decided

The US has decided to shoot itself in the foot and destroy one of the best AI companies in the country

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Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, published a few hours ago a statement in which he announced something unusual: the Department of Defense (DoD) has confirmed that “we have been designated as a risk to the national security supply chain” of the United States. This agency thus fulfills the threat it posed a few days ago and automatically turns Anthropic, one of the best AI companies in the country (if not the best) into a pariah company. What implications does that have? Many and all of them huge. I veto Anthropic. This designation prohibits Anthropic from doing business or developing projects for the US military. That is already serious, but it is not just the Pentagon, for example, that will not do it: any company that works with the Pentagon is also prohibited from using Anthropic’s AI services for any government project. We are facing a decision whose collateral effects could be terrible for Anthropic. The loss of revenue could be massive, and if other federal agencies follow the Pentagon’s lead, Anthropic could have a hard time defending its viability against its competitors. That designation is not immediate, and there will be a transition period six months for DoD to migrate to other vendors (like OpenAI). It had never been done with a national company. The ban on Anthropic is absolutely extraordinary, and that designation as a “supply chain risk” was a measure historically reserved for foreign adversaries like Huawei. By applying this label to an American company, the DoD severs its commercial ties and marks the company with a stigma, a kind of “scarlet letter” that could scare away global investors and partners. ethical shock. The core of the conflict is not technical, but moral. Anthropic was born as a spin-off from OpenAI with the aim of avoid existential risks in the development of AI models, and the company has always positioned itself as a great defender of alignment with human values. Its CEO, Dario Amodei, insisted that its AI could not be used for mass surveillance or for the development of lethal autonomous weaponsbut that has collided head-on with the US government and military establishments, which wanted practically total access without restrictions, except those imposed by the US Constitution and laws. to the courts. Amodei has explained in its statement that it will fight the decision in court. His argument, he explains, is that statute 10 USC 3252 It is a tool of protection, not punishment. The defense will need to focus on showing that the Department of Defense did not use the least restrictive means to ensure security. If they succeed, they could invalidate the designation, although the reputational damage has already been done. The dilemma of sovereignty. Can a private company be above the Government? The Pentagon argues that no supplier can slip through the chain of command, and one thing is certain here: for an AI to have usage clauses that limit military operations is to cede national sovereignty to a private algorithm and the terms of service of a board of directors and a CEO who have not been democratically elected. The threat of extreme interventionism. This unusual measure could end up setting a precedent. If the government punishes companies that ask uncomfortable questions or place limits on the use of their technology, AI innovation could change its philosophy. Companies that want to survive would have to do so without questioning the orders out of pure fear of bankruptcy and bankruptcy. Transition period. There is, however, a period of six months granted for the transition and that seems to make it clear that the Pentagon still depends on Anthropic technology for current operations, as demonstrated by the kidnapping of Nicolás Maduro or the current intelligence analysis of the conflict in Iran. It remains to be seen how events will evolve, but the outlook for Anthropic is certainly worrying. And for the rest of the companies too, if indeed justice rules in favor of the Department of Defense. Image | Anthropic | Xataka with Freepik In Xataka | Anthropic has become the Apple of our era and OpenAI our Microsoft: a story of love and hate

I thought portable consoles were already defined. Lenovo has decided that they can also be folded in half

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I think Lenovo is one of the brands that takes the most risks in the computer segment. And in the consoles: Lenovo Legion Go It’s a good sample. With several models under its belt, the brand has come to the MWC in Barcelona with a hybrid that is, above all, extravagant. But also original, I think there is no better way to please everyone. Do you want a portable screen to play with physical controls? Covered. A more compact panel to make it less uncomfortable? Check. Option to play with the panel vertically and horizontally? Of course. What if the controllers can become a standalone controller? And even with a mouse option. The Lenovo Legion Go Fold doesn’t marry anyone. Just because, It also has a foldable screen. Lenovo Legion Go Fold technical sheet Lenovo Legion Go Fold Concept SCREEN 11.8 inch POLED panel Resolution 2,435 x 1,712 pixels, 16:10 165Hz refresh 100% DCI-P3 500 nits Tactile DIMENSIONS AND WEIGHT 189.1 x 282.5 x 8.5mm 868 g (638 g modular + 230 g controls) PROCESSOR Intel Core Ultra 7 GRAPHIC CARD Integrated Intel Arc 140V GPU 64TOPS, 8 Xe-cores, 1.95GHz RAM 32GB LPDDR5x-8533 STORAGE 1TB PCIe SSD (Gen 4) 2242 OPERATING SYSTEM Windows 11 OTHERS Color: Eclipse Black PRICE Unspecified It is neither one thing nor another, it is everything It is not just a folding tablet, nor a video game console, nor a convertible laptop: it is everything at once. And with a format that can be expanded almost to the unimaginable within the gamer field. Goes from a tablet style surface to a console Steam Deck. Detachable, of course. Just like what happened to me with the modular laptop that Lenovo also brought to MWC, the Legion Go Fold goes a step further when you think it can’t expand further. Broadly speaking: It is a gaming tablet with anchored physical controls. It can be used both vertically and horizontally. It is a large tablet that folds in half into a smaller one. It runs Windows and has a keyboard as an accessory, so it can become a travel laptop. As was the case with the original Legion Go, the controllers can be joined together to function as an independent external controller. As a cherry on top, one of the controllers anchors to the base to become a mouse with a trigger. The device is a concept that is not yet definitive. However, it appears to be fully functional, all parts make sense, They are solid enough and they can be combined without excessive complication. Like all moving parts, the anchors are somewhat delicate to place: you have to remove a lock, slide the control down and separate it outwards. The lane is not too long, it gave me the impression that it was not as firm as it should be. Given the weight and size of the tablet, I don’t think it will be excessively comfortable for long periods of gaming. At least as long as he stays in suspense. A folding screen? Why not If it already seems strange that a tablet has two console controls anchored to the ends, seeing how the screen folds is the ultimate. Because of the size and because the folding looks somewhat rough: the edge is thick and leaves the panel exposed. However, it is the only way to fold the tablet so that it continues to function as a touch device. The folded Legion Go Fold is much more comfortable to play with. The problem is that Windows does not allow itself to be tamed to multiformat: System orientation does not adapt to portrait orientation. I also noticed different errors when resizing the windows, with the touch on the screen and with some buttons on the controls. The problems of direct. It is a concept and it is appreciated as such, a “I’m going to see how far I can go with removable elements.” The result is very curious to see, not so much to enjoy. At least in regards to everything related to the screen, because the design of the controls, its buttons, the detail of the mini-screen on one of the controls and its versatility are noteworthy. Quite far from viability Playing with an unfolded tablet of this size is not very comfortable, having physical controls attached even less so. Lenovo has already more than proven the Legion Go format, it is the path it is going to follow. And surely the experience gained with the Fold will help to improve the commercial family, such as adding a small screen to the controls. Lenovo is the PC manufacturer that usually surprises me the most with its proposals. Take risks even if these experimental products do not go beyond concepts. And when I tried them I found solid, well-thought-out devices with established technologies. I don’t think that combining a folding tablet with controls will come to fruition, but who knows. We ended up seeing it in stores the same way. Images | Ivan Linares In Xataka | Best tablets in quality price. Which one to buy based on use and recommended models

Everyone wants to take away ASML’s throne. Today ASML has decided that the throne is higher

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A team of researchers from ASML They claim to have discovered a way to increase the power of the light source used in their chip production machines. According to their conclusions, this technology would allow chip production to increase by 50% in 2030. Good news for ASML, very bad for its rivals in China and the US. 1,000 watts. Michael Purvis, the ASML engineer who led the research, explained in Reuters that “It’s not a parlor trick or anything like that. We demonstrated for a very short time that it can work. It’s a system that can produce 1000 watts with the same requirements that you might see on a customer.” An almost miraculous process. In its UVE machines ASML needs to create an extremely energetic ultraviolet light. They use a wavelength of only 13.5 nanometers, but to achieve this light the process is exquisitely complex: Microdroplets of molten tin the size of a fraction of a human hair are launched through a vacuum chamber These drops fall one after the other, more than 100,000 times per second A giant carbon dioxide laser shoots at each droplet The impact turns the tin into a very hot gas (plasma) that even exceeds the temperature of the sun. Plasma emits EUV radiation Ultra-precision mirrors manufactured by Zeiss collect that light and direct it toward the chip And it is with that light that the circuits are “drawn” on the silicon wafer with atomic precision Tech drops. What they achieve with the new system is to double the frequency of the tin drops, going to 100,000 per second, which allows more light to be generated. They also use two previous laser pulses instead of one: the first shapes the drop and prepares it. The second converts it into plasma more efficiently. More chips than ever. Currently, the machines UVE photolithography (Extreme UltraViolet) from ASML work with a power of 600 watts. This achievement would allow a 50% increase in the yield or percentage of functional chips obtained from a wafer. It is crucial to turning ASML’s chip production systems into true precision machines. wafers to me. Teun van Gogh, responsible for ASML’s NXE line of EUV machines, indicated in Reuters that the company’s intention is to make it possible for them to use this technology in a much more affordable way. If everything goes as expected, machines that take advantage of this technology will be able to process 330 silicon wafers every hour, instead of the current 220 wafers. The US tries to compete. In the United States, at least two startups, Substrate and xLight, have managed to raise hundreds of millions of dollars to develop machines that compete with those of ASML. Substrate is working in an x-ray based projectwhile xLight —led by Pat Gelsinger and with investment from the US Government— wants to use particle accelerators. And China, of course, too. China takes years trying to create machines like ASML, but so far it doesn’t seem to be succeeding. There is now talk that China has its “Manhattan Project” in this area and it seems to be closer to get your own machine with UVE technology. ASML was already leading. Now it does it even more. In both cases, the reality is clear: today ASML still has no competition. It is the master of the world in this segment, and if you want to manufacture the most advanced chips on the market, you need its machines. This new advance promises to further open the gap with its competitors, who do not have machines that can compete with ASML’s current ones… and who will have even more difficulty having those that can compete with this new advance. The future. Purvis added that this new technique could be improved in the future: “we see a reasonably clear path to 1,500 watts, and there is no fundamental reason why we cannot reach 2,000 watts.” If true, ASML could hold the key to continuing to lead this market for even longer… if rivals fail to turn the tables. And it seems complicated that they do it. Image | ASML In Xataka | Global tension cannot withstand ASML. He is going to build a huge campus equivalent to 50 football fields

In 1997 Blockbuster decided that DVD would never replace VHS. With that decision he began to dig his grave

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In 1997, Warner Bros. proposed blockbuster an exclusivity agreement to rent DVDs. The deal replicated the model that was already practiced with the VHS format, which gave 60% of income to the video store chain. Blockbuster declined because they were confident that magnetic tape would maintain its dominance for years. Warner responded by drastically cutting the wholesale prices of its records and Walmart was quick to take advantage of the opening: In less than a decade, it overtook Blockbuster as Hollywood’s biggest moneymaker. The DVD arrives. In 1997, this format arrived promising better imaging, more durability, and interactive features (we were so young). But it had a giant before it: in 1988, after defeating Sony’s Betamax format, VHS already controlled 95% of the home video market. And a decade later, in 1997, it was an empire: VHS rentals generated $10 billion annually for movie studios, with Blockbuster pocketing about half of that revenue. VHS had reasons not to be afraid: DVD players were very expensive, between $300 and $500, and VHS devices were very accessible. And they were not wrong: DVD sales would not surpass those of VHS until 2003, six years after its commercial release. Warner’s proposal. Warren Lieberfarb, head of Warner Bros.’s home video division and one of the key figures in the development of the DVD format proposed to Blockbuster a deal that replicated the VHS model: exclusive rights to rent the company’s new DVD releases before they hit stores for sale to the public. Warner would receive 40% of the rental income from those records. John Antioco, CEO of Blockbuster, had just arrived at the company after passing through Taco Bell, and his decision could be key to the company’s future. The rejection. Blockbuster decided to reject the proposal because it believed that VHS would maintain its dominance for years. As we said above, a not unreasonable assumption. Furthermore, creating an inventory of DVD movies was an unnecessary expense under the profitable and peaceful reign of VHS. Some later format releases, before the advent of DVD, possibly made Blockbuster think it had done well: JVC’s D-VHS digital tape, which allowed high-definition recording, was a flop. But Blockbuster didn’t have two things: Hollywood support for DVD and the inevitable drop in player prices. The answer. Warner Bros. responded with a strategy that would transform home cinema: it drastically reduced wholesale prices for its DVDs, in order to compete directly with the rental industry. This allowed businesses to sell records at prices that made purchasing more attractive than renting. The North American giant Walmart detected the opportunity very quickly and began to sell DVDs below the cost price, and in this way, for example, they sold their discs for 15 or 20 dollars when renting a VHS cost between 3 and 5 dollars per day. The power of Walmart. Walmart’s network of stores had power in distribution, covering the entire country, that Blockbuster could not match. In addition, it had privileged deals with suppliers and, in general, a fund and resources that allowed it to absorb the losses from the DVDs. In this way, Walmart replaced Blockbuster as the studios’ main source of income in less than a decade. This led to redefining the balance of power in the industry: the most valuable distribution channel was no longer the video store, but became large commercial stores, where consumers no longer only bought movies. Blockbuster, free fall. As is well known, It was not Blockbuster’s last catastrophic decision: in 2000, when Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph, co-founders of Netflix, approached John Antioco about selling their DVD-by-mail rental service for 50 million dollarsthe executive declined the offer. A decade later Blockbuster declared bankruptcy in 2010 while Netflix reached a valuation of billions. They are not the last. The case has parallels with recent technological transitions where dominant companies have underestimated the speed of the public’s adoption of new formats: the physical media industry believed that Blu-ray would maintain its relevance against streaming. And it is also easy to draw lines that link current technology companies with the adoption of AI: who will be the next giant to fall? Header | Stu pendousmat In Xataka | VCR Virus: the anti-copy system of the VHS era that looked like something out of a B horror movie

now Sony has decided to close the chapter on its home recorders

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The decline of physical media is a reality, but it has not come suddenly or with a single announcement, but rather as a succession of small withdrawals that, added together, mark a change of era. Streaming is gaining ground while discs, players and other devices continue to be present in an increasingly smaller background. Some recent decisions within the industry are only deepening this transformation. Another company taking a step back. Sony recently announced that from February it will progressively cease shipping all its models of Blu-ray recorders and confirmed that there will not be a subsequent generation to take over. The message identifies as part of the closure devices marketed between 2023 and 2024, including the BDZ-ZW1900 and the BDZ-FBT4200, FBT2200 and FBW2200 families. A very Japanese category. Unlike other markets where Blu-ray was mainly associated with movie playback, in Japan home recorders maintained a very specific function for years, that of recording television broadcasts for later viewing. This particularity explains why the announcement has a direct impact, especially on local consumption, where these devices were still present in many salons. However, its disappearance also functions as a symbolic sign of the extent to which even the most resistant niches begin to lose meaning when content access habits change. The temporal sequence. Kyodo News notes that the last units will be shipped this month, marking the effective end of its commercial presence. That moment comes after another less visible previous step: the company had already stopped manufacturing both the recorders themselves as of recordable discs approximately a year earlierand the remaining activity was limited to completing the product output. Streaming, and something else. The audiovisual consumption environment has changed to the point of reducing the practicality of devices that were everyday items for years. When broadcasts can be viewed at any time from online platforms, whether global services or on-demand catalogs from the networks themselves, recording them is no longer a central need. Fewer and fewer manufacturers. Sony’s movement does not appear isolated within the industry. In recent years, several relevant players have been abandoning the consumer Blu-ray market, progressively reducing the number of companies willing to support this category. Oppo completely left its player business in 2018, Samsung stopped manufacturing Blu-ray and UHD models around 2019and LG, which was still one of the big names present, ended production in 2024. The closure of these recorders does not equate to the immediate disappearance of Blu-ray as a consumer format either. Different elements of the ecosystem remain active, from home players to computer optical drives and disk catalogs maintained by other companies. This persistence, although increasingly linked to specific audiences, shows that the transition towards digital does not erase previous technologies at once. Images | Sony | Mateus Andre In Xataka | If the question is how much technology can be packed into a collector’s figure, the answer is: these robots

The US has such a big problem with Asian carp in its rivers that it has decided something extreme: electrocute them

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Back in the 70s in the United States someone had an idea to control the growth of algae, weeds and parasites from aquaculture farms in the southern states: introduce four species of carp from Asia, more specifically the bighead carpthe black carpthe grass carp and the silver carp. If you know a little about biology or ever fishing you have come across a tremendous catfishwhat happened next will not surprise you: he got into a mess. Tonight we cross the Mississippi. These four voracious “natural herbicides” released in Arkansas were colonizing the river network, first ascending the Mississippi River and its tributaries and helped by floods to reach open rivers until threatening the Great Lakes located in the northern United States, this chronology of expansion and reproduction details it the United States Geological Survey (USGS). The impressive Mississippi basin or how carp left Arkansas for the Great Lakes. Via Shannon1 They are true titans. Carp are a great example of adaptive management of invasive species: they are able to withstand different environments, can live for several decades and lay millions of eggs. Carp are in their element at the bottom of lakes, ponds or rivers and they swallow everything, since practically any organic matter will do, from plankton to small fish. So they gobble up food that native species could eat. Destination: Great Lakes. Present in every state of the continental United States, the northern Great Lakes are a destination as desirable as it is devastating. In addition to the damage to the ecosystem, a large-scale invasion would cause a catastrophe to the local economy while decimating the fishing industry, which generates approximately 7 billion dollars a year. So the Administration, scientists and environmentalists have been drawing up plans for years to keep them out of there. The grass carp has already been sighted in the lake erie. How many Asian carp can you catch? The first measure they implemented was to encourage the increase of their fishing, with tournaments such as the Redneck Fishing Tournament so that those who participate try to capture as many as they can. The problem is that fishing is not enough to decimate a species with such a reproductive desire. Michigan DNR Aquatic Species Expert Seth Herbst concludes that It would be necessary to get rid of 80% so that its population does not recover. If you can’t handle it, eat it.. In 2022 the Illinois Department of Natural Resources had an idea: use large-scale commercial fishing as an aquatic management tool to reduce population pressure. In other words: encourage human consumption of carp, which renamed “Copi”. Carp meat is rich in protein and is consumed in China and other Asian countries, so why not in the United States? The campaign is still alive and well (like the tents): on the campaign website there is a long list of recipes and restaurants in different states where you can try them. And speaking of recipes, this one from “Can’t Beat ‘Em, Eat ‘Em” (if you can’t beat ’em, eat ’em) gives more ideas for cooking this and other invasive species. The delicious Asian carp taco Chicago’s electric wall. Since 2013, the United States Army Corps of Engineers A series of permanent electric barriers are operational in the Chicago area waterway system with a direct current field of 2.3 Volts per square inch (about 0.35 Volts per square centimeter). This spark does not kill the carp, it only paralyzes them so that they do not advance and remain downstream. Of course, this method is not infallible: changes in water levels or the salt used for defrosting can alter the conductivity of the water and, therefore, the effectiveness of this method. In addition, smaller specimens can escape into shelters that form between boats. And one obvious thing: it affects carp and non-carp fish, thus altering their behavior. And yet, it continues to be used. Looking for the infallible system against carp. In the river basins of Illinois they have tried walls of bubbles made from a pipe, thus obstructing their vision. Its sound also serves as a warning. The problem? That also affects native species. And one step further, a variant in the form of cavitation curtains in which the bubbles are broken to disturb the fish. This method was the winner of the contest Carp Tankwith a succulent reward of $500,000 to whoever came up with the definitive idea. Brandon Road Dam Project The chaos zone. Since electricity is not 100% infallible, in 2024 they allocated 858 million dollars to build the dam project. Brandon Road Interbasind which has everything: improved electric barriers, acoustic deterrents (the silver carp jump when they hear the noise of the engines) and bubbles to obscure their vision. The objective is to prevent the carp from crossing the dam at all, minimizing damage to the rest. In Xataka | The Iberian Peninsula is being invaded: more than 1,200 exotic species have come to stay In Xataka | The coypu, one of the 100 most harmful invasive species in the world, is at the doors of Barcelona Cover | Flickr

Google has smelled blood with AI, so it has decided to spend more in 2026 than the GDP of 158 countries in the world

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New year, new budgets. Big tech companies are beginning to detail their roadmap for 2026 and the trend is clear: spend even more on AI. a few days ago, Goal announced that the planned capex (capital expenditure) rose to 135,000 million dollars and Microsoft too pointed to a similar figure. Alphabet (Google) just told everyone to “hold my hands.” May the rhythm not stop. The bomb was announced during the last results conference. Alphabet plans to spend between $175 and $185 billion, doubling 2025 capex, which was $91.4 billion, and almost quadrupling 2024 spending (52.5 billion). To put it in context, it is more than the GDP of Morocco, Kuwait, Bulgaria and up to 158 countries. At the same time, the company announced record results, surpassing 400 billion in revenue for the first time. The net profit stood at 132,000 million. Vertigo. That’s what investors seem to have felt. They count in Financial Times that, in the hours following the news, Alphabet shares fell 7% after the capex announcement, but then the fall was reduced to -1.5%. Microsoft experienced a similar response after its earnings call a few days ago, it is the response of investors to these exorbitant figures. However, as long as the results are good, it seems that the scare will not last long. Everything’s fine. They count in Fortune that Pichai assured that this year’s capital expenditure is “a look at the future” and justified his strategy by highlighting that the demand for his cloud services and DeepMind (Gemini) is extraordinary, so the investment must also be. He also announced that AI searches now surpass traditional searches and that Google Search’s business has grown 17% compared to last year. Additionally, the order book for its cloud has increased by 55% during the last quarter. It still won’t be enough. The CEO of Alphabet admitted that, despite the record results, there are insurmountable bottlenecks such as computing capacity, problems in the chip supply chain and energy limitations. These restrictions make it take a long time to get a data center up and running, or in other words, it was preparing investors not to expect an immediate return. Gemini, full out. The Google chatbot is in its sweet moment. The viral success of Nano Banana, Gemini 3 sweeping its competition in benchmarks and Apple choosing him as the new brain for the new Siri They have given a boost in popularity to Gemini, which already has more than 750 million users. OpenAI is still ahead with ChatGPT, but Google is closing the gap and Altman’s people have reacted going into panic mode. He moat of Gemini. Benchmarks are fine, but there is something much more important. During the conference, Pichai announced that they had reduced Gemini’s service costs by 78% “through model optimizations, efficiency and utilization improvements.” It is no longer that its AI is surpassing its competition, it is that it is cheaper and there OpenAI does have a problem. With its advertising businesses, the cloud and more revenue, Google has plenty of room to skyrocket its capex. In Xataka | OpenAI’s entire financial strategy depended on achieving a monopoly with ChatGPT: the opposite is happening Image | Wikipedia

Silver is completely out of control, so the solar panel industry has decided something: go independent

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Solar energy, promised as the cheapest and most abundant source of electricity in history, has hit a geological and financial roadblock of critical proportions. The photovoltaic industry is suffering what the Financial Times has baptized like a Silver Squeeze (silver strangulation), a suffocating pressure derived from the dizzying rise in the price of this metal. Manufacturers, who have been fighting for years against slim margins, are now “feeling the heat” of a raw material that has become unaffordable, forcing them into a frenetic technological race to eliminate it from their products. This is not a simple market rally. What we are witnessing is a “perfect storm” where real physical scarcity threatens to slow down the energy transition. According to Bloombergthe rise in silver has hit some solar panel manufacturers that were already burdened by losses after years of brutal competition. After five consecutive years of deficit, silver is no longer just a safe haven asset to become the bottleneck of the green economy. The figures are dizzying. According to the Financial Timesthe price of silver has risen 300% in the last year, breaking the psychological barrier of $100 and currently standing at $112 per ounce. This increase is fueled by three fires: geopolitical fear of possible US military intervention, the voracity of the industry and the massive entry of retail investors, for whom silver is “the poor man’s gold.” This speculative appetite has skyrocketed prices by 60% since the beginning of 2026 alone. The magnitude of the increase in prices is such that from investment portals such as Investing News have reported record prices of $93.77 in mid-January, but market reality has exceeded forecasts in just weeks. But there are geopolitical actors pulling the strings behind this scenario. China, the largest global refiner, has imposed strict controls to export by 2026-2027, shielding its strategic resources for its own renewable energy and Artificial Intelligence industry. Added to this is that India and Russia are aggressively buying physical silver, draining inventories in London and Asia and causing real shortages in Western markets. Financial drain and existential threat The impact on the cost structure of a solar panel has been devastating. According to data from BloombergNEFsilver has gone from representing 3.4% of the cost of a module in 2023, to 14% last year, to an unsustainable 29% today. Silver has dethroned polysilicon and become the most expensive component in manufacturing. For the giants of the sector, this is raining in the wet. Titans like JinkoSolar, Longi and Trina Solar They are posting quarterly losses consecutive in the midst of a “vicious price war.” Factories operate at just 50% of their capacity and, in many cases, sell modules below production cost. Jenny Chase analyst cited by Financial Timessummarizes the situation without hot towels: “It is very painful for solar module manufacturers, who are already having a terrible time and are expected to report losses by 2025.” The problem is that companies have their hands tied in passing on these costs. As explained in PV Magazinedue to excess capacity and weak demand, it is “almost impossible” to pass on the entire increase in the price of silver to the end customer. Although Chinese manufacturers have recently tried to raise prices between 1.4% and 3.8%, these increases are minuscule compared to the 180% or 300% increase in raw material prices. The long-term consequence is what experts call “demand destruction.” If prices remain at these levels, silver use in the PV industry could fall by 20% this year, not only due to efficiency, but because the industry simply cannot afford it. The great substitution Faced with financial asphyxiation, the industry has accelerated what they call “thrifting”, a race against time to replace silver with cheaper metals. The favorite candidate is copper. According to Investing Newscopper is trading 22,000% cheaper than silver and is much more abundant, making it the great hope for saving profit margins. Faced with suffocation, the industry has accelerated the thrifting (material savings) to replace silver with copper, which is 22,000% cheaper. The large Chinese manufacturers already they have made a move. Longi Green Energy will begin mass production of cells using base metals (such as copper and aluminum) in the second quarter of this year. Trina Solar is developing copper contacts to reduce its dependence, and Aiko Solar has already begun producing completely silver-free cells. The Chinese industry, which is more intensive in the use of silver than the European one, lead this forced transition. However, the change is not easy. As they warn in PV Magazine warns that not all solar technologies are equally suited: while heterojunction (HJT) and back contact (BC) cells facilitate the use of copper, the current dominant technology (TOPCon) requires high temperature processes that make copper vulnerable to oxidation. Here lies the greatest risk of this flight forward. Copper oxidizes and degrades faster than silver. Bloomberg alert about danger of launching copper panels on the market without sufficient longevity tests. Customers demand 20-year warranties; If new panels fail within 10 years due to copper corrosion, manufacturers could face massive liabilities that would put them out of business. As one precious metals expert points out: “Going too far too fast can be risky.” A future of scarcity and recycling The pressure on silver doesn’t just come from the sun. At this point we introduce in the equation Artificial Intelligence. The data centers necessary for AI consume enormous amounts of energy, which triggers demand for solar installations and, therefore, money. It is a vicious circle where technology devours physical resources. Furthermore, the electric vehicle (EV) enters like another big predator: An electric car consumes up to 50 grams of silver, almost twice as much as a combustion car. It is estimated that demand from the automotive sector could triple by 2030. In this context of shortages, some companies are taking desperate measures. He Financial Times reveals that Samsung Construction and Trading has skipped the middlemen and signed a two-year direct agreement with a mining company to secure its supply. … Read more

There is a “nihilistic” penguin who decided to embrace certain death. The Internet has been obsessed with him for weeks

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If in many years some historian were to investigate how the world has started 2026, they would find one of those surprises that raise eyebrows: humanity (or at least that part of humanity that rubs shoulders on the Internet) has started the year fascinated by a “nihilistic penguin”. With Ukraine at war, Trump threatening to annex Greenland to the US (by hook or by crook) and Nicolás Maduro detained In a New York prison, half the planet is dedicated to speculating why the hell one fine day in 2007 a palmiped from Antarctica undertook a suicidal trip that would have inspired himself Friedrich Nietzsche. It sounds bizarre, but it makes sense. What the hell is that penguin doing? It sounds bizarre, but for weeks thousands of people around the world have been asking themselves that same question: What is that penguin doing? The bird in question is a Pygoscelis adeliaean ‘Adelia’ like there are thousands of them in Antarctica, but which about 19 years ago came across the German filmmaker’s cameras by pure chance Werner Herzog while recording his documentary ‘Encounters at the End of the World’. The film lasts almost 100 minutes during which Herzog shows snowy plains, seals, underwater scenes and a multitude of frozen landscapes. At one point, however, his camera captured something curious, a detail that caught the attention of some critics years ago and now it has revolutionized half of the Network. The scene shows an Adelie penguin doing something totally counterintuitive. Without us knowing very well why, the animal begins to walk with a firm step away from the rest of its flock, entering between frozen mountains. Ahead, nothingness. No company. No food. That is, death. “But, why?“ The scene is shocking. First because it seems to go against the most basic common sense. At least the human one. Second, because of the surprising determination of the penguin, who sets off on his way without hesitation and only for a brief moment seems to stop to look at everything he leaves behind him. The third reason why it has captivated half the Internet is because Herzog himself was in charge of giving it importance and highlighting its drama. “But why?” he wonders the German filmmaker in the narration that accompanies the scene. After all, he only has miles and miles and miles of barren land ahead of him that take him further and further away from the safety of his colony and food sources. “It caught our attention. It wasn’t heading to the feeding grounds at the edge of the ice or returning to the colony. Shortly afterwards we saw it heading towards the mountains, 70 kilometers away. Dr Ainslie explained that even if he captured it and brought it back to the flock, it would return to the mountains. But… Why?” fascinated account Herzog. The full question would be a little longer: Why the hell would a penguin ignore its own survival instinct? There must be a reason, right? That is exactly what the documentary filmmaker proposed at the time and it has been worrying half the world for weeks. There is who has speculated that the penguin perhaps had a problem that altered its orientation or an ailment that affected its behavior. There is even talk of possible changes at an environmental level or of a exploratory instinct unconventional. If the panorama were not disturbing in itself, add Ainslie’s disturbing observation: it does not matter that Herzog or anyone else tried to correct their course. The animal would begin its deadly journey again almost instantly. Click on the image to go to the tweet. Is this something so strange? The penguin’s attitude does. Our attempts to find an explanation that fits our way of seeing the world (often from a anthropocentric optics), No. We humans have been debating for some time whether animals have something similar to a sense of morality. For example, we ask ourselves if in episodes that seem to us cruel There is a latent intention or they are simply the result of instinct. We have even speculated on the possibility of “altruistic” behavior in fauna. It may sound strange, but these are questions that have arisen in view of specific behaviors. A crow that finds a large amount of meat and decides warn others companions to share the feast, a whale investing time and energy in protect a seal harassed by killer whales, a duck that cares for a cub of another species, even putting itself in danger. Are those animals being generous? Are they selfless or do they act motivated by an instinct that, ultimately, seeks the preservation of themselves and their species? These are issues so complex that they have even given rise to scientific studies. What does it have to do with the penguin? Well, in recent weeks, after Herzog’s video once again gained popularity on the internet, many people have seen a 100% human attitude in the palmipede. Of course, one that has little or nothing to do with altruism or cruelty. What they appreciate is pure nihilismthe doctrine that embraces “nothingness” (hence its name, ‘nihil’) and denies the pillars on which philosophers have relied for centuries: the existence of religious, political and social principles and, in general, any foundation in morality. There is no purpose. Not even life has a meaning like the one that religions have sought for centuries. And what does Herzog’s penguin do if he doesn’t embrace that very thing, nothingness? Does it not evoke, in words by journalist Adil Faouzi, “a willful desertion of the logic of life itself”? The animal recorded by Herzog seems to capture these ideas so well, to condense them in such a powerful way, that many have nicknamed it: the “nihilistic penguin”. A little far-fetched, right? Depends. We do not know what motivated that small creature to undertake a journey towards its own death and who have tried Finding an explanation points (as we said before) to a possible illness or some type … Read more

The internet has decided that 2016 was great and worth remembering. But there’s a problem: it wasn’t at all.

by

The aesthetics of 2016 comes back strong: filters that They imitate the Instagram of then (according to Wikipedia, more than 200 million videos with filters that imitate visuals), trends that they recover photos from thenrecreations of the summer of ‘Pokémon GO’, tributes and memories to David Bowie. Generation Z users, many of them teenagers at the time, they rebuild 2016 like a golden age (there has been a 450% increase in searches of the term “2016” on TikTok). The contradiction is obvious: That same year, numerous media declared it one of the worst in recent history. What happened. On January 10 he died David Bowie; they followed him Prince, Leonard Cohen, George Michael, Carrie Fisher. On June 23, the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union. On November 8, Donald Trump won the US election. Media like slate either Newsweek They wondered if it was the worst year in history. Less than a decade later, that same year it has become an object of nostalgia. Starting shot. The Bowie’s death January 10 marked the year since its inception. Two days before he had published ‘Blackstar’, an album that today is interpreted as a farewell but that then went unnoticed in its testamentary dimension. The shock was immediate: an artist who had hidden his cancer for 18 months disappeared without warning, and memes filled that void almost immediately. The artists mentioned above followed, and each death reinforced the same idea: 2016 was cursed. In Xataka All the reasons you should listen to David Bowie if you haven’t already Imbalance. Trump and Brexit shattered the expectations of progress and openness that dominated Western political discourse. In‘The future of nostalgia’already in 2001, Svetlana Boym distinguished between “restorative nostalgia” (which seeks to reconstruct a mythical home) and “reflective nostalgia” (which enjoys longing without seeking to recover anything). Nostalgia for 2016 is of the first kind: it invents a year that never existed. Boym noted that restorative nostalgia “does not recognize itself as nostalgia, but as truth and tradition.” Just what happens when TikTok recreates the summer ofPokémon GO as if it had been edenic. This has already been said. There are theorists who have reflected on the phenomenon to remember 2016 just ten years later. David Foster Wallace documented in the 1990s what he called “nostalgia for the present”: the urge to long for something that is not yet over. 2016 fulfills that paradox: it has become an object of nostalgia before being historically processed, while its political consequences remain active. The temporal distance necessary for nostalgia, usually two or three decades, has been compressed to the point of almost disappearing. {“videoId”:”x9785qi”,”autoplay”:false,”title”:”Prince – Partyman”, “tag”:””, “duration”:”233″} Retromania. It is inevitable to refer to ‘Retromania‘a 2011 essay in which Simon Reynolds argued that since the 2000s, pop culture had reversed its direction: instead of generating the future, it was dedicated to reactivating the past. Reynolds documented band reunions, deluxe reissues, revival festivals, nostalgic samples. Fifteen years later, his thesis has intensified: no society has ever been so obsessed with the cultural artifacts of its most recent past. The return to 2016 confirms his diagnosis: a decade is enough to activate nostalgia. Hauntology. Mark Fisher elaborated on this idea in ‘The ghosts of my life’where he developed the concept of “hauntology” that Derrida had coined: we are inhabited by futures that did not materialize. Fisher, who died in 2017, argued that contemporary culture had lost its ability to imagine alternatives to the present. The past cannot be recovered; Their ghosts haunt a present incapable of projecting forward. Nostalgia for 2016 materializes this paralysis: one longs for a year defined by its catastrophic nature because there is a lack of vocabulary to articulate desirable futures. In Xataka A rosy past: why our brains can’t fight nostalgia Nostalgia mode. Finally, Fredric Jameson had anticipated this phenomenon in ‘Postmodernism: or the cultural logic of late capitalism’ in 1991, when describing the “nostalgia mode”: postmodern culture reproduces styles from the past by emptying them of historical reference and reducing them to an aesthetic surface. Instagram and TikTok accelerate this process. What was present yesterday is content today vintage available for consumption. The Spotify playlists of 2016 and the summer of ‘Pokémon GO’ are remembered, but not the bad thing. The algorithm creates a sweetened version of the past that eliminates conflict. It could be worse. 2026, without going any further. The nostalgia of 2016 reveals an escape from much more present horrors: those of 2026. That year has been dwarfed as a “bad year” because a decade later Trump returns to the presidency in a much more virulent way, with attacks on international law and invasion of countries, the war in Ukraine has no signs of ending, Gaza is going through a humanitarian disaster that shames the planet, political and media polarization has become radicalized, housing has become inaccessible… Carrie Fisher, who died in 2016 If in 2016 there were those who considered it exaggerated to talk about authoritarian drift, 2026 materializes that exaggeration: the alarms that seemed like hyperbole turned out to be prophetic. Nostalgia for 2016 is not innocent: it is the implicit recognition that the situation has worsened, that that year, with all its disasters, was preferable to the present. It’s coming. The cycle accelerates. If 2016 is already an object of nostalgia in 2026, what year will be nostalgic in 2030? 2020, the year of the global pandemic? 2024? Culture is caught in a loop where the present devours itself before it has been digested, where the ability to imagine alternatives has atrophied to the point that we can only look back. Even when what we see behind is disaster. In Xataka | People are so fed up with the current Internet that they are returning to MySpace. Not out of nostalgia, but out of rebellion (function() { window._JS_MODULES = window._JS_MODULES || {}; var headElement = document.getElementsByTagName(‘head’)(0); if (_JS_MODULES.instagram) { var instagramScript = document.createElement(‘script’); instagramScript.src=”https://platform.instagram.com/en_US/embeds.js”; instagramScript.async = true; instagramScript.defer = true; headElement.appendChild(instagramScript); – The news … Read more

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