app

This app helps you fake your dream vacation

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There are times when entering Instagram it means getting depressed; people living dream lives and us at home with our pajamas on. Don’t worry because there is a new app with which you can also join the wave of posturing, one that uses AI to generate fake images of a vacation that never existed. Who needs vacations when you can invent them? Endless summer. The app in question is called Endless Summer and was created by Laurent del Rey, one of the members of the Meta superintelligence teamjust as they say in TechCrunch. Its creator defines the app as “a simple photo booth application to generate fake snapshots of your vacation, for when you feel exhausted and need to manifest the quiet life you deserve.” Because of course, if you are exhausted from working, the best thing is to invent a life in which you don’t work and are happy, no one ever said. The price of posturing. The app is available free for iPhone and the first two photos are free, but creating a larger album of your fake vacation is going to cost you money. Specifically 3.99 euros for 30 images, 19.99 euros for 150 images and 39.99 euros for 300 images. The result is quite good and, except for the clothes, I recognize myself in the photos that Endless Summer has taken for me, but you can’t choose where you want the AI ​​to take you on vacation. In my case it has been to a fast food restaurant in Los Angeles and a cafeteria in Paris. I’ve been to Los Angeles and I haven’t left this burger joint. Nano Banana. It is the model that the app uses to generate images. He spices it up with his own prompts to achieve that analog look and different variations of the subject. Nano Banana can be used within Gemini, so you don’t need to spend anything to create your fake vacation photos, just give it a nice prompt. Superintelligence. As we said at the beginning, the creator of Endless Summer is part of the superintelligence team that Zuckerberg has been forming all summer at the stroke of a checkbook. The best AI talents gather at the Meta offices to obtain the AGI (or That’s what Zuckerberg wanted). The reality is that we do not know much about its progress, only that They recently launched Vibes, an app to explore AI videos that was eclipsed days later by Sora 2 by OpenAIand that one of its members has just released a very frivolous app without much sense… Images | Endless Summer In Xataka | Meta does not have the most advanced AI of all, but it does have something much more important: a business plan

Openai not only dominates in ia. Now the App Store in the United States with Sora and Chatgpt is also “eating”

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Getting to the podium of the most popular free applications of the App Store is the dream of any developer. It is not just about adding downloads: it means achieving a massive user base and enviable visibility. For many, the reasoning is automatic: “If this app has come here, something must have.” In that scenario, Openai is marking a milestone. The company of Sam Altman barely has two applications and both They occupy the highest positions of the ranking in the United States. It is a direct reflection of the interest that arouses among users and the influence that the firm has acquired in a matter of months. A surprise launch. On Tuesday, after announcing with just a couple of hours in advance, an event, Openai presented a new version of its video generator. But the real surprise came later: An application with a spirit of Tiktoklaunched at the moment in the United States and Canada under invitation. A brilliant rise. Although its access was limited, the app began to add downloads quickly. In just one day it reached 56,000 facilities, According to Appfiguresand this Friday had already become the most unloaded application in the country. An immediate irruption reminiscent of the viral phenomena of other times. The success of Sora by OpenAi It soon reflected in Apple’s official data. The app has reached the first place of the section “Top Charts”surpassing a GeminiGoogle’s chatbot, already Chatgptthe other application of Openai itself. Besides, it also dominates The photo and video category. Much more than download. Being up in the App Store does not depend only on the volume of facilities. Specialists in the field They point out that Apple uses an algorithm that, in addition to downloads, values ​​the retention of users, reviews, the stability of the app and other decisive factors. The details of the algorithm, however, are unknown. The viral factor. Sora’s proposal has met expectations: becoming a viral content factory. Its dynamics encourages users to star in their own memes and share them in a social environment That, in turn, multiplies its reach. The result is an addictive experience that is gaining ground at high speed. OpenAI in front of the usual giants. Today, the place that once occupied WhatsApp, Facebook or Messenger is claimed by OpenAi applications. In the United States general list, the first finish applies appears in the fourth position with Threadsand it is not until the 13th place that we find WhatsApp. What we are seeing is an OpenAi settlement in the digital life of millions of people. The company not only marks the step in artificial intelligence: it is also conquering one of the most influential platforms in the world, the App Store. Images | Screen capture In Xataka | Openai is demonstrating to be able to overcome the goal in virality. His mission was not supposed to be that

Many are still convinced that Instagram listens to the microphone. The app of the app has wanted to set the subject

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In a meeting between friends you talk about making a weekend getaway, rural houses and whether it is worth renting a car. Hours later, when Instagram opens, ads appear for travel agencies, car rental portals and route recommendations. The feeling that The mobile “hears us” It is installed easily. In this context, Adam Mosseri, head of Instagram, published a video to disassemble that myth and explain why we see ads that seem to guess our conversations. Meta has almost a decade denying sharply that their applications access the microphone without permission, but doubts never disappear at all. Now the discussion returns to the front line because The company has announced thatas of December, conversations with their artificial intelligence assistant will also be part of the customization of ads and recommendations (this change will not apply, at least for now, in the European Union). The denial and this novelty have communicated almost at the same time, which adds a striking nuance to the message. Mosseri says they don’t listen to us, while finishing another key novelty The closeness between both communications did not go unnoticed. Instagram head chosen a personal tone, even light, but at the same time he wanted cut the suspicion that the application listens to its users. He presented that statement as a starting point on which to build his explanation. His words were clear and it is worth reproducing them in full: “We do not listen to you. We do not use the microphone of the phone to spy on. If we did, it would be a serious violation of privacy. In addition, we would exhaust the battery of the device and noticed it, and you would even see a small light in the upper part of the screen that would tell you that the microphone is on.” For Mosseri, what seems to really be the effect of four quite common situations. One possibility is that before talking about a topic and lor we have sought without remembering it. Another is that someone in our environment has done it and the platform takes it as a indication. It can also happen that the announcement has appeared before and we did not pay attention, but that it later sneaks into the conversation. And the simplest explanation of all remains: it is a mere coincidence. “I want to reiterate that we do not listen to your microphone. I know that some of you are not going to believe me no matter how much I try to explain, but I wanted to make things clear. I am sure that the comments in this publication will be a bit intense. We see you soon. Paz.” It was not the first time that the company was trying to settle the suspicion. In 2016, Facebook said that did not use the phone’s microphone to guide ads or to change what appears in the Feed. Two years later, in an appearance before the United States Senate, Mark Zuckerberg was asked directly on the subject and rSponge With a “no” just as sharp. Years later, Meta support website itself included A document on the same line. Click to watch the video on Instagram Doubts about possible listening also led the academic community to test it. In 2017, a group of researchers from Northeastern University analyzed more than 17,000 Android applications, including those of Facebook, to check if they activated the microphone without the user knowing. After months of evidence, They found no evidence What happened. They did observe other data collection behaviors, but do not listen undercover. The authors themselves clarified, yes, that there were scenarios that were left out of their study. Beyond the studies, there is a technical aspect that should be remembered. In current mobiles, both in iOS and Android, any application that wants to use the microphone You need explicit user permission. In addition, when an actor appears active on the screen (a color point or a warning in the upper bar) that immediately points it. These notices, together with the extra battery consumption that would involve permanent listening, make it difficult to hide an undercover use of the microphone without the user noticed. The persistence of this myth is better understood if the context is observed. The directed advertising is so precise and so difficult to decipher for the average user that it is easier to attribute it to a microphone on than to an invisible data network. Our memory also influences. To this is added the history of mattress controversies in privacy. Images | Brett Jordan | Xataka with Gemini 2.5 | Screen capture In Xataka | I’ve been hooked to Sora 2 for two days: I’m generating absurd memes where I am the protagonist and I can’t stop

Openai has just presented Sora 2 with own Tiktok -style app. This is outlined a new wave of viral videos

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You open the mobile and, in a few seconds, you see yourself inside a scene that did not exist a minute ago: you are the protagonist of a clip that seems really shot, with movements and rebounds that feel coherent. Mechanics has no mystery, you record a brief take to capture your voice and face, and the app “place” on stage. The striking thing is the feeling of control, you can chain planes and maintain the state of the world without anything falling. There begins the game of Sora 2. To understand what Sora 2 supposes to look back. The road opened in 2022, when Chatgpt He placed the generation of text at the center of the technological debate. That impulse gave way to image models and, in February 2024, to Sora’s first versiona prototype that already showed permanence of objects and some visual coherence. The competition soon react: Runway with his Gen-4 and other projects marked the pattern of a market in full boiling that now receives a new chapter. What’s new in Sora 2. Openai describes this model as a jump comparable to that in its day GPT-3.5 was for the text. The big difference is in physical loyalty: if a ball fails the hoop, bounces on the board instead of teleporting, a common error in previous systems. You can also maintain the status of a scene between plans and follow more complex instructions. In addition to video, it generates voices, effects and sound landscapes, which makes it a much more complete video-audio tool. The app: Cameos, Remix and Feed. Together with the model An application arrives Designed to use it social code. After a rapid face and voice verification, the user can be inserted as cameo in any scene and share the result with their contacts. The app allows you to remix videos of others and navigate a Feed which adjusts to preferences through natural language. Openai ensures that the experience is designed to encourage joint creation, not passive consumption, and that it opens under invitation in iOS. Welfare and security: controls and limits. The company led by Sam Altman He insists that his application does not seek to catch the user in an infinite scroll. It is designed to prioritize known people and encourage creation more than consumption. Base restrictions are applied for adolescents, as a limited number of generations and stricter permits in cameos. To this are added parental controls from chatgpt and the possibility of revoking any use of your image. There will also be human moderators for cases of harassment. Is it free? As we say, the application of Sora 2 gradually opens in iOS, with an initial deployment in the United States and Canada. Openai promises to extend it to more countries, although for now it is not available in Spain. Access requires invitation and can also be requested from the Sora.com website. The service starts free of charge, with use limits that depend on “the computing capacity.” In addition, the subscribers of Chatgpt Pro, the 200 dollars per monthThey have access to a Sora 2 version with higher quality, and the company plans to enable the model via API. Some failures remain. Among the spread examples appear anime fighting, explorers that shout under a snowbird or acrobatics that respect rigidity and flotation. The model manages to give the impression that the failures belong to the character himself, not to the algorithm. It also allows you to insert a real person into a scene with recognizable voice and appearance. Even so, Openai admits that errors abound and that general coherence is far from perfect, although it considers that the progress with respect to Sora 1 is evident. Sora 2 raises a scenario in which videos cease to be just a consumer product and become a shared game space. The key is in that ability to turn anyone into the protagonist of a clip ready to circulate. It may be a fashion of short duration or inaugurate a more participatory creativity stage. What seems clear is that Openai has returned to place the focus on the daily user, with a proposal designed to trigger waves of viral content. Images | OpenAI In Xataka | Chatgpt is already able to buy things for you: OpenAi has just launched a missile to the Amazon flotation line

So they have decided to change our habits with an app

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Plug -in hybrid cars have an obvious problem: many owners Do not plug them in. This Toyota knows it, and that is why he has decided to act developing an application which warns the owners of loading the vehicle and offering information about the recharge points. As Admits the brandhe has resorted to behavior science to solve this problem. The amazing thing about all this is that the results of their pilot tests show that your strategy works. The background problem. Plug -in hybrid vehicles offer between 20 and 50 kilometers of electric autonomy, sufficient for most urban displacements. However, when also carrying gasoline engine, many conductors mainly use them as conventional hybrids without taking advantage of their electrical capacity. This ends up significantly its efficiency and increases real emissions with respect to what is promised by manufacturers. Differences between the group that received the intervention regarding what did not. Image: Toyota Toyota’s solution. The Toyota Research Institute has created Chargeminder, a prototype application that applies principles of behavior science to modify load habits. Instead of bombing with constant notifications, the app sends intelligent reminders just at the right time and place, when the owner is more likely to plug his vehicle but could be forgotten or distracted. How the strategy works. The application integrates more than a dozen interventions based on scientific research. It includes gamification elements such as loading gusts, progress graphics and positive reinforcement messages. It also offers educational content through questionnaires that teach when it is cheaper and sustainable to load the vehicle. All designed to create a scaffolding between the intentions of the driver and his real actions. The results are promising. Toyota tried Chargeminder in two controlled pilot studies with approximately 100 volunteers in each market. In the United States, plug -in drivers who received the APP warnings increased load by 10% compared to the group that did not receive them. In addition, according to their reports, their satisfaction with the vehicle grew 16 percentage points, reaching 100%. In Japan, where the app was modified to promote load during maximum solar production hours, drivers changed their behavior by 59%, adding almost 30 minutes of cargo with renewable energy. Why is it relevant now. “Technology is not the only way to reduce emissions: people’s decisions also matter,” affirms Dr. Gill Pratt, scientific director of Toyota Motor Corporation. This approach is especially significant for the company when in multiple reports it is revealed that plug -in hybrids contaminate more than publicized, precisely because drivers do not plug them into. The future of Chargeminder. Although the application is not publicly available, Toyota plans to extend its research program with more personalized and dynamic interventions. The brand will prove Chargeminder in more people and scenarios, with the aim that what they learned helps align the load of electric vehicles with its global carbon neutrality strategy. It is possible that, over time, Chargeminder ends up arriving at your trusted application store. Cover image | Toyota In Xataka | Audi was too Audi to sell its electric cars in China. Solution: Copy Chinese manufacturers

How to see any photo with the 3D space effect of iOS 26 on your iPhone using the new function of the APP photos

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Let’s explain How to use the app Photos From your iPhone to see with 3D effect The photos you want. It is one of the functions of iOS 26 with which you can use this effect with your photos On the lock screenbut the APP photos also allows you to use it with anyone at any time. Here, you just have to know that this function is pure amusement, to see the effect and that’s it, you can’t use it for much more. But in the end, it can also help you to see how you are with any photograph you have before using it then as a wallpaper. Use the spatial effect with any photo The first thing you have to do is Open the application Photos On your iPhone. Remember that you should have updated iOS 26, and the condition is that the photo where you want to apply the effect must have some type of protagonist, such as a person, pet or object. Choose a photo and enter it. Once you are inside the photo, you have to click on the hexagon icon that will appear above right. To see it you must have the interface, that is, if you only see the photo click on the screen so that the other elements come out. When you press that button, you will see that for a few seconds some purple colors appear on the screen while the AI ​​analyzes the content of the photo. Then you will see that The indicator of Space sceneand that when you move the mobile screen you can see the 3D effect of the photo. In Xataka Basics | How to obtain information from what appears on your iPhone screen with Apple Intelligence and iOS 26

I’ve been using Yi security cameras for years. It was delighted until the app became an advertising hell

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More than five years ago I bought my first Security Chamber To monitor my cat when he got sick. It was YI brand and it worked great; He looked good, had movement alerts and could speak through the mic. With the passage of time I had more cats and I bought two more cameras of the same brand to cover the rest of the house. The problem is that The APP Yi Home has added advertising in its app. How much? All. It is not an exaggeration I was traveling recently and I entered Yi Home’s app to look through the cameras. I don’t lie if I say that More than once I have made me want to launch the mobile. On the main screen there are already a few ads spread there, but that is not the worst. Some of the ads that appear when I open the app or when I try to see one of the cameras. The worst are the Full screen ads. They cannot be skipped until they pass a few seconds, the button to close them is tiny and sometimes it does not work, causing it to end in the App Store, or wherever the announcement in question link. So every time I open the app. But the thing is not there, when entering each camera, advertisements also leave full screen. When you finally manage to see a camera, a banner comes out that covers the controls to be able to move it *Chef’s Kiss*. Few apps I remember that they have bombarded me both with advertising and Yi Home, although it is not the only one. A current example is Capcut, the Tiktok videos editing app. Every time I open the app, I get a full screen advertisement, but it is also that if you leave a moment and enter again, another appears. Not to mention that The entire app is a mines field with ‘Pro’ functions And they don’t stop insisting to join. Pay or suffer Yi Home has never been a super clean app. I already had some Banner type ads and has always shown me pop-ups to join the payment plan. The thing now has no name. In addition to full-screen advertising, those pop-ups continue to come out and remind me that, If I pay, advertising will disappear. On top with picn. The summum of despair. (The controls can be relocated, but was there no other place?) The cheapest payment plan if you have several cameras costs 79.99 euros a year. It seems expensive, but I think that although it would cost a tenth, I wouldn’t pay either. The thing about this app is A manual of how to lose customers. At least I know I am not the only user discontent, In Tustpilot is full of negative reviews on the same subject and in This Reddit thread There are also several angry users. In the same thread they also comment on several ways to eliminate ads such as installing previous versions of the app or configure a DNS with Ad-Block. In my case I take another way to eliminate ads. I change my chambers I had been wanting to buy a while Another 360 camera And obviously I was not going to buy another of the same brand with the problems I was having with advertising in the app. One of those days when I almost crashed my mobile, gave me to get into Amazon to see other cameras and make the decision. TP Link Tapo C210 After reading a few reviews and making sure that his app did not seem like an online casino, I opted for the Top-Link tapo. I found a Offer pack with two cameras 360 And I bought it. When I set them up, some notifications came out within the app to go to the Premium version, but I have been using it for a week and they have not reappeared. Come on, what was Yi Home’s app a long ago and that It should be normal in an app of a security camera. Images | Amparo Babyloni, Xataka In Xataka | It is not you, YouTube is filling with more and more ads. Especially if you see it on a smart TV

Chatgpt’s mobile app generates 30 times more money than Claude, Copilot and Grok together. Still not enough

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If there is a chatbot that stands out in popularity over the rest, that is undoubtedly chatgpt. His mobile app was launched in May 2023 And since then he has occupied the download tops of the main stores, becoming The most downloaded app in the world A few months ago. Openai has reached another milestone with its app: since its launch already has generated 2,000 million dollars. To put it in context, this would be approximately 30 times more than what Claude, Grok and Copilot combined have generated. However, not everything is as beautiful as it sounds. Undisputed leader. According to figures AppfiguresOnly for 2025, the Chatgpt app has generated 1,350 million dollars, which represents a growth of 673% compared to the same period of 2024. Chatgpt is generating 193 million dollars per month, while the next on the list is Grok with 3.6 million per month. If we look at the average download per expense, ChatgPT goes to the head with 2.91 dollars, followed by Claude with $ 2.55, Grok with $ 0.75 and finally co -pilot with only $ 0.28. It is clear: Openai is winning the battle of mobile apps. Still not enough. 2,000 million are many millions and that only with its mobile app. Adding all your services, only In July 1,000 million entered And it is estimated that they will enter 12,000 million this year. However, It is still light years of being profitable And the reality is that they enter much less than they spend. The company did An internal study in which they estimated that the losses between 2023 and 2028 would amount to 44,000 million dollars. According to their forecasts, they will not be profitable until 2029, when they expect to enter 100,000 million dollars annually, almost ten times more than they invoice now. The Big Tech are on the right track. The great technology have invested amounts of authentic madness in AI And it has not been until recently that they have begun to see A slight green outbreak in its results. After several years burning huge amounts of money, Google, Amazon and Microsoft have seen how their income is finally to cover the investment so tremendous. However, it is still not thanks to the products AI directly, but to the cloud services. Even so, the reality is that None is making gold with AI. Mission: Monetize the AI. If there is something that brings to the business of AI is How to monetize your chatbots. Subscriptions “pro” have become the appeal to get income, Some like Claude Max cost a real fortune and OpenAi He followed his steps with O3 Pro. The Subscriptions are getting more expensivebut they are not yet enough to reach the level of expenses. There is no azure or a web service that can get the chestnuts out of the fire as it is happening with the Big Tech. The exit seems clear. Advertising. At the end of last year there were rumors that they could start putting advertising in Chatgpt. At the moment it has not materialized, but Rumors have not ceased and seeing the numbers may be a solution to the profitability problem. They have not been the only ones who have flirted with this idea, Perplexity was also testing it And Elon Musk recently confirmed that There will be advertising in Grok. Very careful. Implement advertising in a chatbot is delicate since we could find ourselves in a scenario in which it ends up losing the trust of users. For example, if we go to a chatbot in the process of buying a car, we could doubt whether the recommendations are based on an advertising campaign. Integration should be clear to avoid possible confusing situations. What seems clear is that, given the serious problem of profitability, advertising stands as a more than attractive option for AI companies. In Xataka | Big Tech have buried thousands and billions in AI. They are earning money, but not thanks to the AI

An app to go to strangers ceremonies

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Two men suited sneak into a wedding. No one knows them, but there they are: providing with champagne, laughing with the guests and looking to flirt on the dance floor. It is one of the first scenes of Wedding wedding, The comedy starring Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn in which the unthinkable played in play: infiltrate others. What looked like an absurd fantasy today begins to happen really. In France, it is no longer necessary to invent excuses or disguise yourself as a distant cousin: it is enough to download an application, pay entrance and sit at the wedding of complete strangers. This has come Invitin. The app that converts love into an entrance ticket. Created this year by the entrepreneur Katia Lekarski, exmodel and founder of Digital Platforms of Child Design, Invitin functions as a Wedding Airbnb. Couples publish their celebration, set the price per person and those interested buy their seat. The company stays with a 15%commission. As explained to The Guardianthe idea arose when their five -year -old daughter asked him why they never invited them to weddings. “I thought: what if you could pay the entrance to a wedding just like you pay a guided tour or dinner with strangers?” He said. Anyone enters. As they detail on your websitethe bride and groom can review the profiles of the attendees and they must sign a code of conduct: arrive punctual, dress elegant, not to drink in excess and not publish photos without authorization. The concept is not entirely new. In India, the company Join My Wedding It already connects foreign tourists with local couples who celebrate traditional links, under the motto: “You have not been in India until you have attended an Indian wedding“. There, attending a ceremony can cost about $ 250 per person and is sold as a cultural experience. Invitin takes that logic, but adapts it to the European context: it is not about offering folklore to visitors, but that French couples finance part of their wedding by making it a shared event. The first wedding with unknown payment. The pioneers were Jennifer, 48 -year -old actress, and Paulo, exatleta, 50, who married this August in a country house near Paris. With an 18 -month -old son and after getting to get to an appointment app, they decided to try Invitin after discovering it at a bridal fair. Its history, Collection by The Guardianhe has detailed that they sold five tickets to 130 euros each, who joined their 80 family and friends. The new “payment guests” enjoyed the whole day: votes in the garden, cocktail with live music, formal dinner (with vegetarian option, since the bride does not eat meat) and the posterior party. How much is intimacy? According to Jennifer, money is almost secondary. “It helps to cover decoration or dress, but we do it because we are outgoing and we think it could be fun to share. In addition, we have many more single friends than single men, so this helps to balance things a bit,” Daily Mail explained. Buyers – or guests – also live it as an opportunity. Laurène, 29, He has confessed to The Guardian that I saw it as “a way of living a different wedding and traditions” in a happy atmosphere. However, the model is not exempt from controversy. In Daily Mailsome readers described the practice of “shabby”, remembering that the word “guest” loses all its meaning if it implies paying. In fact, they remember a case of a New York couple who asked for $ 333 per person to friends and family to marry the Cathedral of San Patricio. The outcome was with 80% of the guests refusing to attend. Lekarski defends, however, that it is a cultural and experiential phenomenon, not just financial. Figaro Gather couples testimonies They see it as an opportunity to replace absent guests, expand the list without shooting costs or even creating new friends. A Russian user has summarized it thus: “Attending French weddings will allow me to better understand their traditions and culture.” The transformation to the show. The phenomenon does not arise from nothing. In the last decade, weddings have become Macro events. As my partner has pointed out in Xatakathere is an authentic “fever” for watching weddings in social networks, with videos that accumulate millions of views in Tiktok and Instagram. The bride and groom are looking for viral moments: theatrical entries, fireworks, rehearsed choreographies. At the same time, the costs shoot. In Spain a link can cost what an average worker earns in a whole year. The tendency to fatten the invoice includes eccentric ideas: Tattooists in the Convitevirtual reality cabins, thematic photocalls. Even controversial restrictions are imposed, as “without alcohol” weddings For fashion Healthyto despair of the guests. In that context, Invitin is almost a logical consequence: if weddings are already lived as a show and are unassumable for many couples, why not turn them into an event shared with payment tickets? From the Airbnb sofa to the altar. Today the app adds only hundreds of users and a few confirmed links, but its founder already dreams of expanding to the US and European tourism. And it would not be strange if he did it: after all, we have already normalized sleeping in the bed of a stranger with Airbnb or dinner at someone’s house we don’t know through Eatwith. Logic is the same: transform the intimate in payment experience. First was hospitality, then the family table and now the wedding. Invitin does not invent anything, simply pushes a border more: if we rent the living room and bed, why not also the “yes, I want”? The question is if we will see weddings in Spain soon with payment entry, in a country where the links are especially expensive and the banquet is almost sacred. Because, for now, Invitin is a French experiment, but its incentives – a budget and convert an intimate rite into show – are universal. Epilogue. In Wedding weddingthe protagonists … Read more

Russia wants to end WhatsApp and Telegram. To do so, he will force his own messaging app accused of spying

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Russia has just moved a key piece on its digital control board. The government has ordered that all mobile phones and tablets that are marketed in the country They must come with a new pre -installed application: ‘Max’, a messaging service promoted by the State that, according to critics, is designed as a Powerful government surveillance tool. It coincides with other restrictions. This new measure occurs just a week after the Russian regulator, Roskomnadzor, will begin to restrict voice calls in services as popular as WhatsApp and Telegram, punishing them for Your refusal to deliver data of its users to the authorities. ‘Max’, the forced replacement that is integrated with the government. This new application does not start from zero. It will replace another messaging application developed by the Russian technological giant VK, which was already mandatory since 2023. However, ‘Max’ goes one step further, since it will be integrated directly with government services, further centralizing the communication of citizens through a platform controlled by the Kremlin. And now has achieved 18 million downloads According to official sources. This measure is part of a law in force since 2021 that forces Smartphone, tablets and computers to include Software of Russian origin. Although the official justification is the protection of citizens’ data, digital rights organizations have been denouncing that the real objective is limit digital freedoms and monitor population activity. An increased control from the war with Ukraine. The campaign against foreign messaging services have been drastically intensified since 2022. The Russian government repeatedly accuses platforms such as Telegram of being used by Ukraine for Ukraine recruit agents and organize terrorist actors in its territory. In this way, as part of its strategy, the Kremlin has already ordered officials and legislators to leave their telegram channels and migrate to ‘Max’. All for your own safety. Or they sell it. The first blow affected WhatsApp and Telegram. Before imposing his new app, Russia had already begun to degrade the experience of competition. Roskomnadzor announced “measures to counteract criminals”, which translated into a Selective restriction of voice calls In WhatsApp and Telegram. Currently, calls on these platforms barely work, since users in Russia are reporting a dumb -plagued service and distorted audio. It is a subtle, but effective way to make applications less useful and frustrating for its combined base of almost 200 million users in the country. The regulator has affirmed that functionality will be restored when applications “begin to comply with Russian legislation”, something that is considered extremely unlikely. Therefore, the degradation of the service could only be the prelude to a total blockade. The ecosystem closes: Rustore mandatory in Apple. The Kremlin plan is not limited to messaging software. The same date that ‘Max’ becomes mandatory, on September 1, another key imposition also enters into force: Rustore, the Russian National Applications Store, It must be pre -installed on all Apple devices. Until now, it was already mandatory on all Android devices sold in the country. With this movement, Russia ensures not only that your applications are on the devices, but also to control the main software distribution channel, closing the circle of its sovereign digital ecosystem. While the authorities insist that these measures are necessary to prevent terrorism and protect minors, for opponents the reality is another: the construction of a great digital firewall to isolate and monitor their citizens. It is not the only country that applies limitations. China with the Impossibility of accessing Google services From its territory, it is a clear example of how countries try to Apply controls to your citizens. North Korea is also another example where A unique operating system is imposed and access to technology is extremely controlled. Images | Igorn In Xataka | Change WhatsApp and Telegram for a European alternative: how to do it and what you should take into account

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