blame

60% of truck drivers drive fatigued and are clear about who is to blame

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Fatigue, tiredness and drowsiness while driving. The conclusions are as clear as they are worrying. 60% of truck drivers drive fatigued, according to a study by the European Transport Workers’ Federation (ETF) that criticizes the inaction of the European Union in the face of what it considers “a safety crisis” caused by lower wages than recommended and pressing stress. “A security crisis”. This is how Livia Spera, General Secretary of ETF (European Transport Workers’ Federation), defines the situation in the sector, in words collected by Transportation Diary: “For many professional drivers, every day is the longest. Fatigue is systematically built into their working conditions. This represents a safety crisis generated by unfair wages, poor application of regulationsdisproportionate pressure and supply chains that prioritize the lowest price over a sustainable road transport industry” The words were spoken during the report presentation ceremony Driver fatigue in road transport. It highlights the problem of fatigue at the wheel and the pressing need to take action to the European Commission. The data. ETF (European Transport Workers’ Federation) It is a union organization which brings together unions and labor organizations from all over Europe since 1999 and represents five million workers through 200 organizations. What they have presented to the European Union is a report that contains the following data: 60% of truck drivers and 66% of bus and coach drivers said they drive while tired on a regular basis. 772 drivers said they almost crashed or caused a major traffic accident due to driver fatigue. Almost a third of truck drivers and a quarter of coach drivers reported having fallen asleep at the wheel while driving. 57% of bus and coach drivers and 52% of truck drivers say they would like to stop and take a break when they feel tired but cannot due to work reasons. Because? For ETF the reasons are clear: labor problems. They assure in their report that this chronic fatigue among truck and bus drivers is caused by low salaries, the impossibility of knowing the work time ahead of them, that the rest time is not real or that the facilities and spaces for resting and sleeping are not well equipped. These reasons are repeatedly pointed out by the unions that in March They already threatened to strike so that Social Security recognizes their right to early retirement, ensuring that these workers face a constant risk given the high accident rate in the sector. In 2024, in fact, road transport was the sector with the most work accidents with fatal results. were counted in Spain. That year, 138 transportation and storage employees died during their work day in our country. Drivers are missing. In Xataka We have been talking about the pressing lack of truck drivers that is putting pressure on the market and resulting in insufficient rest times and excessively long days. Last November 2025 It was already estimated that Europe is short three million truck drivers despite the fact that 85% of the goods are moved with their work. In Spain, the problem is just as serious. In fact, it is estimated that in our country 30,000 more truck drivers are needed to handle all the accumulated work. Countries like Morocco either Türkiye They have become a fishing ground for workers due to the lack of labor. and bad conditions. “My wheels were in terrible shape, completely smooth, and the ones on the back platform burst. (The truck) made me the scissors (…). I went into the ditch, against a river.” The narration is by Roberto Pérez, a truck driver interviewed by The Country who told his experience about his biggest scare behind the wheel. He reported that the wheels of his truck were finished and that they ended up bursting. This, along with fatigue and rest times, is the other great demand of the sector. In 2023, The DGT reported that a campaign lasting just one week left 72 trucks immobilized that did not comply with minimum safety conditions. And the problem has been recurring for years. In 2021a company was accused of homicide because its worker died in an accident caused by the poor condition of the tires. In addition, the truck had more than a million kilometers behind it and the MOT had expired. Two years lateranother company was investigated for forcing its driver to drive with wheels in poor condition, with the worker himself notifying the Civil Guard to immobilize the truck. Photo | Bhargav Panchal In Xataka | Four trucks and a total of zero truckers: China seeks solutions to a huge labor crisis

Triton has been looking like a strange moon for decades and the worst thing is that it seems to be entirely to blame

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Neptune It’s a strange planetboth for himself and for his environment. For starters, it’s tilted in a somewhat strange way. Its axis is 28º. It is not outrageous if we compare it with the 23º of the Earth. However, it is quite puzzling, because according to traditional planetary formation models, it should be much closer to zero. On the other hand, most of Neptune’s moons are very different from those of the rest of the gas giants. He only has one that could fit the predictions. But what about the rest? These questions have long intrigued astronomers. Now, thanks to two recently published studies, there are hypotheses for each of these phenomena. The curious thing is that both point to Triton’s guilt. A violent irruption. According to models recently made for the publication of two studies differentNeptune’s anomalies could have been due to the irruption of Triton into its satellite system. Possibly, during the dawn of Neptune, there would be several Moons rotating around it, all in the same direction. However, a passing Kuiper Belt object came close enough to be gravitationally attracted to Neptune. It was traveling in the opposite direction, so it violently burst into the window system, like a car bursting onto the highway in the wrong direction. Many moons shot out of the Neptune orbit. Others ended up directly destroyed. Only one, Nereid, stayed there, but with a much longer orbit. As for Neptune, its axis suffered that new inclination that does not fit with that of models of a calm planetary youth. Clues that didn’t add up. Neptune has 16 moons around it. The rarest is Tritonbecause it rotates in the opposite direction to that of Neptune and, due to its composition, it looks more like an object in the Kuiper belt than the Moon of a gas giant. Then we have Nereid, which is in an abnormally elliptical orbit, in which it takes 360 days to orbit the planet. The rest are much more homogeneous satellites, but too small and not very massive for what would be expected from the moons of a gas giant. Nereid, having such a rare orbit, has long attracted the attention of astronomers. When it was recently analyzed more closely with the help of the James Webb Space Telescope, it was found to be more similar in composition to the icy moons of other gas giants, such as Saturn or Uranus, than to a Kuiper Belt object. With all this in mind, it was decided to carry out a series of computer simulations, thanks to which we already have an answer. The most likely story. In 20% of the simulations, the result was a case unleashed by Triton. When it was attracted by Neptune, it destroyed the satellite system initial of this planet, as we have seen previously. Nereid held on without destroying itself or flying out of orbit. However, its orbit was deformed, giving rise to the strange orbit it has today. As for the rest of the moons, many of them became debris that regrouped under the effect of gravity, giving rise to the rings of Neptune. Furthermore, some of those fragments became the small moons that orbit the planet today. Triton, the cause of chaos, remained in a fairly stable orbit, becoming just another moon. Of course, a moon that rotates against the current, as a clue to the cosmic chaos that it unleashed at the time. A probe is needed to confirm. All this makes a lot of sense, but it is still a hypothesis with a not too high percentage of success in the simulations. The authors of the study insist that it will be necessary to send a probe to study Neptune closely and clarify the answers. Still, it is possible that Nereid is the only moon capable of truly telling us about Neptune’s past. It is a rare moon, but because it has endured a lot to be able to remain there. Image|NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Joseph DePasquale (STScI), Naomi Rowe-Gurney (NASA-GSFC) In Xataka | We have been deceived by the distances of the Solar System: the closest neighbor to Neptune is Mercury

Neither Robotaxi nor Cybercab. Elon Musk is having a hard time naming his autonomous taxi, and now it’s French sparkling water to blame

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It will soon be a year since Tesla’s first autonomous taxis began to roll And to this day the creature still does not have an official name. AND not because Elon Musk hasn’t tried. First it ran into the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and now it has been a French sparkling water company. rookie mistake. Tesla may have the technology of the future rolling on the streets, but when it held the ‘We, Robot’ event in 2024 in which it presented the Cybercab, it forgot a small detail: it announced the name without having officially registered the brand. This is where Unibev comes into play, a French beverage company, which saw the perfect opportunity to troll the richest man in the world. The patent troll. What Unibev did is a clear case of patent thief (or troll, as they would say in ‘Silicon Valley’). Taking advantage of Tesla’s oversight, six days after the announcement, the company registered the name Cybercab and it doesn’t seem like it’s because they want to call their sparkling water that way, but rather to simply be annoying. The company already had a history of trolling Musk and in addition to Cybercab they also registered Cybertaxi, Robocab Systems, XCab, Cyber ​​Diner, Teslaquila, Teslaquila Hard Seltzer and With a Touch of Musk. Some horny ones. The answer. The USPTO suspended Tesla’s application because Unibev had beaten them to it, but Tesla did not sit idly by and filed a lawsuit of more than 150 pages in which they accuse Unibev of bad faith and having acted as a patent thief. Having registered before is not synonymous with victory, since simply proving that Unibev does not manufacture vehicles the authority should rule in favor of Tesla. In their application, Unibev said they could use the name for “a car, a ship or a plane.” It seems easy enough to dismantle, the problem is that the litigation could extend until 2027. If Unibev wins the dispute, Tesla could be forced to negotiate the use of the name outside the US and even have to use another name in certain markets. And ‘robotaxi’?. Tesla too tried to register the trademark ‘Robotaxi’but the USPTO told them that nanai. The reason had nothing to do with any patent thief, but because it is “used to describe similar products and services of other companies. (…) This expression appears to be generic in the context of the applicant’s products and/or services.” The USTPO comes to say that it is too standard a name, it would be like registering the ‘taxi’ trademark. There is still more. The organizational chaos does not end with taxis, the same thing also happened with its autonomous minibus, presented with great fanfare as “Robovan.” The problem is that Tesla announced it without first having verified that the brand was already registered by an Estonian delivery company. Tesla has had to look for less attractive alternatives such as “Robobus”, “Robus” or “Cyberbus”. About launching autonomous vehicles with super-advanced technology, well, that’s all the paperwork. Image | tesla In Xataka | Tesla robotaxis are autonomous, except when driven by a man from Texas

The greatest Japanese military taboo after the Second World War has just been blown up. China and North Korea are to blame

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In 1945, Japan emerged from World War II with a new Constitution that, in practice, prevented him have again offensive aircraft carrier. Eight decades later, one of its largest ships is once again preparing to operate fighter jets from the deck alongside the US Marines. Japan leaves its historical limits behind. Japan is entering a military phase that for decades avoided describing openly. He “Kaga”officially classified as a helicopter destroyer, will operate in June F-35B stealth fighters of the US Marine Corps in joint exercises that definitively bring the country closer to a light aircraft carrier capability. The gesture is much more important than it seems because it breaks a deeply rooted political and historical barrier since World War II: the idea that Japan should strictly limit its offensive capabilities. Tokyo continues to avoid the term “aircraft carrier,” but operational reality is beginning to look more and more like classic shipborne aviation. The Kaga and a return. The transformation of the “Kaga” and its twin “Izumo” It has been underway for years, but now it is entering the truly decisive phase: operate fighter aircraft fifth generation from deck in real conditions. The planned exercises with the US F-35B will include “cross-deck” maneuvers, where Marine aircraft take off and land from a Japanese ship. all this requires modifications depth in the deck, thermal resistance to withstand vertical landings and new coordinated procedures between pilots, sailors and technical personnel. Although Japan has placed the F-35Bs under the control of its Air Force and not the Navy, the practice brings the country enormously closer to having fully functional small aircraft carriers. A US Marine Corps F-35B lands aboard Kaga during training exercises in 2024 China and North Korea behind. The great driver of this transformation is the deterioration of the strategic environment in the Indo-Pacific. China multiply your pressure naval around Taiwan and the East China Sea as North Korea maintains a constant capacity of military destabilization. In this context, Tokyo needs to disperse its air capacity and reduce dependence on vulnerable ground bases. There the F-35B enters: a fighter capable of taking off over very short distances or landing vertically from relatively small decks. For Japan, this offers enormous flexibility in an archipelago full of islands and long sea distances. Each converted ship expands the number of platforms from which the country can project air power. USA as accelerator. The direct involvement of the US Marine Corps makes clear the extent to which Washington is acting as an accelerator of Japanese military transformation. The Marines already made the first historic landings on the “Izumo” in 2021 and since then they have accompanied practically all phases of the program. The “Kaga” even traveled to the United States for specific tests with F-35B and has already operated alongside British and American aircraft linked to the aircraft carrier HMS Prince of Wales. More than simple maneuvers, these exercises serve to integrate allied doctrines, logistics and procedures in a possible regional crisis scenario. The Indo-Pacific is filling up. The change also reflects a broader trend: the proliferation light aircraft carrier and ships capable of operating F-35Bs throughout the US allied network. United Kingdom, Italy, South Korea and potentially Spain sfollow similar paths to maintain embarked aviation without the need for gigantic nuclear supercarriers. He F-35B It has thus become the centerpiece of a new generation of medium navies capable of projecting air power from relatively compact platforms. Japan fits that model perfectly, especially in a scenario where war in the Pacific could force aircraft, ammunition and fuel to be dispersed across multiple moving points. The real test begins now. Until now, much of the Japanese program had still been experimental or symbolic. The real test begins with regular operations, long deployments and the ability to sustain stealth fighters on deck for weeks. That is where it will be measured if the “Kaga” It definitively ceases to be a “helicopter destroyer” to become, in practice, a a light aircraft carrier fully operational. And there, too, the most profound change is perceived: Japan is gradually leaving behind the defensive military culture to adapt to an increasingly Indo-Pacific more militarizedcompetitive and unpredictable. Image | hunini In Xataka | Japan has just crossed a line unprecedented since World War II: China has responded with supersonic missiles In Xataka | Japan has made a historic decision in the face of US uncertainty: deploy missiles that reach North Korea and China

If your hard drives disconnect on their own, an underpowered USB Hub may be to blame. With these you won’t have that problem

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If you usually use a hub to connect hard drives, mice, keyboards and other accessories or peripherals, perhaps at some point it has happened to you that they disconnect randomly. That’s especially worrying with hard drives, because you can lose data. Today we are going to tell you why the problem is not the hard drive, but surely the hub USB you have. The price could vary. We earn commission from these links How does a hub Hub without external power. The hubSpeaking of models that do not require external power, they are accessories that generally have fairly low prices, although it depends a lot on the brand. They act like port multipliersince connecting them to a single port on the computer (generally USB-A or USB-C) allows us to connect two or more devices to the hub. They are usually quite cheap, small and there is a wide variety to choose from, with different formats (elongated, square and even round). To use them you only have to connect them to a USB port on your computer, without the need to also connect them to a power outlet. AND here is its main limitation. The energy required to use it comes directly from the computer, so the power will be limited to what the port offers. Furthermore, the maximum power is always divided by the hub (so that it can work) and the number of devices that we connect. To give you an idea, a standard USB 3.0 gives 900 mA. A mechanical hard drive can require almost all of that to boot. If you add a keyboard with lights, the system collapses. How does a hub with external power Hub with external power. The hub with external power they are less frequent, more expensive and often larger. Here we can identify the hub assets, which are usually cheaper, and Docking Stationwhich are larger and come with more ports, including some video ones. With this type of hub We are not so limited to the power that the computer’s USB port can offer. In practice, this means that in many cases the power does not have to be divided when connecting two or more devices, although there are exceptions: some USB ports of the hub Active devices require so much energy that they prioritize these ports, something that we can see in those USB-C (Power Delivery) that are aimed at charging devices such as mobile phones compatible with fast charging. It is worth mentioning that the hubs assets come with a USB-C PD (Power Delivery) port. They don’t come with a transformer, but if you connect the laptop charger to them, they become “powered.” And… what are they for? Both the hub assets like Docking Station They are ideal if you are looking to connect devices that require high power, such as mobile phones, monitors or hard drives and SSD drives. By way of differentiation: It’s a hub passive if: It just has a short cable coming out of it and nothing else. It’s a hub active if: It has an extra port that says “DC 5V” or “USB-C Power Delivery (PD).” It is a Docking Station if: It is large, heavy, has its own power brick (like that of a laptop) and has video connectors such as DisplayPort or several HDMIs. The good and the bad of both options, face to face Hub without external power hub with external power THE GOOD 🟢 They are cheaper, more compact and lighter. They offer better stability when connecting many devices and usually have a greater number and variety of ports. THE BAD 🔴 The power is limited to what the computer’s USB port offers, so you may experience power outages in certain cases. They are more expensive and tend to be larger and heavier. Ideal for: Keyboards, mice, microphones or flash drives (pendrive). Mobile phones with fast charging, hard drives and SSD drives and monitors. We do the math to see which one can compensate you more. Both options have their positive and negative points, so the choice lies in how we are going to use them. If it is still not completely clear to you, let’s see it with an example. If you want to use a hub sporadically because you are not going to connect many devices at the same time, it may be worth it to buy a hub without external power. Actual use: Let’s say you want to connect two low-power devices. The accounts: You save between 70 and 80 (or more) euros between the cost of a hub without external power and another with external power. Also, if you chose this second option, you would not be squeezing it, since you are going to connect low-power devices. So? If you want to connect a mouse and keyboard (because they are wired or because you want to recharge them) and you still have a free USB port on your computer to connect a hard drive, this type of hub It can serve you very well. However, if what you want is to connect several devices, low or high power, and you do not have any more free USB ports on the computer or they are in an area that is not easily accessible to use them, it will be more useful for you to go for a hub with external power. Actual use: Let’s say you want to connect many devices to the hubsome need more and others less power. The accounts: You pay more for this type of hubbut it allows you to connect practically any device. So? You can have a greater number of connected devices (depending on the hub), and it will give you “the same” what to connect, whether it is a keyboard or a hard drive because it will offer a stable connection. Also, as a utility, if you have the computer under the desk or in some area that is difficult to access, you will not have to bend down to … Read more

We believed that Generation Z was returning en masse to the Church. An error in a survey is to blame for the mirage

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Stadiums vibrating with thousands of twenty-somethings raising their arms, eyes closed, singing to god. International pop stars posing in nun’s habits on the covers of their most anticipated albums. And, as a backdrop, an incessant barrage of headlines announcing the unthinkable: the massive return of the youth to the church pews. Over the past few months, the world seemed to witness a fascinating twist in the script. Generation Z, the most secular and secularized demographic cohort in history, was re-embracing Christianity. However, when you scratch the surface of this apparent spiritual awakening, what emerges is not a collective epiphany, but a trap. A gigantic demoscopic mirage. What they sold us as the great rebirth of faith is, in reality, a monumental miscalculation where the armies of artificial intelligence, the mischief of paid online surveys and the desire to believe in a revival have completely distorted the true—and much more complex—religious transformation of young people. We believed that faith was returning to the streets, but the fault was in the method. The spark that ignited the narrative of the great Christian revival jumped in the United Kingdom with the publication of the report The Quiet Revivalcommissioned by the Bible Society. Based on survey data YouGov, The study showed a spectacular figure: monthly church attendance among English and Welsh young people aged 18 to 24 had quadrupled, going from a marginal 4% in 2018 to a resounding 16% in 2024. The news spread like wildfire. Entire dioceses held conferences to “turn up the volume” on this revival, and politicians in the British Parliament used the report as proof that “Christianity is neither oppressed nor decayed,” as reported by BBC. However, demographic experts were quick to raise alarm bells. Surveys considered the “gold standard” of sociology for using random probability samples—such as the British Social Attitudes wave Labor Force Survey— showed a diametrically opposite film. According to these rigorous metersthe percentage of practicing Christians between 18 and 34 years old had not only not risen, but had fallen from 8% in 2018 to 6% in 2024. The danger of surveys opt-in If young people are not filling the churches, where do the miracle figures come from? The answer lies in the architecture of the internet itself. The report of the Bible Society was based on surveys opt-inthat is, panels where users voluntarily register in exchange for financial rewards or points. Demographer Conrad Hackett warns that this format suffers an “existential threat.” Those who respond to these surveys usually seek to maximize your profits filling out questionnaires at full speed, lying about their age to access more surveys, or using Virtual Private Networks (VPN) from other countries to get paid in hard currency. Worse still, Artificial Intelligence has come into play. The researchers have detected armies of chatbots programmed to imitate humans and fill out surveys en masse. The fake young people in these polls are so unreliable that, in similar studies carried out in the USA12% of those surveyed opt-in under 30 years old even stated that he had a license to pilot a nuclear submarine. The “great awakening” was largely an algorithmic hallucination. The situation in our land In Spain, the optical illusion is similar. Phenomena like Hakuna Group Music They managed to bring together 12,000 young people at the Vistalegre Palace, while events such as Calls They gathered 6,000 people at the Movistar Arena. Both are betting on Contemporary Worship Music (CWM), an evangelization format of Protestant and evangelical heritage, full of giant screens, pop-rock and raw emotions. But the noise of the stadiums clashes head-on with the silence of the parishes. The comparison of the official reports of the Spanish Episcopal Conference (CEE) is devastating. If we analyze the transition from the previous exercises to the most recent data, the fall of the sacraments is an undeniable constant: Baptisms: They fell from 152,426 registered in 2023 at 146,370 in 2024which represents a year-on-year decrease of 3.97%. The magnitude of the collapse is better understood if we look in the rearview mirror: in 2007the Church celebrated no less than 325,271 baptisms annually. Communions and weddings: Inertia drags the rest of the life cycle. First communions fell by almost 5% (standing at 154,677), and Catholic marriages fell by 6%, remaining at a reduced 31,462 ecclesiastical unions. Institutional collapse has other profound social consequences. Given the collapse of baptismal prayers, more than 150 Spanish town councils now offer “civil baptisms” or lay welcome ceremonies to celebrate the arrival of newborns. At the same time, the bleeding of vocations has left Spain with only 15,285 priests, whose average age is around a worrying 65 years. The problem It’s so pressing that has forced bishoprics like that of Tui-Vigo to make lay women official to lead “Celebrations of the Word” in the villages in the face of the total lack of priests. The only discordant note—the small statistical lifeline to which the Church clings—is the baptism of children over 7 years of age. This figure experienced a reboundrising from 11,835 in 2023 to 13,323 in 2024. A figure that suggests a paradigm shift in Spanish Catholicism: conversions that are much more thoughtful, personal and less conditioned by “cultural” inertia. The great gap between Spirituality and Religion To understand Generation Z in Spain, two concepts must be drastically separated: the Catholic institution and the search for the transcendent. Here comes into play what my partner in Xataka defined as: “The 29-59% paradox.” According to the Barometer on Religion and Beliefs in Spain (BREC) of 202561% of young people between 18 and 24 years old declare themselves indifferent, agnostic or atheist. Only 29% define themselves as Catholic, a figure much lower than the 46% national average. However, just because they don’t set foot in a church doesn’t mean they are pure materialists. That same report reveals that 59% of young people firmly believe in the existence of the soul and 45% in “energies.” As the sociologist Mar Griera explainswe are not facing a return to dogma, … Read more

The return to the Moon is delayed again and now helium is to blame

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If at this point someone tells you that NASA has delayed the mission again Artemis IIthe most logical thing is to think that they are playing a joke on you, since the list of accumulated postponements begins to border on comedy. And the last one is not for less, since after announcing that the last tests had been a success, hours later we knew that the mission scheduled in the window that opened on March 6 has been postponed again and the rocket returns to its ‘garage’. The new culprit. If one of the great enemies was hydrogen, which already forced delay the first date that we had for 2026, now the focus has been on helium. And, after the second general test with fuel that we saw last fridayengineers have detected a new technical problem in the propulsion system of the SLS superrocket. Specifically, it is an interruption in the flow of helium in the intermediate cryogenic stage. AND it’s not a minor mattersince this gas is absolutely essential to purge the engines and pressurize the cryogenic fuel tanks in order to ensure mission safety. And although everything worked well in the previous tests, during the post-test the system said “enough.” To the starting box. As confirmed by NASA itself on its official blog this February 21, as well as Jared Isaacman, current administrator of the agency, via Xthe team is evaluating the situation, but the decision has already been made: rollback. Repairs cannot be done outdoors on the launch pad, forcing the behemoth SLS to be returned to its garage, technically known as the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB). The possible causes of this failure range from a blocked filter to a failure in the umbilical interface or the check valve, which are technical ghosts that are dangerously reminiscent of the problems that already tortured Artemis I in 2022 and that generated a situation of constant delays that took away all the seriousness of the mission. The new window. With March completely off the calendar, everything points to April, if it resolves quickly enough and passes the next general test. Although, given what we have seen, fixing one problem causes a completely different problem to arise, so saying a date is real nonsense. The chronology. Making a list of all the critical points in the mission that was to put four humans back into lunar orbit is almost a titanic and memory challenge, but we are going to illustrate it to make clear the context of delays that we have seen in this mission that has been going on for years. It all starts in November 2024, which was the original launch date. Throughout 2024, the mission was scheduled from September 2025 to April 2026 after discovering severe damage in the heat shield of the Orion capsule during Artemis I. In March 2025, a little light was seen when it was pointed out that the mission could be brought forward until February 2026. January 2026: a winter storm delay transfer to the launch pad. February 2, 2026: the first dress rehearsal is aborted with 5 minutes left due to a hydrogen leak liquid. February 21, 2026: After fixing the leak, the second rehearsal is a success and announces the date of March 6 with great fanfare… and in the end the helium fails, throwing March overboard. Doubts about the future. The bad experience with Artemis I and II already makes us doubt everything that NASA has planned in the future. Artemis III is the next major space project that aims to land at the south pole of the Moon and for man to set foot on lunar soil again. A mission that has already been delayed until 2027 in order to further perfect the capsule and the suits space. But the real focus is on Mars with the goal of humans setting foot on the red planet for the first time. A much more complex mission as it involves a much greater distance and a mission time that requires the astronauts to travel for many more days, with all the security implications that this entails. China. The great competitor of the United States in this space race, which has a great political component behind it. And while NASA turns its calendars into wet paper, on the other side of the world the Chinese space program follows a methodical rhythm, opaque in its crises, but at the moment relentless in its dates. Right now the goal is to put taikonauts on the lunar surface by 2030, and although the United States there is still room for temporary advantagethe image contrast is brutal: while the SLS suffocates between hydrogen leaks and helium failures under the spotlights around the planet, the Chinese space agency (CNSA) continues to chain millimeter successes with its Chang’e robotic missions. Images | POT In Xataka | Two Spanish space giants have joined forces to take 5G defense satellites into space: PLD Space and Sateliot

The special effects of 2025 are worse than those of 2010. And part of the blame lies with us viewers

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When James Cameron released ‘Avatar’ in 2009, the film industry contemplated what seemed the future of visual effects. The film set a technical standard that, paradoxically, today’s cinema not only has not surpassed, but often does not even reach. The problem is not technological: software tools have advanced exponentially since then. But the industry has evolved in a way that everything looks worse than before. The sooner, the better. It is not necessary to go to the undisputed peak of the digital image that represented Cameron’s movie. ‘Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest’ featured Davy Jones and his beard of tentacles, one of the best live-action CGI integrations ever seen. ‘Interstellar’ featured the participation of astrophysicist Kip Thorne for their spatial sequences. It is enough to compare the photorealistic texture of Na’vi or Jones with the plasticized finishes of Marvel or DC to see that something fundamental has changed in the way of producing special effects. The common denominator in all of them was time. In this analysis about the visual effects crisisit is explained that the productions of that decade had post-production calendars that ranged between 18 and 24 months. ‘Avatar’ He had two full years for the effects phase. Its consequences have started from comparable times. The spectacular images in ‘Inception’ of the city folding in on itself, another milestone of the era, took months of planning. Luxuries that are practically unthinkable today. Increasingly. The problem is the quantity. The latest studies indicate that while a commercial film from 2010 contained approximately 600 shots with visual effects, current productions usually exceed 3,000 shots. This 400% increase has not been accompanied by proportional budgets or calendars. Quite the opposite: hasty effects, poorly worked compositions and a digital homogenization that detracts from the personality of the images. Tremendous expectations In your situation analysisTreehouse Detective explains the case of the prequel to ‘The Thing’, which in 2011 remade John Carpenter’s 1982 classic. The special effects team Studio ADI, led by Alec Gillis and Tom Woodruff Jr., built physical creatures with animatronics and prosthetics over several months of pre-production. After test screenings, Universal Pictures made a decision that Gillis would rate how devastating: Almost all practical work was replaced by CGI in post-production. Audiences expected to see digital effects in a science fiction horror film and considered practical effects “old-fashioned.” Paradigm shift. This case illustrates a profound cultural shift in expectations. During the 2010s, CGI went from being an exceptional tool for what was thought unattainable with practical effects to becoming the standard. The irony is that the greatness of films like ‘Alien’ or ‘Jurassic Park’ (where CGI was mixed with practical effects) was built precisely on the tangibility of their creatures. But the industry, and with it the audience, developed a dependence on digital finishing that is associated with prestige and quality, regardless of whether the final result can be improved with traditional effects. The economy of effects. The proliferation of streaming platforms has radically reconfigured the economics of special effects. Films produced directly for Netflix, Amazon Prime or Disney+ operate with significantly lower budgets than productions destined for cinemas, while the public maintains their visual expectations. This impossible equation has put pressure on the entire FX production chain. The era of auctions. The contract awarding system has evolved towards an auction model that prioritizes cost and speed over quality. The studios put projects into competition between multiple effects companies. The one who offers to complete the job in less time and for less money gets the contract. This process creates a competitive spiral in which small studios accept unsustainable conditions in the hope of maintaining their position in the market. Studies that close. It is a system that sometimes has extreme consequences. ‘Sonic the Hedgehog’ case: after the public’s rejection of the character’s original design, Paramount ordered a complete redesign. Moving Picture Company, the studio responsible for the effects, had to redo hundreds of shots without a deadline extension or significant additional budget. The studio closed its Vancouver headquarters shortly after, with multiple sources indicating that the project had contributed significantly to their financial problems. It is not an isolated case: Rhythm & Hues, winner of the Oscar for the effects of ‘Life of Pi’ in 2013, declared bankruptcy weeks before the awards ceremony. The company had agreed to complete the job at a loss to maintain its reputation, a pattern that media outlets such as VFX Voice have documented. Visual effects artists and technicians frequently operate in crunch to meet deadlines that were unfeasible from the beginning. The lower union rate In the visual effects sector, unlike other technical departments in film, it leaves these professionals without protection against abusive working conditions. The causes. The deterioration in the quality of the special effects does not respond to a single cause, but to pressures from two opposite directions. Movie studios have optimized their production structures to maximize profit margins, outsourcing visual effects work to companies competing in a wild race. The public has developed inflexible expectations about the omnipresence of CGI, rejecting alternatives. As technology advances, the time and money available to apply it decreases. Just compare budgets: ‘Avatar’ operated on a total budget of $237 million, of which a substantial portion was allocated specifically to technological development and visual effects over several years. Meanwhile, an MCU production distributes a similar budget among multiple items (salaries, marketing) while compressing post-production calendars to just six or eight months to meet immovable release dates, established years in advance. In Xataka | Either CGI designers get their act together or our televisions will continue to put their movies on the ropes

Netflix series are becoming more and more similar to each other and Matt Damon knows who is to blame: your cell phone

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Matt Damon has just confirmed one of the most widespread suspicions about Netflix. In one almost three hour conversation with Joe Roganwhere he appeared alongside Ben Affleck to promote ‘The Loot’, his new film, the actor revealed that the platform requires scriptwriters to constantly repeat the plot in the dialogues. The reason is that the platform assumes that the viewer is with their cell phone in hand while watching its content. Affleck went further and pointed out that streaming has built its entire business model on the assumption that no viewer pays full attention to the screen. Partial attention. Damon didn’t mince his words: if you write for Netflix, you assume from the beginning that your viewer has Instagram open in another tab or is answering WhatsApps. Affleck mentioned the concept of “partial attention,” a term that technology and behavioral studies have been dissecting for years and that now sets the rules for how to construct a dialogue. For the two actors, this has nothing to do with a conspiracy theory or union complaint: it is the real editorial policy of the platform. New era. The leap compared to traditional cinema is brutal. In a dark room there is no escape: the cell phone is silent (or it should be), the giant screen takes up the entire field of vision and the fact of being surrounded by people forces you not to get lost. Netflix plays in another league: it competes with notifications, with getting up to get something from the refrigerator, with someone commenting out loud about what just happened. And instead of standing up to this dispersion, it has chosen to adapt: ​​every five minutes someone recapitulates who is who and what the hell is going on. Netflix vs. Hollywood. This is not the first time that Hollywood has attacked streaming, although it is perhaps the most specific in technical terms. Spielberg already said in 2019 that Netflix movies should compete for Emmys instead of Oscars, and his argument was exactly this: that where you watch something determines what that something is. Scorsese went further that same yearjust as Netflix was paying him for ‘The Irishman’, and talked about the erosion of what he called the concept of “revelation”, those moments that only work if the viewer is completely immersed in the film. What Damon and Affleck bring to the table is the practical detail: we’re not talking about aesthetics or philosophy, but rather literal instructions that screenwriters receive in development meetings. In Rogan. Almost three hours of conversation where there is time for everything. Joe Rogan’s format (long conversations, no commercial breaks, no rush) allows two guys used to reciting friendly anecdotes on Jimmy Fallon’s shows to develop complex ideas. And therein lies the surprise: Affleck and Damon are not just familiar faces who sell movies, they have been inside the machinery for thirty years and know exactly how every gear works. The contrast with the usual promotional circuit is devastating: these two actors, whom many know mainly as movie stars, turn out to be sharp analysts of an industry in the midst of an existential crisis. A narrative change. What Damon and Affleck say is not an isolated case: it confirms a trend that the industry has been tracking for years. Deloitte documented in its annual report on digital trends Doing other things while watching a series is no longer the exception, it is the norm. The leap compared to the prestige television of two decades ago is evident: before the series constructed scenes without words, they left narrative gaps that the viewer had to fill in on their own, they introduced secondary characters whose importance was not clear until later seasons. David Simon, creator of ‘The Wire’, said who had designed the series like a visual novel: each episode required total concentration because crucial information could appear at any moment. The Netflix change. The platform works differently. Provides showrunners accurate data about the exact minute viewers leave a series or pause to do something else. Those metrics set the development notes: If the data shows that audiences lose interest in scenes without dialogue or complex subplots, subsequent seasons simplify the structure and multiply the verbal exposition. ‘Wednesday’ and the fifth season of ‘Stranger Things’ are recent examples of this process. Completion rate (how many users actually finish a series) has become the criterion that dictates creative decisions unthinkable a decade and a half ago. A paradox without a solution. What Damon says contains a contradiction: the technology that has allowed millions of people to access content previously reserved for movie theaters or physical distribution is changing what type of content is produced. Netflix reaches 260 million subscribers; HBO never went over 150 million in its best era. But this increase in audience comes at a cost: the narrative is simplified to accommodate viewers whose attention is divided. Can both models coexist? Recent series like ‘The Bear’ or ‘Succession’ have achieved million-dollar audiences without sacrificing ellipses, long silences or plots that demand attention. Damon’s comment perhaps functions more as a diagnosis than as a definitive sentence: it shows a tension that Hollywood has not resolved for years, the clash between the logic of streaming based on metrics and the persistence of narratives that demand concentration. If viewers look at their phones while watching series, Netflix simply recognizes that behavior and adjusts its production accordingly. But… do we want him to do it? In Xataka | lhe creative death of Marvel’s MCU left a huge hole. One that in my case is filling WWE on Netflix

The light of the light has risen a lot and the electric ones blame it for the blackout. Facua has something to say about it

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May 2025 promised to be the cheapest month thanks to the renewable generation in spring. However, consumers They have ended up paying more In the light of the light for the blackout of April 28, since they have had to activate emergency mechanisms or reinforcement systems. Now it seems that that should not have been so high. Short. Facua-Consumnadores in Action has warned the electricity marketers of the free market, In a press releasethat they cannot raise their rates unilaterally for the blackout of April 28 if that change is not provided for in the contract. A specific case. The association has loaded directly against Energía, a commercialization of the Repsol Group that has notified a 6% surcharge (about 73 euros per year), alleging an “increase in technical costs of the system” for the electricity network reinforcement system. However, like He recalled Facuaadjustment services are not part of the regulated costs (such as tolls and charges) and, therefore, do not justify a rise in the price agreed in free market contracts. The law is clear. According to the Civil Code, contracts must be fulfilled as agreed and cannot be modified according to the will of a single part (Arts. 1256 and 1258). Exceptions would only be accepted if the contract explicitly includes a clause that allows the marketer to apply these increases by extraordinary situations such as the lived. From the other part. The employer who brings together Iberdrola, Endesa and EDP, AELEC, is pressing to distribute or contain the overrages derived from the blackout. Its proposal is to transfer these extraordinary expenses – given to operate the system in “reinforced mode” to avoid new blackouts – to other concepts of the invoice, such as regulated charges, where costs by renewable or extrapeninsular are also included, according to Finch access has had access. There are more. The employer has calculated that the reinforced security strategy has meant an extra cost of 200 million euros in just one month and requires that there be an extraordinary regulatory response, so that neither consumers nor marketers assume that impact alone. As has detailed Fifodies, are in search of a “transient and exceptional” measure that relies on operation procedures 8.2 and 14.4, already provided for in the current regulatory framework. So is it valid? Legally, the key point is the type of contract that each consumer has. In free market contracts, prices are agreed for a year and cannot be modified unless the contract expressly allows. If there is no clear and specific enabling clause, the climb would be illegal, and it could be considered an abusive clause, even if there is a notice. From Facua they support this thesis in the Civil Code and in Article 65 of Royal Legislative Decree 1/2007 on consumer defense, which establishes that contracts must be interpreted in favor of the user and according to the objective good faith. That is, although the company affirms that the surcharge is justified, if you did not sign it and is not in transparent conditions, it cannot impose it. Any forecast? Today, neither Red Eléctrica nor the Ministry for Ecological Transition have clarified how much this reinforced security operation will last, nor how its costs will be distributed. From AELEC and other associations, an intervention of the regulator or the Ministry to temporarily redesign the cost distribution is expected. The objective: avoid an irreversible impact on the electrical marketing market and contain the price escalation. Image | Seoane Prado Xataka | Broady in April, more expensive invoice in May: thus has affected the system reinforcement

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