Although it is true that his older brother (the Xiaomi 17 Ultra) takes the 200 MP sensor, this standard Xiaomi 17 is not far behind. Incorporates a 50 MP main camera with a one-inch sensor and refined with LOFIC HDR technology, to control high lights in night scenes. Another of its surprising features is its battery. This has a capacity of 6,330 mAh, a capacity which is surprising in a body of just 8 mm. In addition, it supports fast charging at 100 W, so it is perfect if you want to charge your phone in the morning, while you have breakfast, before going to work. In real practice, it is a mobile phone that lasts a day and a half perfectly without going through the plug. If you want a compact high-end mobile (its screen is 6.3 inches), flat and extremely powerful, this Xiaomi is a good purchase option. In this new Xiaomi 17 family, you could say that this terminal has stopped being the “little brother” to become a very balanced option for the general public. ⚡ IN SUMMARY: offer for the xiaomi 17 today ✅ THE BEST Leica cameras: The Xiaomi 17 takes photos with organic texture and dynamic range (thanks to the LOFIC sensor) that look like they were taken from a professional camera rather than a smartphone. Battery: It seems like magic to integrate 6,330 mAh in such a thin design. In addition, its autonomy is enough for a full day (and then some). ❌ THE WORST The price… Xiaomi is no longer the affordable mobile phone brand that we were used to. This terminal fully enters the 1,000 euro barrier, competing head to head with Samsung and Apple. Secondary cameras… Although the main lens is superb, the wide-angle lens can be a step behind in low light situations, making the jump in quality between sensors noticeable. 💡 BUY IT IF… You are an avid photographer and value the natural color and manual control that Leica optics offer. ⛔ DON’T BUY IT IF… Your budget is tight, since a Xiaomi T series or a high-end Poco can give you a similar (although not the same) experience at 70-80% but at half the price. Some accessories that may interest you for this mobile Olgary Case for Xiaomi 17 6.3″ The price could vary. We earn commission from these links XIAOMI Buds 5 – Wireless headphones The price could vary. We earn commission from these links 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 | Xiaomi In Xataka | Xiaomi 17 vs Xiaomi 17 Ultra: two similar brothers focused on very different audiences In Xataka | The new Xiaomi 17 versus the Samsung Galaxy S26: we compare the five models that will fight for the best Android of the year

Ibiza has evicted 200 people who lived in campers and caravans. Their big problem is that they are key workers for the island

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If you enter Idealista and you are looking for a home For rent in Ibiza the cheapest option right now, a 32 m2 studio in Sant Joan de Labritja with the kitchen almost at the foot of the bed, is 799 euros. And that, the ad warns, is only the price of “the winter season.” Looking ahead to spring and summer, things change. The next option, a 35 m2 studio, already costs 1,000 euros. From there up. Especially if you are looking for near Eivissa. With similar prices to many workers who keep the island’s hospitality and construction industry afloat they have no other choice than staying in cabins, shanties, vans or (hopefully) caravans. The problem is that they are often installed in unauthorized settlements that end up dismantled by court order. What has happened? That Ibiza has just expanded its (increasingly large) list of evicted settlements. He April 21 About twenty police officers went to the Sa Joveria site, near the Ibiza fairgrounds, to clear what was probably the largest settlement of substandard housing on the entire island. When the agents arrived there were barely any tenants left (the date of the operation was announced days before), but it is estimated that in Sa Joveria they have come to live (badly) more than 130 people who spent their daily lives in caravans, shacks, tents or vans camperized. Just a few days later, the April 29another judicial delegation moved to Can Misses to dismantle another settlement made up of caravans, tents and shacks. The photo was similar: when the agents arrived at the lot there were hardly any people left, but not so long ago more than fifty people lived there (it is estimated that between 70 and 80), part of them bounced from a previous eviction in Can Rova. The eviction left no incidentsbut it is a new reminder of the housing challenge that Ibiza faces. Are these the first evictions? Not at all. a few days ago Ibiza Diary took stock and counted at least half a dozen similar operations since 2024, including the last two in Sa Joveria and Can Misses. The list starts with what was probably the most dramatic episode of all: the eviction of Can Rova in the summer of 2024, when agents from the Santa Eulària police and the Civil Guard dismantled a settlement in which they lived hundreds of peopleincluding children. The episode ended with detained. In March 2025, a similar (more peaceful) operation was carried out in Can Raspalls and in July of that same year the scene was repeated in the es Gorg and Can Rova industrial estate (again). Now the authorities have returned to act in Sa Joveria and Can Misses, among other reasons due to the fire and pest risk what the settlement entailed. “Ibiza city has a major housing problem, but the administration cannot tolerate this becoming a habit of life,” argues the mayor, Rafael Triguero. Why is it a problem? Ibiza is not the only territory in Spain (or Europe) that deals with illegal shanty settlements. The problem is that there is a peculiarity on the island that is explained by its residential market: a good part of those who are forced to survive aboard motorhomes or vans parked in lots like Can Misses or Sa Joveria are not people at risk of ‘social exclusion’, without jobs or fixed income. It comes with reading the local press and the interviews with evicted people to understand that construction, hospitality and tourism workers also live in the towns. People with stable jobs and payrolls that exceed 1,000 euros per month. The problem is simply that their salaries are not enough to find housing. Or what they find (rooms in shared apartments in exchange for exorbitant rents) is less attractive than the prospect of living alone in caravans or vans. Are there testimonies? Yes. Recently The Country chatted for example with Ahmed, a 35-year-old immigrant from Western Sahara who works in a five-star hotel on the island. At least until a few weeks ago, before the eviction of Sa Joveria, at the end of his shift he returned to the cabin built with wood and cardboard that served as his home. The newspaper claims that 80% Of those who lived on the plot were Sahrawis who worked as seasonal workers in the construction and tourism sectors. Another similar case was that of Mohamed, 38 years old, installed in a tent. Also interesting is the experience of Yamile Elisabeth, a Venezuelan who has resided in Spain since 2019. Until her eviction, explains to elDiariolived in a van in Can Misses for which he paid 550 euros a month. “When you look for a rental, they easily ask for 1,000 euros and three or four months’ deposit to share a small space with five other people,” the woman clarifieswho claims that he works several hours a day cleaning a bank branch, although in reality he has training as a physiotherapist and last summer he earned 1,600 euros by working six days. Is housing that expensive? Not only is housing becoming more expensive in Ibiza, but there are a number of factors that have put special strain on its market. The first is its status as an island, with limited space. The second, its enormous demand for tourist accommodation, which even leads some homeowners to abandon them in summer (they temporarily move into caravans) to rent to visitors. The result is prohibitive income for many workers, including civil servants. Three years ago, in fact, the case of a firefighter at Ibiza airport who was forced to settle in a caravan was reported. “The only solution to save some money”, recognized the man, of Andalusian origin, in an interview with laSexta. Is there more? Yes. The problem, as remember our colleagues Motorpassionthe thing is that living in a caravan on the island is not that simple either… or economical. Laws like the 5/2024 vehicle control or that of the Rustic Land of … Read more

OpenAI already knows which device will replace our smartphone in the age of AI. It will be another smartphone, according to Kuo

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He doesn’t always get it right, but Ming-Chi-Kuo just made a particularly striking statement. According to your dataOpenAI is preparing its first “mobile AI agent”, a smartphone that will be quite different from the current ones not so much in form as in substance. If its predictions come true, we could be facing a device that will shake the pillars of the current mobile segment. Hello, “OpenAI phone”. Kuo states that mass production of this smartphone designed by OpenAI will begin in the first half of 2027. He also tells us that the SoC that will govern this device will be a customized version of the future MediaTek Dimensity 9600 manufactured with TSMC’s N2P process and that will theoretically arrive in the second half of the year. The mobile that wants to see the world. This chip will have some special features, such as an ISP (Integrated Signal Processor) with an HDR system that allows optimizing the visual perception of the world. It is logical: the mobile wants to become an integral part of our interaction with the world, and that visual capacity is critical. Two NPUs better than one. It will also have a dual NPU architecture to increase its AI computing capacity. It will theoretically integrate LPDDR6 memory and will have UFS 5.0 to avoid memory bottlenecks. If all goes well, Kuo says, between 2027 and 2028 30 million units will be distributed. Not anything else, but the plan seems incredibly ambitious. Paradigm shift. This type of device, Kuo points outwill doom the UI as we know it. The concept of navigating a patchwork of icons to perform independent tasks will be obsolete. The concept proposed by OpenAI understands that the user does not want to use an “application stack”, but rather achieve objectives through a centralized agent. This implies a radical redesign of the smartphone in which the screen stops being a menu of options and becomes a kind of mirror of what the user wants, of their “intentions.” We went from a manual interaction to a proactive inference, because the AI ​​is responsible for detecting what needs to be done to complete the action that the user needs. Without touching the screen. Task resolution rules over navigation. OpenAI being Apple. To achieve this OpenAI needs to control everything on this device, so similar to what happens with Apple and its iPhone. For an AI agent to function seamlessly, it needs access to sensors and device status in real time, something that current operating systems restrict by design. OpenAI wants to control both the hardware and the software to capture all the relevant information at all times. The technical barrier is not the AI ​​model, but that total control that also requires perfect management of memory and energy consumption. Apple, by the way, is in that same battle, although in a different way. The energy challenge. It seems logical to think that this device bases a good part of its capacity on AI models in the cloud, but also that it will have the ability to execute some tasks thanks to small local models. Hence having two NPUs that allow at least certain tasks to be executed on the mobile itself. That will be crucial precisely regarding energy consumptionbecause this AI that automates tasks by chaining them consumes much more computing than the usual interaction with an app today. App Store in danger of extinction. There is a particularly striking idea here. The app store economics faces existential disruption. The current model relies on friction: you need to open a specific app for each task, which justifies the 30% “tax” and the walled garden. If an AI agent can book a flight or order food by directly accessing the background APIs, the icon on the home screen disappears. The “app” stops being a destination and becomes an invisible tool. This not only threatens Apple’s revenue, but redefines mobile development towards an “API-first” ecosystem, where the graphical interface is irrelevant and competition is decided by agent efficiency, not UI design. Goodbye, privacy? And in this context, privacy could once again become the price of that “it’s so convenient to use a device like this” of these future mobiles. For an AI agent to be useful and function truly autonomously, it needs to know everything or almost everything about us. Our location, health, messages and of course the screen content at all times, among other things. The opacity of proprietary models will mean that we will never know what data is leaked to the cloud to “improve the service”, turning privacy into a variable controlled (once again) by the manufacturer. In Xataka | Microsoft has insisted on making Windows “agent.” His users have reminded him that they had not asked for it

Europe and Japan step on the accelerator of nuclear fusion and place the ball in the court of a strategic country: Spain

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Europe and Japan walk hand in hand towards nuclear fusion commercial. They have been working together for several years in the JT-60SA experimental reactorthe largest magnetic confinement fusion energy machine that currently exists. However, this is not the only project in which they collaborate. They are also fine-tuning the LIPAc linear particle accelerator (Linear IFMIF Prototype Accelerator or IFMIF Prototype Linear Accelerator). This machine resides in Rokkasho (Japan). After having undergone a very ambitious update, it is ready to begin the final phase that will conclude with its commissioning in 2027. Its purpose is to test the limits of particle beam physics to pave the way for future fusion reactors. Europe and Japan began developing this 36-meter-long particle accelerator in 2007 with the aim of validating the design of an IFMIF-type machine (International Fusion Materials Irradiation Facility) capable of acting as a neutron source. To achieve this, this device had to recreate the intense irradiation conditions that occur inside a fusion reactor. One of Europe’s most important contributions is a huge steel cryostat with magnetic shielding and a thermal shield that houses a powerful superconducting radio frequency system. This component serves to accelerate protons and deuterium nuclei until they reach a maximum energy of 9 MeV (megaelectronvolts), which will place them close to the high-energy neutrons that future commercial fusion reactors will produce. LIPAc is the precursor of IFMIF-DONES, which is already being built in Spain The knowledge that scientists hope to gain from LIPAc will be used in the development of IFMIF-DONES (International Fusion Materials Irradiation Facility DEMO-Oriented NEutron Source), that is already being built in Escúzar, a town in the province of Granada. The heart of this facility is a linear particle accelerator that will cost approximately 450 million euros, although the Government of Andalusia will provide half of this money. However, this is the cost of the accelerator; The entire IFMIF-DONES project will cost around 700 million euros. Spain will contribute half of this capital. IFMIF-DONES is one of the three fundamental pillars of the nuclear fusion edifice in whose construction the European Union is involved. The other two are ITER (International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor) and DEMO. The experimental nuclear fusion reactor that is currently being built in the French town of Cadarache aims to demonstrate that fusion at the scale that man can handle worksand also that it is profitable from an energy point of view. However, ITER does not aim to produce electricity. That will be the task of DEMO (DEMOnstration Power Plant), a facility that will take the technological advances that have been proven to work correctly at ITER and take them one step further to establish itself as the true precursor of commercial nuclear fusion reactors. However, without IFMIF-DONES there will be no DEMO, so right now Granada is the center of attention. The IFMIF-DONES linear accelerator will produce high-energy neutrons with the intensity and irradiation volume necessary to test candidate materials To fully understand the role of the IFMIF-DONES project, it is necessary to briefly review the fundamentals of nuclear fusion. One of the greatest challenges faced by technicians involved in the development of nuclear fusion reactors using magnetic confinement, such as ITER, is to recreate the conditions necessary for them to operate inside the vacuum chamber of these sophisticated machines. deuterium and tritium nuclei fuse. However, this is by no means all. When this reaction takes place, the fusion of a deuterium nucleus and another tritium nucleus triggers the production of a helium nucleus and a neutron that is ejected with an energy of about 14 MeV. The problem is that the neutron lacks a net electrical charge, so it cannot be confined inside the magnetic field which, however, does manage to retain the deuterium and tritium nuclei, which have a positive electrical charge. This is the reason why when it originates as a result of the nuclear fusion reaction, this neutron is ejected towards the walls of the vacuum chamber with enormous energy. This particle is very important because in practice it will be closely linked to the production of electrical energy in nuclear fusion reactors, but, at the same time, it represents a very aggressive form of radiation that can significantly degrade the materials used in the reactor. The components that will be most affected by the direct impact of high-energy neutrons and the most intense heat flow are the internal wall of the vacuum chamber and the blanket. The components that will be most affected by the direct impact of high-energy neutrons and the most intense heat flow are the inner wall of the vacuum chamber and the blanketwhich is a mantle that covers it and whose purpose is to regenerate the tritium that must be used as fuel in the nuclear fusion reaction. This is why it is crucial to develop new materials that are able to withstand the neutron flux and therefore ensure that the reactor will have a long operational life. This is, neither more nor less, the purpose of IFMIF-DONES. And to carry it out it is necessary to set up facilities designed to allow the technicians involved in the project evaluate the properties of candidate materials to intervene not only in DEMO, but also in future commercial nuclear fusion reactors. The mission of this project invites us to intuit what the heart of IFMIF-DONES is: a source capable of producing high-energy neutrons with the intensity and volume of irradiation necessary to test the candidate materials. And this neutron source will be nothing more than a linear particle accelerator that will help IFMIF-DONES scientists to test, validate and qualify the materials that in the medium term should reach future electric energy production plants through fusion. Image | Fusion for Energy More information | Fusion for Energy In Xataka | ITER has faced one of the great challenges of nuclear fusion: preventing plasma at 150 million ºC from destroying the reactor

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