Mobile Tech & Gadgets

an “invisible” galaxy made up almost 100% of dark matter

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The Universe continues to be that great unknown. Not only because of its vast immensity, but because human research and subsequent theories that explain its functioning continue to require tweaks and reformulations. we have seen it when calculating the distances between planets of the Solar System, the size of Jupiter either what is the training mechanism of planetary systems. Now, a research team from the University of Toronto has discovered to the strongest candidate for a “dark galaxy”, something that until now was only considered a possibility. The candidate. The study presents the discovery of CDG-2, an acronym that literally means Candidate Dark Galaxy 2. It is an object 300 million light years away, in the Perseus cluster, with a peculiarity: it is almost completely dominated by dark matter, with a minimal number of stars. Thus, between 99.94% and 99.98% of its total mass would be dark matter and it only delivers a light of “only” six million suns compared to the brightness of tens of billions of the Milky Way. Context. Galaxies are something like the Lego pieces that make up the universe and they all contain dark matter. The dark matter It is something scientifically fascinating: it is invisible, it does not emit or reflect light, but its gravitational influence was the scaffolding on which galaxies were formed and is what holds them together today. In the Milky Way, estimates suggest that between 65 and 90% of the mass is dark matter, depending on the model, but astronomy has always wondered if there were even more extreme galaxies. The “dark galaxies” were until now just a theoretical prediction. Why is it important. To begin with, because it empirically confirms what the theoretical models contemplated, but it has more implications: It opens a new way to detect galaxies from statistically significant groupings of globular clusterswhich serve as a trace. As a case study: the most probable hypothesis is that neighboring galaxies ripped away the gas necessary for star formation, leaving only the skeleton. It makes us look at its “twin” CDG-1 with different eyes. Detected previously, it could be a case of an even more extreme dark galaxy, possibly a pure dark matter halo. How they discovered it. The research team came across this galaxy in a striking way: looking for its shadow, since it is practically undetectable. Their fingerprints were four globular clusters, small dense concentrations of stars around the Perseus cluster. After analyzing its disposition with statistics and ruling out that its grouping was a matter of chance, they pointed the three most powerful telescopes available, Hubble, Euclid and Subaru, towards that region and created the image that evidenced its existence. Is, in the words of the main researcher Dayi Li, “the first galaxy detected solely through its population of globular clusters.” Image: NASA, ESA, Dayi Li (UToronto); Image Processing: Joseph DePasquale (STScI) Pending subjects. However, CDG-2 is still a candidate and not a confirmation, which is why it keeps its name. To confirm with certainty the mass of dark matter it would be necessary to measure the velocities of its stars or clusters, something technically very difficult with current technology due to how little they shine. It will be necessary to wait for James Webb and new Euclid observations to improve the image of this object to better define it or continue finding more dark galaxies like it hidden in the universe. It would require measuring the velocities of its stars or globular clusters, something technically very difficult given their extreme tenuity. The next few years, with James Webb and new observations of Euclid, will be crucial to refine the portrait of this object and track whether there are more galaxies like it hidden in the large clusters of the universe. In Xataka | A new “solar system” has just been discovered. There’s just one problem: it shouldn’t exist. In Xataka | We have been deceived by the distances of the Solar System: the closest neighbor to Neptune is Mercury Cover | POT

A plant was on the verge of extinction in the Mojave Desert. So they built a solar park on top

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The Mojave Desert is not only a paradise when it comes to filming movies, setting video games and name operating systems: It is also home to thousands of plant species that are accustomed to an extremely hostile climate. It is estimated that there are about 2,000 species and a very specific one is in danger of extinction. Until they decided to build one of the largest photovoltaic plants in the United States on top of it. The Gemini Solar Project. In short. The journal Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution revealed a few weeks ago the results of a curious study. The ‘threecorner milkvetch’ plant (which has a name for everything except a plant) went from 12 specimens in the Mojave Desert to 93. This plant was being evaluated for inclusion in the Endangered Species Act in the United States and not only has its number multiplied: the new plants are larger and produce more flowers. And they have “only” had to build one of the largest photovoltaic plants in America on top of it, next to Guanchoi in Chileto achieve it. Threecorner milkvetch. It is a creeping plant that has curious needs: it only grows in sandy soils of the Mojave Desert. However, it is dependent on rainfall because its seed remains dormant in the soil and only germinates and reproduces with favorable rainfall. In dry years, it remains completely unnoticed, waiting for a little rain. And it is so rare that the species remains under evaluation for status as threatened or endangered under U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service regulations. In the same desert there is another threatened species: the desert tortoise Gopherus agassizii. The habitat of the two species should be the last one on which it would be decided to build a photovoltaic plant, but there is the Gemini Solar Project. The plant Megaplant. When such an installation is to be carried out in the desert, a technique known as clearing and leveling is used. In essence, all vegetation is removed, the land is leveled and prepared for install the pillars of the solar panels. Not only is a lunar landscape created, but any type of latent seed beneath the surface, such as that of the threecorner milkvetch, is destroyed. However, the Gemini Solar Project’s approach was different. The company wanted the land because it is especially ‘fertile’ within the US to harvest sunlight, but concessions had to be made. One was to minimize the alteration of the habitat of both species to conserve the desert surface with all its biological resources, preserve the topsoil and adapt the facility to the natural relief. On the US Geological Survey website we can see photos of little turtles between the panels. Works. This is part of what we know as ‘ecovoltaics’, with a branch called ‘agrovoltaics’ that we have also talked about and that, although it can be used by companies as a facelift, it serves to unite energy activities with agricultural activities. In the study on the impact of the Gemini Solar Project and the evolution of the plant, researcher Tiffany Pereira discovered what we have mentioned: there were more plants and they were healthier. This showed that the energy company had done its part by not destroying the soil because the seeds had been able to germinate, but they found something else. The plants inside the installation evolved earlier than those outside it and grew not under the panels, but in the strips between the rows. This implies that they still need intense sunlight to mature. The yellow zone is where the Sun shines the most hours. The blue one is the stripe that varies depending on the position of the Sun. The red one is where direct light never shines. Okay, but then… what is the role of the panels in the improved evolution of these plants? The hypothesis used by the researchers is that the panels provide partial shade on the groundslowing down evaporation. We have already said that seeds are dormant until they have the necessary humidity conditions to germinate, and in this context, a more humid microclimate has allowed plants to grow more and produce more seeds. Not all the field is oregano. Now, like almost every scientific study, we look at the other side of the coin. The rainfall in recent years has been favorable and we will have to see what happens with periods of prolonged drought. In a few years we could talk about long-term effects. But, in addition, this absence of plants under the panels could indicate a possible loss of potential habitat in very humid years. In any case, Pereira’s study is not isolated. Other studies point to improvements in both the number of flowering plant species and pollinators in agrovoltaic installations in a state like Minnesota. AND in China there are also indicators that those photovoltaic plants in deserts is contributing to the moisture pocket construction in which plants can thrive more easily. As we said, it remains to be seen the impact of the panels on the creation of a “new” biodiversity in the long term, but for now, what is evident is that it is not necessary to raze land to build a photovoltaic plant. Images | DRI, Tiffany PereiraGemini Solar Project In Xatka | The biggest fiasco of solar energy is in the Nevada desert: it is useless and its promoter blames a Spanish company

Apple has been setting up a health system parallel to public health for years. The question is whether public health will do something about it.

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I haven’t worn a watch of any kind on my wrist for years. Partly for convenience, partly for not having another device to distract myself with. The paradox is that I find it more and more advisable to wear or give a smartwatch, precisely because of the leap they have made in monitoring our health in recent years. The other day, Dr. Miguel Ángel Cobos Gil, a prestigious Spanish cardiologist, told us at a press event that “the Apple Watch provides more parameters than anyone admitted to a coronary unit.” It made me think: we already have very reliable medical technology in our pockets, on our wrists and even in our ears. And now what? A parallel system to saturated healthcare Healthcare in Spain has just concluded a few days of strike in which they demand improvements in a system with problems: saturated primary care, insufficient personnel, underfinancing or territorial fragmentation are just a few. Spain is not the only one like this. Countries like the United Kingdom, Canada, Italy or Portugal are struggling with similar situations, and if we look at Latin America or Asia the photo even it gets more complicated. Doctor Miguel Ángel Cobos Gil at an Apple Health event in Madrid. It is no coincidence that Apple has spent years setting up a whole parallel health system through its best-selling devices. You can now take a medically approved EKG with Apple Watch In a few minutes, the iPhone notifies you if you have risk of falling when analyzing how you walkand AirPods are increasingly looking more like a smart sonotone. Apple is the one that is taking the most solid and visible steps, but it is not the only one. Samsung integrates teleconsultations, a game to detect Alzheimer’sbooking diagnostic tests and ordering medications at Samsung Health —starting with Indiawhich is no coincidence—; Huawei gives you ten health parameters in a single gesture with its Watch 5; Google bets on a medical coach with AI on top of Fitbit and Pixel Watch data. Almost the entire tech sector is looking at the same place. Useful technology to help us with our health is already here. The problem is how to make all that data that our devices give us use for something in a collapsed public system. Your doctor doesn’t have time to look at the data on your watch And now we have been in this house for ten years: We have a lot of information about preventing diseases and devices that can help us do so. However, there is still no effective system to address it. Cobos Gil summed it up bluntly: “urgent care works.” When something really goes wrong, the system responds. The problem is before, in that period of time where an asymptomatic disease could be detected and treated with a change in habits or a simple medication, but where the family doctor cannot dedicate fifteen minutes to you if he does not see something serious or actionable. Hypertension doesn’t hurt. Atrial fibrillation does not warn. Apple Watch possible hypertension alert system And this is exactly where technology comes in—or should come in—. A smartwatch does not sleep, has no waiting list and does not need you to go see it: it passively monitors whenever you wear it, accumulates months of data and notifies you when it detects an anomaly. Cobos Gil mentioned something that illustrates the difference well: a conventional cardiac holter monitor must be taken for about 24 or 48 hours, and many times it does not capture anything because the arrhythmia does not appear in that time window. With three months of data from the Apple Watch, he says he’s gotten diagnostic information he otherwise wouldn’t have had, and has even “had to anticoagulate patients who were cleared by a Holter monitor.” This gap is especially relevant for the older population, especially if they live alone. Spain is aging fast and a silent heart attack, a fall, or an arrhythmia that is accelerating are situations in which the time between the event and medical attention is everything, and in which not having a family member or caregiver nearby—the child in another city, the grandchildren in another country—creates a very vulnerable situation for these people. These are situations that happen. In Applesfera we have just told the case of a lady who suffered a fall due to an epileptic attack in Torremolinos and his Apple Watch helped everything end in a scare. The striking thing about this is that hospitals already do this type of monitoring in extreme cases. When a modern pacemaker or defibrillator is implanted, the hospital monitors the patient remotely and can intervene if something goes wrong. A watch like the Watch takes that logic from the hospital to home: it allows a son in Madrid to see in real time if his mother’s heart in a town in Teruel is beating strangely, or to receive an alert if she has fallen and hasn’t gotten up. It is not medicine of the future. It is medicine of the present waiting for the system to learn to incorporate it. The limit that no one has set Tim Cook at WWDC 24 What Apple, Samsung, Huawei or Google have built so far is the beginning. Apple has been working for years on non-invasive blood glucose monitoring —without being punctured, through optical spectroscopy—and the most solid rumors suggest that could come to the Apple Watch in 2027 or 2028. Before that, I’m pretty sure we’ll see an AI-powered medical assistant built into the Health app — known internally as Mulberry Project— trained with your real clinical data. Tim Cook has been repeating for years that the Apple’s greatest contribution to humanity will be in healthcare. What it doesn’t say is exactly how far. Because the question that these devices do not answer is one that seems very important to me: Where do they set the limit for themselves, and who sets it for them from the outside? Early detection of … Read more

Anthropic releases a new feature to download all your memory to leave ChatGPT and switch to Claude

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This weekend Anthropic has gone from being an AI used by the Pentagon, other US agencies and having partners such as Microsoft or Amazon to total ostracism: from Friday at 5:01 p.m. It is classified as a “risk to the supply chain”. Total veto, a serious threat to the survival of a company valued at 380,000 million dollars and also a challenge for those entities that in less than six months will have to transition to another alternative. The Pentagon itself He already has an agreement with OpenAI to succeed him. Anthropic’s situation is delicate to say the least serving its strategic clients and alliances, something essential to continue growing in the tough battle of intelligence. The company led by Dario Amodei, which was firm in its principles when expressing its concern about the use of artificial intelligence for mass civil surveillance and the development of weapons capable of firing without human intervention, has already announced that he will contestbut for now they look rough. He only has the civil…in every sense, because Claude has risen to number 1 for free downloads in the App Store in the United States, as reported by CNBC. Because yes, this tug of war with the US government has brought an increase in the popularity of Claude, less known than other alternatives such as ChatGPT or Gemini. On the other hand, this movement in which the US Administration has said goodbye to Anthropic in favor of OpenAI also has a reading in which Claude wins: the terms of the agreement and how it affects ChatGPT users. Anthropic Coup de Effect. So Anthropic has been taken out of the sleeve a new feature to facilitate the transition from other AI models, such as ChatGPT or Gemini, to Claude. Because if you have been using ChatGPT for a while for example and already knows youstarting from scratch is a step backwards in every sense. The new feature allows you to import all your memory from other models into Claude so that it immediately knows everything about you (everything that your previous AI already knew). You no longer start from scratch. How to download your memory and load it in Claude. To incorporate your preferences and context from other AI providers into Claude you have to do two steps: Copy and paste the prompt below into the AI ​​you normally use, like Gemini or ChatGPT: I’m moving to another service and need to export my data. List every memory you have stored about me, as well as any context you’ve learned about me from past conversations. Output everything in a single code block so I can easily copy it. Format each entry as: (date saved, if available) – memory content. Make sure to cover all of the following — preserve my words verbatim where possible: Instructions I’ve given you about how to respond (tone, format, style, ‘always do X’, ‘never do Y’). Personal details: name, location, job, family, interests. Projects, goals, and recurring topics. Tools, languages, and frameworks I use. Preferences and corrections I’ve made to your behavior. Any other stored context not covered above. Do not summarize, group, or omit any entries. The model will return everything it knows about you in a block of text, which you have to copy and paste later into Claude. Go to ‘Settings‘ > ‘Capabilities‘and there in Import Memorypaste the answer. Then, tap ‘Add to memory’. From that moment on, Claude already knows what your previous AI knew. It has small print. This is a feature for users on a paid plan (Pro, Max, Team or Enterprise). If you are on the free version, at most you will only be able to have that context in that conversation, but not permanently. In short: the import is free as a manual process, but for Claude to remember it permanently a payment plan is required. In Xataka | Claude: 23 functions and some tricks to get the most out of this artificial intelligence In Xataka | Anthropic and OpenAI have developed AI. The US Pentagon is showing you who really owns it

If your renovation is a pain, think about the house that cost 120 times more than its original cost: a masterpiece

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Renovate a house It is usually an exhausting experience: budgets that skyrocket, structural unforeseen events, provisional solutions that end up being permanent. Now imagine that this home is not just any apartment, but one of the great icons of the 20th century, visited by millions of people and examined to the millimeter by historians, engineers and conservators. Then the reform stops being a domestic problem and becomes a continuous battle against time. Thus an icon was born. The assignment that changed a career The year was 1934 when Edgar J. Kaufmann commissioned Frank Lloyd Wright a weekend house next to a waterfall in Bear RunPennsylvania. The architect then took an unprecedented decision: He decided not to look at the water from afar, but to literally build on it. The work, built between 1936 and 1938, almost immediately became in a manifesto of organic architecture: concrete terraces that float over the waterfall, local stone walls that sprout from the rock, spaces that open to the forest as if the house were an extension of the landscape. By January 1938 he already occupied the same cover of time and critics proclaimed it one of the great masterpieces in the history of architecture, one capable of reconcile modernity and nature in an unforgettable image. It happens that there is always a “but” in a work, and one like this was no different. Yes. That perfect image had a disproportionate price from day one. The original cost exceeded the planned budget almost four times and reached approximately $155,000 of the time, a figure equivalent to about 3.3/3.5 million current dollars. Added to this were Wright’s own fees and the expenses derived from a complex execution in a unique but remote environment, so that the project was born already financially stressed. What should be a weekend country house became a total commitment, technical and economic, to materialize a radical vision. And we come to the material that has given the work its name, although it almost took everything away. The gesture that made Fallingwater world famous, its large columnless cantilevers over the waterfall, was also its Achilles heel. During the work, the engineer in charge of concrete warned that only eight reinforcing bars had been placed on a main beam and that, for a span of that length, it should have been duplicated steel. However, Wright rejection the objections, arguing that adding more reinforcement would damage the structure and demanding absolute confidence in their judgment. The contractor, without warning, decided to increase the steel anyway. Even so, when removing the formwork the first cantilever deformed more than four centimeters and was left with a permanent arrow that today translates into a visible slope close to two degrees. And the cracks came before inhabiting it The problems were neither theoretical nor late. Even before the Kaufmann family moved in in 1937, there were already documented leaks and cracks on the concrete parapets. As the decades passed, some balconies began to sink. more than 20 centimeters with respect to its original position, and in the nineties engineers found that the cantilevers they had failed technically and required urgent reinforcements to avoid greater risk. The house that seemed to defy gravity rested on a more fragile balance than the iconic photograph suggested. If the waterfall was the soul of the project, the rain and snow were its nightmare. Flat roofs, terraces that function as roofs for lower rooms and masonry walls holes filled with rubble They made it easier for water to find invisible paths into the interior. So much so that since the 1940s the house was nicknamed with irony by its owners for the number of buckets needed to collect leaks, and almost ninety years later an intervention of 7 million dollars intended to seal covers, inject more than a dozen tons of grout on the walls and improve waterproofing. It didn’t matter the crazy price that had been used previously, many leaks they returned with time. The overhang of the living room seen from the bridge leading to the house At the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st, a structural restoration was undertaken that would be decisive: the beams were drilled and introduced steel cables post-tensioned to “pull” the concrete and recover part of its original position. That operation prevented the sinking will progressbut it did not eliminate the need for ongoing maintenance. To give us an idea, from 1937 to today, the preservation of Fallingwater has already exceeded 19 million dollars, a figure multiplied by about 120 times the initial cost of construction and which illustrates the extent to which keeping the icon standing has been more expensive than its own creation. In 1963 the Kaufmann family donated the house to the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy, which opened it to the public the following year. Since then, more than 6 million of people have visited it, and its status as a National Historical Monument and UNESCO World Heritage Site consolidated his status as one of the masterpieces of the 20th century. Paradoxically, the same audacity that generated the cracks, deformations and leaks is what gave it its symbolic force: Fallingwater, or The Falling House, embodies the rhetoric of the American dream of merging with nature and dominating it at the same time, even when that ambition required paying an enormous structural and economic price. The history of this icon shows that architectural genius is not exempt material risk. Wright’s possibly exaggerated authorship, his conviction towards engineers and contractors, and his willingness to take concrete further of prudent limitsproduced a work that was both sublime and problematic. If you will, it is also an imperfect building that has needed decades of disagreements, revisions and reinforcements to remain standing. And precisely for that reason, more than a frozen postcard over a waterfall, Fallingwater It is proof that great works are born from the tension between vision and reality, and that even masterpieces can always be, literally, at the edge of the … Read more

I have tried all the browsers with AI on the market and the one that works best is the one that started the worst: Dia

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I started using Arc in the summer of 2024. I was slow to get into it (I had tried it before and found it too capricious, too determined to teach me how to sail when I already knew) but when I arrived, I really arrived. Vertical tabs. The spaces. The way he organized the digital day without me having to think about it too much. Arc to me was not just a browser: it was a work environment. And then The Browser Company Dia announced. I remember it with some annoyance. Josh Miller, the company’s CEO, uploaded a video talking about “something new,” and Arc was in “minimal maintenance,” a euphemism for not saying the word “abandonment.” The Arc community complained, rightly so, and I joined the discontent. They had built something great and threw it overboard at the first opportunity to pursue the AI ​​chimera. Still, I tried Dia as soon as I could and wrote about it: You opened Dia and saw Chrome. Chrome with better typography, Chrome with more careful animations, but Chrome nonetheless. No split tabs, no gaps, no anything that had made Arc great. Just a chatbot in the sidebar. I closed it and went back to Arc, which continued to work despite the abandonment warnings, until I started trying other AI-based browsers. Months passed and Dia was updated, week by week, with a striking cadence. And at some point I started to notice something: the things I missed were coming backsometimes even improved. First the vertical tabs, which Arc had popularized and which Chrome has just announced that it will also adopt, something that says a lot about who sets the pace in browser design. Then the groups of eyelashes, with that aesthetic care that has always been a trademark of the house and now goes further than before. Other browsers already have this feature, but “not like this.” Recently, the split viewwhich I have been using for years in Arc and which is one of those functions that, once you have it, you don’t understand how you navigated without it: Simultaneous view of several tabs in a single window. Split tab view to display multiple tabs in a single window. Image: Xataka. Tab groups have even partly replaced my use of favorites. You can create them by hand or see how they are automatically grouped and renamed when you open multiple tabs from the same place. Its design and user experience are fantastic. Image: Xataka. The set favorites are still there. Tabs in the sidebar also ended up coming to Dia. And between both blocks, the groups of tabs. Image: Xataka. There is a pattern in The Browser Company that you should have already learned with Arc: they release something that seems incomplete, almost “psché”, and then they improve it until you can’t put it down anymore. It took me two tries to fall in love with Arc. Something similar has happened with Dia, only the process has been longer and the reconciliation more gradual. And that boss now has to live with a new owner, because since September This company was bought by Atlassianwhich wants to make Dia the reference for working with AI. Nothing has changed at the moment on a day-to-day basis (pun intended) of the browser. What Dia has done smartly (and differently than Arc) is start almost from scratch and give up all the weirdness. Arc asked you to adapt to it, to learn its logic, to assume its curve. And Dia does exactly the opposite: she is very Chromiumvery familiar, very little foreign to anyone coming from Chrome and not as rigid as Arc. That takes a toll: some of Arc’s more radical ideas have been lost in the transition, but it also means it doesn’t create as much friction for the average user. You open Dia and browse. There is no twenty-minute tutorial on how to think about tabs, which is something that penalized the growth of Arc: those of us who used it loved it, but many people left when they saw that they did not understand the proposal. The weight is what catches my attention the most on the negative side: it’s around gigabyte, which is an outrage for a browser. And there is no mobile version yet. That hurts more, because it means the experience is split between devices, and the consistency Arc was trying to offer across platforms doesn’t yet exist on Dia. I hope they don’t take long. In theory it will arrive this year. Regarding AI, it is not what I use the most. Of course I use Claude or Gemini, I mean Dia’s chatbot sidebar. It’s not something I used on Dia nor have I used much on Neon, Atlas or Comet, the other three that I’ve tested in some depth. The chat in the sidebar is a good complement, I can ask it something about the tab I have open, ask it to summarize several at once, respond with context of what I am reading; but it is not the focus of my browsing experience. All three browsers conveyed at their launch that AI would change everything, and reality is more modest– It’s useful, sometimes very useful, but it doesn’t transform your workflow in the same way that a good tab design does. At least in my experience. I have tested more browsers that leverage AI for their value proposition. And they all have their strong points: Comet It is very fast and efficient searching for information in real time. Atlas is very capable when you need to systematically extract data from multiple pages, but none have the level of care in the experience that Dia has. Opera Neon is a browser built from the ground up for the AI ​​era, with much more than a well-placed chatbot. But it’s not just that they work. Dia feels good. There is something in the design, in the animations, in how the groups of tabs are constructed, that remains … Read more

best MediaMarkt deals on technology and entertainment, today March 1

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This has been an especially busy week due to the launch of some Samsung devices and the number of offers that MediaMarkt has right now. Unless you decide to renew any of your Samsung Days and Techmanía campaigns, all these offers They will end next March 3so in this article we have put together the best deals that will be available until then. Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra by 1,449 eurosthe top mobile phone of the new generation S26. Marshall Emberton II by 99 eurosa portable speaker with a beautiful retro design. Samsung Galaxy Buds4 by 161.10 euros When registering in the store, the new Samsung headphones with their first discount. nintendo switch 2 by 459 eurosthe console along with a gift video game. LG 86QNED82A6B by 999 eurosa huge television with a more reasonable price. Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra Although MediaMarkt (and other stores) have the same campaign as Samsung to buy the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra 512 GB at the price of 256 GB (1,449 euros), Samsung itself also has it for 1,449 eurosalthough in this case it offers other discounts and additional gifts that may interest you more: Extra discount of 50 euros paying with Bizum or Samsung Pay. Free color protective case when using the REGALOS26 coupon. Gift charger when consulting with an expert in the store chat. Savings of up to 775 euros by handing over your old smartphone, tablet or smartwatch. He Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra It is the most attractive mobile phone of the new generation, since it incorporates new features such as privacy screen for the gossips to look at. It also comes with the latest and most powerful Qualcomm processor and its battery supports a 60W fast charging. Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra (512GB) The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Marshall Emberton II Marshall speakers are very attractive due to their retro design, and although many of them have somewhat high prices, we usually see others with good discounts. MediaMarkt, for example, has the Marshall Emberton II by 99 euros instead of 149 euros and stands out mainly for its battery of up to 30 hours of use, for the weight of only 0.7 kg and because it offers good audio power. The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Samsung Galaxy Buds4 Along with the new Samsung phones, the brand’s new headphones have also been announced. The Samsung Galaxy Buds4 can be purchased for 161.10 euros when registering with MediaMarkt. We are talking about headphones that offer compatibility with the SSC-UHQ codec for listen to music without losswhich have active noise cancellation and offer a good autonomy of up to 30 hours. The price could vary. We earn commission from these links nintendo switch 2 If you didn’t already have one nintendo switch 2 and you were waiting for it to receive new discounts, be very careful with the pack that MediaMarkt has put together. By 459 eurosthe store right now is giving away the ‘Kirby Air Riders‘, a driving video game that is especially interesting because of how fun it is. If you prefer, this same gift is also available with the console pack with ‘Mario Kart World’, whose price in this case is 499 euros. Nintendo Switch 2 + Kirby Air Riders The price could vary. We earn commission from these links LG 86QNED82A6B There is little left until the World Cup, so if you are thinking of buying a huge television to enjoy each game to the fullest, MediaMarkt right now has the LG 86QNED82A6B for 999 euros. And be very careful because it is a TV of no less than 86 inches which also incorporates a QLED panel and multi-screen function to view several contents at the same time. LG 86QNED82A6B (86 inches) 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 | MediaMarkt and Compradicción (header), Samsung, Marshall, Nintendo, LG In Xataka | The best mobile phones, we have tested them and here are their analyzes In Xataka | Best televisions in quality price. Which one to buy and seven recommended 4K smart TVs

If the question is “how did I meet your mother,” this graph reveals how much the answer has changed since 1930

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Allow me an indiscreet question if you have a partner: how did you meet? A quick review around me gives me some answers like “class”, also others like “common friends” and in many cases Tinder would come to the fore. Well, and I also know of some cases of Twitter or even forum sharing. I am a millennial and so is the majority of my environment. If I asked this same question to my mother or if I asked it to my grandmother (if she were alive), I might find the same answers, but the proportions would change. However, for 20 years there has been one way of dating that overwhelmingly prevails over the rest, considering “success” as having a partner: internet wins by a landslide. Although like me you can do that quick review of your environment, there is someone who has done it more and better (statistically speaking): a team from Stanford University has repeated this study titled “How the couples meet and stay together” for several years that, although you can read, James Eagle has turned it into a visual resource to analyze how this modus operandi of flirting has changed over time: a very revealing one minute video. This video covers almost a century of dating habits: from 1930 to 2024 and it includes classic options such as friends, family, in a bar, at work, neighbors, at university or school, at church and of course, on the internet. Obviously, in the 1930s and subsequent decades, the Online option was a huge zero. But be careful because in 1981 it started timidly with 0.01%. In the 30s, the best way to flirt was for your cousin to introduce you to your future partner (followed by friends and school): the family as a matchmaker which lasted until 1944, at which time it was superseded by Friendships. As leisure options begin to become popular and women enter the workforce, we see how “at work” or “in a bar” gain ground until they are able to share the podium with your friends back in the 80s. How the democratization of the internet changed dating The 90s is a critical moment: online begins a meteoric rise that consolidates it as the most infallible method to find a partner in 2011, displacing those eternal friendships that have been helping us flirt since time immemorial. As striking as the rise and total consolidation of the internet is the drastic fall of all other options: in the last 10 years we have gone from only friendships holding the type with a 20% share to that in 2024, the year of the end of video, flirting online is consolidated as the quintessential method with more than 60% of the pie. Being introduced to your partner by your colleagues happens in only one in 10 cases, something that makes sense in an increasingly individualistic society, which complicates even making new friends. If you are a single person, it is clear that apps are the place to find dates, according to this study. However, dating apps are no longer as convincing, especially to new generations: this Evenbrite report dating back to 2024 reveals how Gen Z and millennials are starting to get tired of the format. Because although they continue to flirt online, it’s not like before: They prefer to ask for Instagram than to ask for a date by Tinder. Fear of “public failure” is killing traditional flirting. However, the Internet as a dating method remains stronger than ever: because before apps existed, we were already dating in the most unexpected places. Without going any further, in the mythical Terra chat. In Xataka | Tinder has understood something uncomfortable: young people are alone and no longer want to flirt like before In Xataka | The world is experiencing a matchmaking crisis. 5,000 students and an algorithm are experimenting to fix it Cover | James Eagle

When a mountaineer experiences extreme experiences on the mountain, his brain begins to imagine something: a “third man”

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Not all adventures have to be successfully resolved to become epic. It happened with what is known as Imperial Transantarcticthe expedition that left England in August 1914 under the orders of explorer Ernest Shackleton with an enormous purpose and not for the faint of heart: cross Antarcticafrom Vahsel in the Weddell Sea to Ross Island at the other end. Due to the harsh conditions at the South Pole, the ship Endurance ended up trapped between ice and Shackleton saw how his plans became complicated until they dragged him into a real feat that took his endurance and that of his colleagues to a limit level only achievable between icebergs, glacial temperatures and extreme exhaustion. The explorer’s feat also served something that he probably did not even suspect: coining the expression “third man factor or syndrome”. Well known by mountaineers and which is, even today, a fascinating phenomenon. “Who is the third person walking beside you?” Ernest Shackleton (left) with Robert Falcon Scott and Edward Wilson in Antarctica, 1902. The phenomenon was described by Shackleton when he recalled the very hard two and a half days during which he advanced—along with Frank Worseley and Tom Cream—towards a whaling station located on the northern coast of South Georgia. The group walked 36 long hours between terrible conditions, with hardly any material and avoiding death. On their shoulders they also carried the responsibility of having to help the rest of their companions from the ill-fated Imperial Transantarctic. Only the three of them, Ernest, Frank and Tom, wandered through the desolate Antarctica, although if someone had asked them how many people made up that desperate entourage, they would probably have answered something different: that with them was another person, a fourth member, nameless, faceless… but undeniable. “I know that during that long and stormy march over nameless mountains and glaciers, it often seemed to me that there were four of us, not three,” the explorer wrote. That common feeling, precise Guardianoverwhelmed the three men who undertook the journey: the presence of a “fourth” that accompanied them. Such an expression must have surprised the poet. T. S. Eliotwho some time later, in 1922, after reading Shackleton’s story, picked up the idea to capture it in his popular poem The Waste Land: “Who is the third one who always walks by your side? When I count, there is only you and me together, but when I look ahead on the white road there is always another walking at your side.” Eliot’s license, which changed Shackleton’s “fourth” man for a “third” was successful and since then we usually talk about the “third man syndrome” to refer to that: the feeling of a ghost companion, a presence that in a way comforts people who face a borderline sensation. Shackleton was not the only one to describe it. Several years after his death, in 1933, Frank SmytheBritish and explorer like him, recounted an experience similar while trying to summit Mount Everest. “The whole time I was climbing alone I had the strong feeling that I was accompanied by a second person. It was so strong that completely eliminated all the loneliness I might otherwise have felt,” the explorer wrote in his diary. So vivid was the sensation that, Smythe explains, at one point during the ascent he searched in his pocket, took out a piece of Kendal Mint Cakebroke it and turned to offer one of the halves to that companion who felt so close. He didn’t see anyone, of course. You don’t have to go back that far in time. Not that far. The Madrid mountaineer Fernando Garrido wrote in his notebook the feeling that came over him when, at the beginning of 1986, he spent more than two months on the lonely summit of the Aconcaguaat almost 7,000 meters, to achieve the altitude survival record. “Today, like other times, I woke up with the feeling that there was someone outsidenext to the store. Have you spent the night there? Why didn’t he call me to let him in? (…) —said the mountaineer in statements collected for him The Confidential—He’s my brother, my brother Javier! Javi, wake up, come on, wake up! I turn it towards me. “He is dead, his head is a skull.” “A solid science” A good handful of articles and references have been written about the phenomenon, some in media within the reach of Guardian either NPRand in 2008 the writer John Geiger dedicated a monographic book to him, ‘The Third Man Factor: Surviving the Impossible’ after spending five years tracking down similar stories. It is more complicated than collecting experiences, however, to give them a plausible explanation. Years ago, during a chat with the journalist NPR’s Guy Raz, Geiger reported that there are those who turn to spirituality, although he insists that the syndrome can be explained by “a solid science”. “Many skeptics and non-believers have had this experience and attribute it to other causes,” claims the author, who in his volume even includes the case of a 9/11 survivor. In 2009 Geiger pointed out explanations such as biochemical reactions or simply failures in brain activity. “If we understand that the third man factor is part of us, like adrenaline is… then we can access it more easily. It is not a hallucination in the sense that hallucinations are disordered. This is a very useful and orderly guide,” he reflected. Years ago, researchers Ben Alderson-Day and David Smailes commented on the phenomenon and they explained that “strong feelings of presence” do not occur only in dramatic circumstances. Cases have been recorded after bereavement, during sleep paralysis or in cases of neurological disorders, such as Parkinson’s disease or brain damage. “The different contexts in which they occur give us some clues about what could be happening,” they say. “Understanding more about how and why felt presences occur has the potential to tell us many things about ourselves: how we react under intense mental or physical stress, how we deal with danger and threat, … Read more

South Korea has had the most catastrophic birth rate in the world for years. And now it has finally managed to grow

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For a few years now, talking about demographics in South Korea has made it necessary to first take out a clinex package. Despite all his attempts (and there have been not a few) the country seemed condemned to suffer an uncontrollable ‘bleed’ of birth rates and see the seams of its economy tighten. It may sound exaggerated, but it is good to remember that he said goodbye to 2024 by declaring “super aged” and that there are academics who warn that the nation is emptying (literally). With that backdrop, Seoul has started 2026 with a positive fact: wins babies. And it also does so for the second consecutive year. The big question that arises now is… Are we facing a change in trend or just a mirage? The figure: 254,457. It is provisional data (the definitio will not arrive until the summer), but even so it has arrived like manna in a country accustomed to every piece of news about demographics involving a national drama. Last year South Korea registered 254,457 birthsa good balance no matter where you look at it. To begin with because it means 6.8% more that in 2024 and leaves the largest percentage increase since 2007; but those are only two of the possible readings. More babies per woman. Another interesting reading is the one that tells us about the “fertility rate”, the average number of babies that (at a statistical level) a woman is expected to have throughout her reproductive life. A few years ago that indicator plummeted to 0.72very far from the “replacement rate” (2.1 children per woman) that allows societies to remain stable. The data is still below that red line, but at least it has grown: in 2025 it passed from 0.75 to 0.8. Not only that. Reuters remember that the South Korean Government had optimistic estimates that suggested that this rate would grow to 0.75 in 2025 and 0.8 in 2026, which appears to be recovering positions faster than expected. In Seoul the trend is even more pronounced. There the indicator rose 8.9%, going from 0.53 to 0.63. The data is still very poor and they are far away to solve the problem that Korea has, but they suggest a change of cycle. Breaking the bad streak. That the birth rate is increasing in South Korea is news, but it is even more so if (as is the case) that growth is maintained for two years. In 2024 the country has already registered a positive fact (breaking up with eight exercises of consecutive falls) that now invites us to think about whether it has really found the right way to encourage its young people to have more offspring. Of course, the country has invested time, efforts and especially economic resources in that objective, in which it is played from the social sustainability and the march of his industry to issues as relevant as national defense. More weddings, more babies. 2025 has not only been a good year in maternity hospitals. It has also been for the wedding planners. Marriages increased by 8.1% in 2025, reinforcing the 14.8% rebound already recorded in 2024. This is good news because, in a conservative society like South Korea (the percentage of births outside of marriage It’s surprisingly low.), weddings are often considered an early indicator of a rebound in birth rates. Trend or mirage? That’s the million dollar question. That South Korea has been trying to activate its birth rate for years is undeniable, as is the fact that it has invested large resources in this effort and that they have been involved in the effort since the public institutions to the business world. However, there are other factors at play that suggest that the recent growth in the South Korean birth rate could be more circumstantial than structural. That is to say, in reality we would be facing a kind of demographic ‘mirage’. The hangover of the pandemic. When explaining the phenomenon, there are those who point to the influence of the pandemic. Not so much in the birth rate itself as in marriages. It is true that more South Koreans are getting tired and that this indicator will probably influence the birth rate in the coming years, but it is also true that many couples had to postpone their plans during the pandemic. “The number of marriages has increased for 21 consecutive months, from April 2024 to December last year, as couples who had delayed their marriages due to COVID-19 have tied the knot,” recognize Park Hyun-jung, director of the government office that analyzes population trends. He himself admits that today it is very difficult to establish a clear “correlation” between government policies and improved birth rates. A demographic with ‘echo’. There are those who point out, however, another factor that would be directly influencing South Korean demographics: history. The explanation I broke it down Rapahel Rashid recently in Guardian and provides an alternative theory. More babies have been born in the South Korea of ​​2024 or 2025 simply because the same thing already happened in the Korea of ​​30 years ago. To be more precise, more or less during the first half of the 1990s (1991-1995) there was a peak of around 3.6 million of babies who today enter their thirties and begin to become parents themselves. Reviewing history. We explain ourselves. Paradoxical as it may be, in the 1950s and 1960s Korea had a very different problem than today: a very high fertility rate which led authorities to launch family planning programs. The objective: guarantee the country’s recovery after the war. The message that was launched was very simple: have fewer children (two, one) and guarantee them a better life. It worked so well that by the early 1980s the fertility rate had fallen below the replacement margin and Seoul decided change course. By doing so, it favored the rebound that would now be heating up the birth rate. According to that theory, what we see today is actually a … Read more

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