Science also begins to study the effect of art and culture

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“Ah, a lot of gym. But it works the brain a little too.” When Shakira uttered this phrase, immediately converted into a global meme thanks to her session with Bizarrap, she certainly did not intend to lay the foundations for a new scientific hypothesis about aging. And yet, in the midst of the era of biohackinglongevity supplements and timed wellness routines, a recent British study has just put the focus exactly there: on the brain, emotions and culture. We have been hearing for years that the secret to aging gracefully involves count grams of protein, lift weights, nail eight hours of sleep, avoid glucose spikes and of course reach the sacrosanct 10,000 steps a day. Longevity has become a cocktail of science, aesthetic obsession and multi-billion dollar industry. However, a team of researchers from University College London (UCL) has put an unexpected ingredient in the shaker: visiting museums, getting lost in a good book or vibrating at a concert also tangibly influences how our body ages. The investigation, published in the scientific journal Innovation in Aginganalyzed data from 3,556 British adults over 50 years of age. Pulling the thread of the English Longitudinal Study of Aging (ELSA)—one of the most ambitious European projects on the subject—scientists crossed two seemingly unconnected worlds: cultural habits and physical biomarkers. On the one hand, they recorded how often these people went to the theater, visited galleries, listened to music, danced or painted. On the other hand, they measured their biological clock through blood tests and epigenetic data. The main conclusion was that those who participated in cultural activities at least once a week showed biological aging approximately 4% slower than those who only carried out this type of activity a few times a year. Furthermore, according to one of the indicators used by the team, the most culturally involved people had a biological age close to one year younger than the least culturally active participants. Professor Daisy Fancourt, lead author of the study, explained in the UCL statement that the results suggest that “artistic and cultural activities should be considered beneficial health behaviors, similar to physical activity.” The museum is not a magic pill It is advisable to curb your enthusiasm: the study does not say that reading Tolstoy will take away your wrinkles or that an exhibition replaces a good cardio session. Nor does it guarantee that listening to Clara Schumann automatically lengthens your life. What is evident is a strong correlation. People who often participate in cultural activities have better aging indicators, but correlation does not imply causation. As I well remembered Guardianmany experts insist that this type of research should be interpreted with caution. People who frequently consume culture also tend to share other factors: higher educational levels, higher incomes, less financial stress, healthier lifestyles, and a stronger emotional support network. Although the authors adjusted the statistics to isolate variables such as smoking, previous physical exercise or socioeconomic status, cleaning the equation of all confounding factors is an almost impossible task. Still, the findings dovetail perfectly with an increasingly robust line of science that underscores the biological impact of emotional health and social connectedness. According to the magazine Healththe secret is not in the museum or the book itself, but in what happens inside us when we enjoy them: stress is reduced, isolation decreases, the brain is stimulated, we regulate our emotions better and we receive a good shot of dopamine. Art would not cure by itself, but it would trigger physiological processes that do stop biological deterioration. And that, without a doubt, changes the terms of the conversation. Beyond muscle and metabolism Perhaps the truly revolutionary thing about this study is not that “4% slower”, but the paradigm shift it puts on the table. We have been understanding healthy aging for decades almost exclusively through physical parameters: diet, sweat and cardiovascular prevention. All of that remains essential. In fact, the study itself does not at any point question the benefits of physical exercise. But contemporary science is embracing a broader idea: aging is not just a metabolic or muscular process. It is an emotional, mental and deeply social process. Concepts as the “cognitive reserve” —the protective shield that the brain creates against deterioration thanks to continuous intellectual stimulation— are already common in neuroscience. Learning, having stimulating talks or being impacted by a work of art strengthen that shield. At the same time, disciplines such as psychoimmunology they are teaching us how loneliness, chronic stress or depression punish the body through inflammation and hormonal imbalances. Social isolation is already a major cardiovascular risk factor. This is where culture jumps out of the drawer of mere “entertainment” to reveal itself as a key tool for physiological well-being. The interesting thing is that the study does not talk about extraordinary habits or impossible routines. It talks about everyday practices such as reading a few pages before going to sleep, listening to music on the way to work, commenting on a movie after the cinema and going to an exhibition on any given Sunday. Small cultural gestures that, according to this line of research, could have more biological impact than it seemed. In fact, in the UK this has already jumped from theory to practice. The British health system has long been promoting “social prescription” (social prescribing), a strategy where doctors refer patients to community and cultural activities as a complement to traditional medicine. Reading groups, art workshops, choirs or gardening are prescribed to combat anxiety, cognitive decline or depression in older people. Daisy Fancourt herself is a pioneer in this field, documenting in his book Art Cure how art tangibly intervenes in physical and mental health. The antidote to the stress of hyper-optimization That this study has gone viral reveals something deeply contemporary: collective exhaustion in the face of the tyranny of productive well-being. Today, wanting to live longer seems too similar to an endless spreadsheet– Measure steps, macronutrients, heart rate, REM sleep, and ice water immersion. In such a gridded panorama, … Read more

In 1910, a comet approached Earth. And half of Spain panicked when they believed that she would die from poisoning.

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In 1908, while reviewing the spectroscopic analysis of the tail of a comet, astronomer Daniel Walter Morehouse realized that it was full of toxic gases (such as cyanogen). The publication of the discovery made half of humanity’s hair stand on end. Above all, because there were just two years left until the Earth crossed paths with the largest known comet: the Halley. Plus, it was very close. Every year, between April 19 and May 28, our planet crosses the trail that Halley has left in its wake over the last few million years. This is what we know as the Eta Aquarids: a shower of very fast stars that peaks this year on the early mornings of May 5 and 6. In 1910, we encountered the comet on May 18. Our grandparents could almost touch it with the tips of their fingers. And that’s where the problems began. As explained Pedro Ruiz-Castell, Ignacio Suay-Matallana and Juan Marcos Bonet A few years ago, the vast majority of astronomers “seemed to be clear that this presence did not pose a danger to the visit of the comet. After all, “the tail of the comet was much less dense than the most perfect vacuum that could be produced in the laboratory”, what effect could such a tail have, no matter how many toxic gases it carried with it? However, the people she went crazy. Whether they were justified or not (which I already say they were not), the doubts about the extension of the comet’s tail and, “consequently, about the possibility that our planet could pass through it and be involved in it” became mainstream. So much so that José Comas i Solà In La Vanguardia on January 23 he even said that “we have been waiting for him (Halley) for 76 years to give us nothing but dislikes“. The confessionals filled to the brim In the end, as constantly happens today, “astronomers do not cease, even without intending to, to alarm the public with the statement that from May 18 to 19 we will have to pass through the tail of Halley’s Comet. On the one hand they assure that nothing bad will happen, and on the other they enumerate the dangers that await us on that day” said El Restaurador de Tortosa. But it was not something uniquely Spanish. Wherever there was a newspaper, there there was dozens of news stories dedicated to denying the hoaxes and prophecies that spread on the street. During those weeks, enormous sales were made. amounts of oxygen in pharmacies throughout Europe and thousands of wills were written before the imminent catastrophe.” In England, many citizens were convinced that “the comet is a chariot of fire, sent by the Supreme Being to take the soul of King Edward to heaven” who had just died on May 6. In Italy there were hundreds of psychotic outbreaks motivated by the comet and from the United States news came of “the strange rites celebrated in the countryside during the early mornings by African Americans in the south”. In Spain, the correspondent of The Impassionate in Bilbao, he wrote on May 18 that “the famous comet is the obligatory topic of all conversations. Many people see the critical moment arriving with real fear, and as proof of this, this morning an extraordinary number of faithful could be seen in the communion boxes in the churches. The priests, even trying to be brief and lenient in the court of penance, were not able to dispatch all those who requested confession, and tonight the churches were full. Tomorrow there will be a almost cometary queue before the sacred tables” Luckily, astronomers they were right and the passage of Halley did not end life on Earth. It did leave us priceless scenes of what would become, with the passage of time, hoaxes, collective hysteria and scientific journalism. Oh, and he “renewed” the material that we come across every year in the month of May: the wonderful Eta Aquarids. Image | Frank Cone In Xataka | Mysterious lights have been appearing in a remote valley in Norway since 1811. And we still don’t know what they are In Xataka | We had always believed that galaxies preceded black holes. James Webb has discovered something else

It’s the billions of cigarettes a year that pay for everything else.

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In the midst of Xi Jinping’s anti-corruption campaign in 2013, the Chinese Government came to officially ban that at banquets and public events of officials there would be cigarettes on the table. The detail seemed symbolic, but it reflected the extent to which tobacco was embedded in the political and economic culture of the country. The silent business that sustains too much. When talking about the Chinese economy, the conversation usually revolves around of electric cars, solar panels, batteries either rare earth. However, one of the most important financial pillars of the Chinese State remains much older, less glamorous and much more profitable: tobacco. I counted this week the new york times that China consumes about half of all cigarettes on the planet and sells about 2.4 billion units a year, a figure so gigantic that it turns the country into a global anomaly. While much of the world reduces tobacco consumption, China has gone in the opposite direction. And it is not just a cultural or health issue. Behind it there is an immense economic and political machinery: the state tobacco monopoly generates around 244 billion dollars annually in benefits and taxes, an amount equivalent to about 7% of all Chinese central government revenue and comparable to the country’s official defense budget. The personal contradiction of the “boss”. The paradox is even more striking because Xi Jinping stopped smoking years ago and, according to reported the Timesto people present in private conversations, went so far as to describe smoking as a serious problem for China. Plus: during his first years in power there seemed to be a certain political will to tighten restrictions, even banned smoking for officials during official events and Beijing adopted limitations in indoor spaces, in addition, in 2015 taxes on tobacco were raised. Even Peng Liyuan, the Chinese first lady, publicly participated in anti-smoking campaigns with Bill Gates. But the momentum quickly faded. The reason seems obvious: the Chinese State depends too much of cigarette money. The same government that promotes futuristic industries and constantly talks about technological modernization continue financing part of its stability thanks to millions of people smoking cheap three-dollar packs. The most powerful monopoly in the country. The heart of the entire system is the State Tobacco Monopoly Administrationan extraordinary structure even by Chinese standards because it regulates the sector and at the same time controls the dominant company that makes virtually all of the country’s cigarettes. That is, the regulator and the business are the same thing. Its economic power has translated into direct political influence. The heads of the organization have a rank equivalent to that of vice minister and several Chinese academic investigations have openly pointed out that the monopoly has blocked or diluted many important health initiatives. The clearest example came around 2017, when an attempt was stopped to implement a national ban on indoor smoking and moved the responsibility to local governmentswhere restrictions are usually weak or barely applied. Financing much more than tobacco. The most revealing thing is that tobacco money is no longer just supports local budgetsbut also some of the great strategic priorities by Xi Jinping. The monopoly has invested more than 1 billion of dollars to strengthen the Chinese financial system and has also participated in the giant national semiconductor fund valued in about 100,000 million. In practice, part of China’s commitment to chips, high technology and industrial independence is being financed thanks to smokers. In producing provinces like Yunnan, tobacco taxes represent more than half of the municipal budget. That explains why so many local governments resist even to moderate measures against smoking: restricting consumption means opening huge holes in finances already weakened by the real estate crisis and the economic slowdown. The great world exception. The Chinese case also breaks several global trends. While in many countries vaping has reduced part of traditional consumption, in China the State hardened quickly regulations on electronic cigarettes and limited flavors and points of sale, preventing them from eroding too much of the classic business. There are also no aggressive health warnings like in the West: Chinese packages still show national symbols and discreet messages instead of shocking images about diseases. Although the smoking rate has dropped slightly Because fewer young people are getting into the habit, the total sales volume continues to grow. Partly because China still has hundreds of millions of smokers and partly because tobacco also functions as a social valve in a context of growing economic pressure. A battle that you don’t want to win at all. The result is a deeply contradictory situation. China officially recognizes that tobacco It is a health problem gigantic and maintains public objectives to reduce the number of smokers, but at the same time financially dependent that millions of people continue to buy cigarettes every day. The Chinese political system itself has created a perverse incentive where really combating smoking would involve hitting a fundamental source of income for local governments, banks, strategic investments and even part of the national technological project. That is why China’s big hidden business is not only in the battery factories or rare earths that dominate international headlines. It is also in a state monopoly that sells almost half of cigarettes on the planet and whose revenue helps support much of everything else. Image | SoQ錫濛譙, Steve Evans In Xataka | It’s never too late to quit smoking: the lungs have an incredible capacity to regenerate In Xataka | Fertility rates have plummeted around the world. There is an unnoticed suspect: tobacco

The Social Security reform has opened the door to working longer. Early retirement will remain half closed

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Social Security is pushing those who can continue working to delay their retirement as much as possible, but it resists modifying one of the most discussed rules of the system: the penalty in the pension of those who they retire earlyeven when they accumulate more than 40 years listed. The flexible retirement reform contemplated in the Royal Decree 416/2026 will come into force on August 28, launching the Government’s strategy to extend working life of workers and contain pension spending. What changes with the reform. The new flexible retirement regulation seeks to encourage more people to extend your working life as much as possible voluntarily and can make part of their pension compatible with a salary, something that current regulations did not allow. The idea is not to force anyone to continue working beyond the legal retirement age, but rather offer more incentives so that those who can and want to do so, keep working. The person who is already retired, instead of stopping working completely, can do so part-time. In exchange, they will receive a salary for their work and a supplement to the proportional part of the pension. In this way, someone retired can obtain a higher income while still active, and will receive 100% of their pension again when they stop working. That is, if someone retired receive a pension of 1,000 euros, and for working 32 hours a week (80% of a full day) they will pay you a salary of 1,000 euros, your pension will be cut in that proportion, but the sum of salary (1,000 euros) and pension (200 euros) will provide you with greater monthly income. The current regulations force you to choose between working or receiving the pension. Put obstacles to early retirement. The demographic pyramid in Spain, in which there are fewer and fewer young people to maintain the pension system and a longer life expectancy, has forced successive governments to take measures to maximize working life of employees to continue contributing. This has led to the extension of the retirement age, which has been progressively delayed since 2011 to go from 65 to 67 years in 2027. The other measure approved in the pension reform of 2024 to discourage early retirement is to apply some reducing coefficients to the retirement pension, so that the more you anticipate retirement, the less pension you receive in return. Contribute 40 years without reward. One of the problems posed by the application of reducing coefficients is that those workers who already exceed the maximum limit of years of contributions necessary to access ordinary retirement at age 65 (38 years and six months or more by 2027), will not be able to retire early. without penalizing themand end up getting paid a lower pension than other workers with fewer years of contributions. This group has already organized under the association Asjubi40 and different political groups with representation in Congress have carried out proposals to eliminate this grievance to workers with long contribution periods when they want to advance their retirements. As and how he published The Independentvoluntary early retirees bear an average reduction coefficient of 11.36% and receive an average pension of 2,002.58 euros per month, after retiring at an average age of 63 years and two months. In the case of involuntary early retirement, the average reduction rises to 18.9%, the average pension stands at 2,100.42 euros per month and the average retirement age drops to 61 years and ten months. The unaffordable cost of stopping working. The reason given by the Government for not eliminating these reducing coefficients It’s simple: removing those penalties would be expensive. The Executive estimates an additional cost of 3,358 million euros per year for Social Security if the reducing coefficients are eliminated for those who retire early after having contributed 40 years or more. Of that figure, 1,345 million would correspond to voluntary early retirement, and 2,013 million would correspond to those retired involuntarily, that is, those who have been affected by ERE, business closures, force majeure or other cases considered by the General Law of Social Security. Social Security cannot assume it. Although Spain is registering record numbers in terms of number of members. It closed 2025 with a budget deficit of 5.58 billion euros. Once again, we are facing a record to be treated of the smallest deficit of the last 14 years, as as highlighted The Confidential. But it is a deficit, after all. However, the incorporation of contributions such as the Intergenerational Equity Mechanism (MEI), has contributedIn 2026 alone, 1,162.23 million euros will be added to the Social Security Reserve Fund, which reached a total amount of 15,267 million euros last March. In Xataka | From the “Great Resignation” to the “Great Early Retirement”: the labor market loses the experience of those over 55 years of age Image | Pexels (Joaquin Carfagna)

Quietly, a mobile phone manufacturer is skyrocketing in Spain. One that hits right in the nostalgia

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There was a time when it seemed that consumers only had eyes for Xiaomi when looking for an affordable mobile phone. Things are starting to change. The data of Omdia For the first quarter of 2026 they show a significant drop compared to 2025 for the Asian manufacturer, with Motorola taking center stage. The numbers. The European phone market grew 2% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2026, with Samsung as the big name. The company, according to data from the consulting firm, already has a 38% share, its best number in years with a growth of 3%. But Apple. The good global results of the iPhone 17 They already left us a clue about what could happen in Europe. Apple grew 9.9%, thanks to relatively affordable price models such as the iPhone 16e and the commercial success of its new models. Apple remains in second place, but with a striking fact: it sold 8.8 million iPhones compared to Samsung’s 12.6, and still grew at three times the rate of its rival. Samsung depended largely on the Galaxy A16 4G to sustain their numbers. Xiaomi. The Chinese company maintained third place, although its fall was the most pronounced. Xiaomi falls no less than 15% in Europe, although the numbers have fine print: the company sold fewer phones, but the ones it did sell were more expensive. Xiaomi’s average price (ASP, Average Selling Price) rose by 21%, mainly after the launches of the series Xiaomi 17 and the good sales of the Xiaomi 15T. It is a strategy that is working for them: although they sell fewer units, they sell much more expensively. Mainly, the markets in which these ranges worked the most were France, Germany and… Spain. And Motorola arrived. Motorola has been obsessed with the Spanish market for some time. It knows that we like quality-price phones, and that the buyer still has a certain nostalgia for a brand that always had a good product. Thanks to its expansion in Spain and Portugal, the company has grown 17% year-on-year, with almost two million units sold. A quick look on Amazon makes it easy to understand what’s going on. Motorola has a barrage of phones available at competitive prices, clean software that does not generate any type of friction, and an acceptable update policy. to stay. Motorola has a clear market strategy in which Spain is a fundamental market: affordable and accessible mobile phones. For its part, Xiaomi is turning towards Be increasingly premium to improve your margins. A golden opportunity for a manufacturer that once flooded Spain with Moto G, to once again travel the path of commercial success. In Xataka | Motorola Edge 70 Fusion, analysis: putting 7,000 mAh in such a thin mobile phone seemed like magic. The trick is under the hood

The horror movie of the summer is ‘Backrooms’, and its origin is so surprising that there is a rumor that its director is not real

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‘Backrooms’ premieres today in the United States (it arrives in Spain on June 5). The film, produced by the unstoppable indie A24is expected to be the horror bomb of the summer (hand in hand with the already tremendous ‘Obsession’, which is putting its hand in the face of ‘The Mandalorian and Grogu‘). It has 87% positive reviews on Rotten Tomatoes and is expected to open between $45 and $50 million, which would be the biggest debut in the studio’s history. Of course, it faces an unexpected controversy: there are those who say that its director, the very young Kane Parsons, has not really directed the film. What has happened? Days before the premiere, this unexpected rumor has circulated online: a more experienced director would have been working from the shadows. Osgood Perkins, producer of the project and director of the great ‘Longlegs‘. Mark Duplass, who stars in the film alongside Chiwetel Ejiofor, Renate Reinsve and Finn Bennett, responded in X: “I don’t remember seeing you on set. When I was there, Kane was 100% in control. More than many directors three times his age.” The origin of ‘Backrooms’. As we already explained in detailon May 12, 2019, an anonymous user posted on /x/, the paranormal board on 4chan, a photograph without a signature or context. It looked like a kind of abandoned office: yellowish carpet and walls, fluorescent lighting… It was ridiculously disturbing. The next day someone added a description that spoke of “not clipping out of reality” (a term taken from a glitch of video games in which the player falls into a geometric void beyond the mapping), and ending up trapped in a space that extends infinitely. The backrooms They are an extreme version of what the internet calls liminal spaces: hotel hallways at three in the morning, empty waiting rooms, closed shopping centers, underground parking lots without cars… Recognizable places but stripped of their function and of the people who normally inhabit them. Just like has been explainedthese types of environments activate the same response as the phenomenon of uncanny valleybut applied to physical places. The brain identifies these spaces as known and at the same time does not know how to read them logically. Jump to the cinema. Kane Parsons was 16 years old when he posted his The Backrooms (Found Footage): nine minutes in first person with a VHS filter, in which someone was chased by a strange presence in one of these spaces. The series that followed this first video, full of secret research institutes and dimensional experiments in the eighties, exceeded 197 million views. A24 bought the rights a year later. Youth, divine treasure. One of the apparent hooks of the A24 film, the extreme youth of its director, has worked against it. The press has underlined Parsons’ youthand some conspiracy theorists consider it to be a marketing strategy. In reality, what this talks about is the current situation in Hollywood, which has produced franchised cinema for two decades in which the director is, fundamentally, a technical executor under the creative supervision of the studio. The system of great sagas has normalized the idea that a good film cannot come from the criteria of a single person, a young person without credentials. We viewers are distrustful because that is what the industrial cinema of recent years has taught us. The explanation. Parsons was born in 2005, the year YouTube launched. “YouTube, more than a cultural reference for me, has been the way I know how to do everything I know how to do,” declared. Parsons doesn’t have the kind of resume that the traditional production circuit demands, but rather his only credential is a massive audience of followers who have been reacting to his work in real time for three years. And that is capable of arousing the suspicions of anyone who is buried by the industrial machine logic of modern Hollywood. In Xataka | When a town found a dead whale on its beaches, it decided to dynamite it. 55 years later they still celebrate it

The DGT has never imposed so many penalties for drugged driving

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I’m going to make a confession: I’ve gotten hooked on Road Control. One day, YouTube put a 15-minute short video in front of my eyes. The algorithm hit home because right now I am bingeing on a product where the novelty is almost non-existent and is repeated like the worst fast food. And the surprise with each video is: none. Time and time again we attend a breathalyzer test where one, two or several drivers are “caught” under the influence of alcohol. “Have you had anything else,” the voice of the agent on duty sounds already tired. Then, drug controlnew positive and more problems for the unwary. If the premise has not yet convinced you, I will tell you that from time to time there are new features. Some driver has caused an accident and fled. Another skips the breathalyzer test and tries to flee. But the end is usually the same: positive for alcohol and/or drugs. Does it sound repetitive? Yes. But it is. At least that’s what the DGT data says, that in 2025 drug tests were carried out on more than 144,000 drivers. Of them, almost half took home a fine for having consumed some type of substance. More than 70,000 complaints The figure is rescued by our colleagues from Motorpassion. Last year the DGT punished 70,717 people for having tested positive in an anti-drug test. The figure comes in response to a parliamentary question from the Popular Party. It detailed that last year 144,346 roadside drug tests were carried out. That is, almost 50% of the people who faced these controls tested positive. The figure is much higher than in previous years. In 2025, 122,938 tests were carried out and then 64,314 positives were detected. Control on the roads has been increasing, they point out in Europa Press. According to the information detailed by the DGT, the data in the last five years are as follows: Year 2021: 123,211 tests and 41,067 sanctions. Year 2022: 58,126 tests and 42,103 sanctions. Year 2023: 101,927 tests and 50,002 sanctions. Year 2024: 122,938 tests and 64,314 sanctions. Year 2025: 144,346 tests and 70,717 sanctions. The fine for testing positive In a drug test it is 1,000 euros and the subtraction of six points on the driving license. In addition, the driver faces the withdrawal of his license from one to four years and a prison sentence of three to six months, a fine of six to 12 months and community service of 31 to 90 days if he commits a crime against traffic safety, is a repeat offender or if he has been involved in an accident. It must also be remembered that in a drug test, unlike an alcohol test, the amount of substance present in the body is not taken into account. If the control detects that it is present, the driver is sanctioned. This is important to take into account since some substances leave traces in the blood for days after being consumed. Photo | DGT In Xataka | Drunk driving is not enough to “arrest” someone: the Constitutional Court acquits a woman despite testing positive

now it goes against its users

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Imagine enjoying all the football and premieres for just 40 euros a year, with the peace of mind that a sophisticated system and payments in cryptocurrencies make you completely invisible. That tranquility has just vanished suddenly for many users of the Cinemagoal network who has been dismantled by the Italian authorities. The biggest risk is no longer that the screen goes black in the middle of the game, but rather receiving a notification in your mailbox with a fine of up to four figures. what has happened. Through the baptized as Operation “Tutto Chiaro”, The Italian Guardia di Finanza has managed to dismantle the technological infrastructure behind Cinemagoal. More than a hundred searches have been carried out in Italy and key servers located in France and Germany have been seized. But what is striking about the case is that they are not only persecuting those responsible for the network, but they are tracking and identifying the subscribers of the service, who are receiving fines ranging from 154 to 5,000 euros. Why is it important. Italy is one of the toughest countries against the broadcast of matches and content without a license; It is not content with dismantling the infrastructure, but is going after the final link that feeds the business: the users. It’s a war they’ve been fighting for years, even leading to prison sentences. Although in Spain it has not reached that point, LaLiga has followed in the footsteps of Italy with the massive blocking of IPsalso affecting legitimate companies and services that have nothing to do with with the distribution of unauthorized content. This is how Cinemagoal worked. The network did not transmit video via IPTV, but used virtual machines that operated 24/7, maintaining open sessions on services such as Netflix, DAZN, Sky, Disney+ or Spotify through legal subscriptions registered in the name of false identities. Instead of copying and broadcasting the audiovisual content, these machines extracted the keys or authorization tokens from the official sessions every three minutes and sent them in real time to the application installed on the clients’ devices. Through this system, users downloaded the video directly from the platforms’ official servers, which completely hidden their IP addresses and made it Piracy Shieldthe Italian platform against the dissemination of unauthorized content, was blind. The service cost between 40 and 130 euros per year and was distributed by more than 70 resellers in Italy, who paid preferably in cryptocurrencies or through foreign accounts to evade tracking. For the users. Cinemagoal customers believed they were protected by anonymity, but the police have managed to identify at least 1,000 users by cross-referencing data. To find them, investigators analyzed customer records seized from more than 70 resellers operating in Italy, tracked payment histories and activity logs (logs) hosted on the application’s own servers. The minimum fine is 154 euros, which will be for users who were simply viewing content. Those who had the “fictitious subscriptions from which the authentication tokens were extracted”, that is, those who redistributed the content, will have to pay up to 5,000 euros. 300 million. The Italian authorities estimate that the damage caused by this platform reaches 300 million euros in subscriptions. It’s what It is known as lost profits, That is, the money that platforms stop earning due to unauthorized content. However, their way of doing the math assumes that the hacking user would have paid 100% if they did not have the illegal option: it is a fallacy and an unrealistic metric of losses. Image | Xataka with Gemini In Xataka | LaLiga wanted to fine VPNs that did not block IPs during matches. A court has been set up

We have found a hidden “switch” of Alzheimer’s. And the best thing is that we have promising candidates to put it out

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Alzheimer’s is still one of the biggest medical challenges of our century, since we are facing a disease with a very important incidence and above all that entails a large number of social problems around it. Here research over the decade has focused on the accumulation of protein plaques beta-amyloid in the brain to explain it. However, the scientific community has begun to pay much more attention to an equally devastating factor: neuroinflammation. A new gene. Science continues to advance and one of the latest discoveries that has been made lies in the APOE4 genewhich is a known risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease. And it is no wonder, since people who inherit this variant have a much higher probability of developing the disease, and often do so at younger ages. But now a research team has been investigating exactly why having this genetic variant predisposes one to Alzheimer’s, and the answer appears to lie in chronic inflammation. More specifically, in APOE4 carriersthe brain’s immune system overreacts, creating a toxic environment that damages neurons and accelerates cognitive decline. And at the center of this inflammatory storm, researchers have indicated to the enzyme cPLA2 as the main culprit. It’s a challenge. Knowing that cPLA2 plays a crucial role in the inflammatory cascade associated with Alzheimer’s, the objective is logically set turn it off permanently. However, inhibiting enzymes in the brain is not an easy task, since the brain is very well protected by the blood-brain barrier, which acts as a true customs control that allows only some very selected elements to pass through. That is why creating a drug that passes through it without causing side effects in other parts of the body is a great challenge. The strategies. To reach this goal, science is now doing computer simulations of thousands of molecules to be able to find those with the exact shape and properties to “fit” into the cPLA2 enzyme and deactivate it. Once this ‘key’ that fits the enzyme that looks like a lock is identified, candidate compounds can be refined for testing in animal models. Until now, research already has several selective cPLA2 inhibitors that have proven to be powerful and capable of penetrating the brain, making it possible to reduce neuroinflammation in the models studied. Personalized medicine. The study, supported by multiple leading institutions such as the National Institute on Aging and the Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation, is not only relevant for the design of the new drugs, but also for its personalized medicine approach. Looking back, clinical trials for Alzheimer’s have treated all patients equally, often resulting in million-dollar failures. But now, by targeting these new cPLA2 inhibitors specifically at neuroinflammation fueled by the APOE4 gene, scientists are creating tailored treatments for the most biologically vulnerable patients. Although we are still in a very early phase of research, it may take years to see a tangible result. Images | Robina Weermeijer In Xataka | Alzheimer’s no longer seems irreversible: science allows brains with advanced damage to recover for the first time in animals

Metro de Madrid has insisted on being a pop icon like London’s “Tube.” His plan: retro football jerseys

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There are cities that are recognized by their metro before you can place their flag. The iconic roundel red and blue Tube London has jumped from the tunnels and platforms to the closets of half the world, becoming a global emblem that people wear with pride. It is not a simple transportation logo: it is the city itself compressed in a circle. The Madrid Metro knows this well, which has been looking at its British counterpart for some time with the envy of someone who aspires to transcend their status as a mere public service. And he has just made his boldest move to close the gap: launching his own collection of retro football shirts. Nostalgia reaches underground. With its sights set on the 2026 FIFA World Cup, the Community of Madrid has launched Metro FC: five retro t-shirts inspired by world champion teams, at 54.95 euros each, sold in the Metro online store and at the Ópera, Sol and Plaza de Castilla stations. Each garment bears the Metro’s own embroidered shield – based on the historic rhombus of 1921 – and the seven stars of the Community, with a color that varies according to the World Cup of each honored team. Line 2 is the Spain of 2010; Line 1, Maradona’s Argentina in ’86; Line 3, Romario’s Brazil in ’94; Line 5, the Germany of Italy 90; and Line 10, Zidane’s France in ’98. The question that closes the campaign sums it all up: “And you, which line are you from?” It’s not just merchandising. It is a declaration of intentions about what the Madrid Metro wants to be. The model that Madrid envies. To understand what the Madrid Metro is after, you have to look at London, where this path has been taken for more than a century. He roundel —the red circle with a blue bar that identifies the London Underground— was born in 1908 as a simple stop sign. Today it is one of the most recognizable and emulated commercial symbols ever designed. The architect of that transformation was Frank Pickhead of communications for the Underground in the first half of the 20th century, whose philosophy was as simple as it was ambitious: design is not something optional that appears here and there. Design must enter everywhere. The result of this obsession is today an unparalleled brand machine in global public transport. According to a Nielsen studyhe roundel Londoner is more recognizable than Mickey Mouse, and the phrase “Mind the gap” has become one of the most identifying sounds of the city. The Underground generates more than five million pounds a year on merchandising alone, and carries more passengers during the working week than all other trains in Britain combined. The conquest of streetwear. It is no longer so much the scale, but rather who you sit down to negotiate with. His recent collaborations include Adidas, Arsenal, Prada Linea Rossa, Kurt Geiger and some Nike sneakers with the fabric moquette of the meter that are resold online for around 400 pounds. In 2026 it has launched its third collection with Uniqlowith t-shirts and bags decorated with iconic London transport graphics, celebrating the city’s character and heritage. And before, in 2023 he created a line of streetwear complete —London Underground Studio—in collaboration with the South Korean brand Handsome, from the Hyundai group, with leather bombers and knitted sweaters sold in Seoul. The symbol has transcended its signaling function to become shorthand for the city itself, inspiring fashion and pop music. It is, in the words of its scholars, “cool” in a way that public bodies rarely achieve. The Madrid Metro knows exactly what it wants. And the Metro FC shirts are their first big attempt to achieve this. The trend that opens the door. The Metro movement does not emerge from nowhere: it intelligently takes advantage of the exact moment when the football shirt has become the object of cultural desire of the decade. You just have to walk through any big city to find the image: dozens of young people walk around wearing Real Madrid t-shirts from the 2000s, the 90s Juve or the Japanese national team. They don’t go to the stadium, it’s not even match day. The border between catwalk fashion and sporting passion has been completely blurred. The phenomenon has a name: Soccercore either Blokecore. It takes its name from “bloke” – the common type of British working class of the 80s and 90s – and consists of combining vintage football shirts with baggy jeans or classic sneakers. What began to go viral on TikTok in 2021 has ended up on the Balenciaga catwalks and on the bodies of Bella Hadid, Kim Kardashian or Jennie from Blackpink. Brands like Etro or Stella McCartney have taken the style from the stadiums to the catwalks, and Loewe is in charge of dressing the Spanish team in this World Cup. The business of belonging. It is precisely in that context where the Metro’s commitment takes on all its meaning. The journalist Alejandro Mendo, from his substack Pieces of Fabricidentifies the key movement that explains it: the rise of institutional “white label” clothing. Clubs and institutions have discovered that they can produce their own collections, without large multinationals involved, that cost around 50 or 60 euros and that generate something that no external sponsor can buy: brand loyalty. Metro de Madrid does not sell t-shirts, but rather it sells belonging. The narrative of big brands has also changed in this sense. Mendo points out how brands like Adidas have put aside the muscular epic to sit your stars in chairs during their campaigns. Putting figures like Lamine Yamal or Jude Bellingham in a relaxed and introspective attitude turns them into cultural icons rather than gladiators on the grass. The footballer, like the shirt he wears, has stopped being just an athlete and has become a generational reference. A material anchor in the society of “non-things.” There is something else, however, that explains why these garments work … Read more

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