Hit

Sylvester Stallone and the phrase that turned a scene into the most dangerous of his career: “Hit me for real”

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For years, in action cinema there was a kind of unwritten rule: the more real a scene seemed, the better it worked on screen, even if that meant taking unusual risks. That limit was unexpectedly tested when, in the middle of filming Rocky IVa seemingly minor decision ended up forcing Sylvester Stallone to leave the set and be transferred urgently to the hospital. “Hit me for real.” Rarely has a phrase said on set had consequences that were as real as they were dangerous, but that is exactly what happened during Rocky IV. Sylvester Stallone, obsessed with making the final fight convey absolute authenticity, made a decision that would mark the filming: he asked his partner to leave the choreography aside and really hit during part of the fight. That order, which had to be translated into dramatic intensity on screen, ended up becoming a physical experiment that crossed a dangerous line between interpretation and reality. He almost doesn’t count it. The result did not take long to arrive. Dolph Lundgren, much larger, stronger and with training in martial arts, executed what was asked of him without restraint. In the middle of that unscripted combat, a direct blow to the chest hit with such force that it compressed Stallone’s heart against his ribcage, causing an injury that doctors compared “to a traffic accident“. The most disturbing thing was that the actor did not notice anything at the moment of impact, but hours later his body began to collapse, dizzy and with symptoms that showed that something was very wrong. From filming to the emergency room. That same night, the situation became critical. Stallone’s blood pressure shot up to extreme levels and his heart began to swell, forcing to transfer him urgently by plane from Canada to a hospital in California. The actor entered directly in the ICUwhere he spent several days surrounded by health personnel, in a surreal scene due to the way it occurred. Stallone himself I would admit with the time that he was very close to dying that day, in an episode that turned a simple creative decision into an extreme experience. ANDThe plane that he did not want to cut. The most surprising thing is that the blow responsible for that entire critical situation was not eliminated of the final assembly. On the contrary, Stallone, faithful to his obsession with the authenticity of the saga he had created, decided to keep in the film the exact moment that took him to the hospital, turning the moment into a key piece of the intensity conveyed by the fight. Paradoxically, a scene that seems spectacular due to its realism and brutality is precisely because, for a few seconds, it stopped being fiction. Return to the ring later. Far from abandoning, Stallone returned to filming after leaving the hospital to finish the production, thus closing a production marked by physical excess and the search for truthfulness at any price. That decision reinforced the myth of Rocky IV as one of the most extreme installments in the saga, but it also left an uncomfortable lesson about the risks of pushing realism too far. Authenticity turned into danger. If you also want, the case of Rocky IV It’s not just a filming anecdote, but a clear example to what extent the film industry has historically played with the limits of security in search of greater impact on screen. What happened that day sums up an idea that is difficult to ignore: sometimes, in the attempt to make a story seem real, there is a risk that it stops being so altogether. Image | United Artists In Xataka | In 1953 Hollywood filmed a blockbuster in front of US nuclear tests. It was the most radioactive movie in history, literally In Xataka | The day a man dared to go further than anyone else: a real fight with Bruce Lee where there were no limits

Harry Potter has slipped through its fingers, but Netflix’s need for a hit franchise is still there

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In February 2026, Netflix renounced what would have been one of the biggest economic bets in its entire history (72 billion for the studios and the Warner Bros. catalog), in the face of a counteroffer from Paramount that it did not want to match. The episode precisely exposes one of the weaknesses of what remains the main service of streaming in the world: twelve years of own and exclusive content cannot compete against a century of third-party franchises. The businesses. In December 2025, Netflix announced a deal with Warner Bros. Discovery valued at $72 billion to take over its studios and HBO Max. Two months later Paramount Skydance raised its offer at $31 per sharecompared to the 27.75 that Netflix had agreed upon, and Warner leaned towards this new proposal. Netflix refused to match it. “The transaction we negotiated would have created value for shareholders, but we have always been disciplined, and at the price that required matching the last offer, the deal was no longer financially attractive,” the company said in a statement. Catalog wanted. Beyond finances, the failed business reveals that Netflix was looking for something that can only be achieved with time (or a lot of money): catalog. Warner, Disney or Universal have accumulated decades of iconic franchises and characters, but Netflix only has a history of twelve years. It is the best explanation for why the platform was willing to make a very high economic proposal. It seems obvious to think that Netflix, now that it has concluded’Stranger Things‘, seeks comparable success: after all, the Duffer series has provided you more than $1 billion in revenue since 2020. and can be credited with signing more than two million subscribers. Proof: Willy Wonka. A good test that to achieve overwhelming successes it is not enough to walk the checkbook is in the purchase of the Roald Dahl catalog. Netflix paid about 700 million dollars, according to specialized media calculations, for the rights to works such as ‘Charlie and the Chocolate Factory’ or ‘Matilda’, but five years later it has not generated any relevant success. In 2026 they will make a new attempt with a reality called ‘Golden Ticket’, in which the participants face tests in a scenario with a chocolate river inspired by Willy Wonka, but we are very far from a launch that equals ‘The Bridgertons’ or a ‘Wednesdays’. The ‘K-pop Warriors’ accident. Netflix’s latest big hit is perfect proof that, no matter how hard you try, there are things that can’t be bought with money, much less can be thoroughly planned. ‘The K-pop Warriors’ became such an unexpected phenomenon that the platform did not have products merchandising available during the Christmas season. Apparently Netflix approached toy manufacturers more than a year before the premiere, but no one wanted to take the risk of an untested franchise. But now Netflix is ​​treating ‘K-pop Warriors’ as its next big property: deals with Mattel and Hasbro, themed menus at McDonald’s, a possible concert tour and an animated sequel in development. It’s a real irony: Netflix has been saying for years that franchises are its goal and when one appears, the infrastructure to exploit it was not ready. The 2026 roadmap. What awaits the platform in the coming months? ‘The Bridgertons’ enters its fourth season, ‘One Piece’ in the second, and series are being prepared such as a new approach to ‘Assassin’s Creed’ with the approval of UbiSofy and a reboot from ‘Little House on the Prairie’. The company has also closed agreements with Sony Pictures to exclusively distribute streaming its next releases (including Spiderverse films, the adaptation of ‘Zelda’ or the Beatles biopics directed by Sam Mendes) and maintains with Universal the exclusive premiere in streaming from franchises like ‘Jurassic World’. They are alliances that partially compensate for the absence of a more powerful catalog of our own. The need for franchises. Why series like the true gem of Warner (almost above the DC heroes), ‘harry potter‘, are so necessary for Netflix. According to data from the consulting firm Owl & Co, the engagement Netflix grew just 2% in the second half of 2025. Revenue is expected to increase 13% in 2026, up from 16% a year earlier. And advertising represents only 3% of the total, very residual. Franchises are, in this context, an impetus for growth: they build loyalty and allow exploitation with merchandising and live events. A replica of Hogwarts on the scale of Netflix would, of course, guarantee a turnaround in these figures. In Xataka | The ranking of Spanish television by including Netflix and YouTube changes everything: traditional TV is on its heels

The US continues to hit targets in Iran, but the Islamic republic keeps another weapon practically intact: its cyber attacks

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In recent days, tension between the United States and Iran has escalated with direct military actions. Washington has resorted to Tomahawk cruise missiles launched from warships and fighters F-35 to attack Iranian strategic infrastructure. At the moment, there is no evidence that Tehran has managed to respond with military attacks on US territory. Its response, however, has been felt on another front: the attacks against energy facilities in the Gulf, like those of Ras Laffan, in Qatar. In parallel, the conflict is also being fought in a less visible terrain, cyberspace. The information war. The photograph of the conflict begins to be completed when we look beyond the military level. Analysts cited by The Register They argue that Iran is turning more intensively to cyberspace to pressure the United States, an area in which it can operate with less direct exposure. In this context, the attack against Stryker is not interpreted as an isolated episode, but as an indication of a trend. “This is just the beginning,” said retired Gen. Ross Coffman. A case already visible. The most recent example of this dynamic is offered by Stryker, a medical device manufacturer with a global presence. According to Reutersa cyberattack last week altered its internal operations and made it difficult to manage personalized inventory. The company confirmed that it had contained the incident, although the episode shows how this type of action can impact especially sensitive sectors, beyond the strictly technological field. Beyond a specific interruption. Bloomberg notes that the impact on Stryker’s operations had an indirect impact on hospitals and patients, with surgeries that had to be rescheduled due to problems in the supply of specific material. This is a clear example of how the border between digital and physical can quickly blur. The American Stryker specializes in surgical equipment, orthopedic implants and neurotechnology solutions Civilian targets. Along the same lines as the analysts pointed out, the focus is not limited to public organizations. The aforementioned media reports that several voices agree that companies may be more exposed than government agencies, in part due to their unequal defenses. Targeting this type of offensive seeks to generate economic pressure and disruption without the need for a direct confrontation, they explain. A historical case. A clear example is Stuxneta malware discovered in 2010 that managed to infiltrate the Natanz nuclear plant and manipulate its systems until it caused failures in about a thousand centrifuges. The code was designed specifically for that environment, acting stealthily for weeks while altering processes without being detected. Its authorship has never been officially confirmed, although it has been widely attributed to the United States and Israel. When the damage is physical. The Stuxnet case helps to understand a key idea in this type of conflict. As we tell in a video from Xataka Presentahe malware He did not limit himself to infiltrating computer systems, but took control of the industrial controllers that regulated the centrifuges and altered their operation. First accelerating them and then slowing them down, he caused progressive wear until they became unusable. A front that already leaves its mark. The scenario that is drawn is clear. While there is no evidence of a direct Iranian military attack inside the United States, the conflict is already having effects inside the United States through other means. The Stryker case shows how an intrusion can translate into real disruptions in sensitive sectors, with an impact on companies and patients. Images | DC Studio | Stryker In Xataka | Russia is not sending troops or weapons to Iran: it is sending something much more important to take down the US

In 1954, Ann Elizabeth Hodges was hit by a rock. And thus he became the only person who has had a meteorite fall on him.

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Let’s say you’re on your couch enjoying a quiet afternoon. Suddenly, an infernal sound wakes you up just a moment before you see how a rock violently destroys your bookshelf, your old “vintage” radio and bounces towards you. It will take you a little longer to realize that the rock has passed through the ceiling before hitting you. And as strange as this story may seem, it is totally true. It was a clear afternoon in 1954 when a meteor struck Ann Elizabeth Hodges. The woman was lucky and only received a huge bruise on his waist. But he could have experienced a consequence as tragic as that of his poor radio. After all, we are talking about a piece of rock that fell at hundreds of kilometers per hour, burning on its frictional path towards the surface of this small planet. Ann ended up in the hospital but not because of the blow, but because of a small nervous breakdown caused by the huge crowd that came to see what had happened. Let us remember that in the 1950s, the Cold War was in full swing and conspiracy theorists did not miss an opportunity to see Soviet planes fly over (and explode) in American skies. So, after the sighting of the meteorite, a small host of curious people gathered around the Hodges house. And here began the adventures of the famous Sylacauga meteorite, whose name is due to the Alabama town where it fell. The fragment that hit Ann was called “Hodges meteorite“, while the complete meteorite, which broke into three about nineteen kilometers above the surface, it was much larger, probably almost half a meter. After the commotion, the assistance to Mrs. Hodges and the uncertainty, the United States Air Force sent a team to collect the remains of the meteorite. The stone’s fame rose incandescently over the next few days, continuing until a couple of years later. The media and residents of the entire region echoed the impact and there were those who wanted to buy the meteorite. For his part, Eugene Hodges, Ann’s husband, hired a lawyer to recover the rock from the hands of the State. At the same time, finding out about the mess, Bertie Guy, the landlord of the house, claimed ownership of the stone, much to the chagrin of the Hodges, with the intention of covering the repairs that the meteorite had cost her. The stress caused by all this diatribe and as attention on the meteorite faded, along with the potential buyersthey pushed Ann to donate the Sylacauga meteorite fragment to the Alabama Museum of Natural History. But Ann, according to the chronicle, never stopped being afraid of something falling through her ceiling again. Other “lucky” people in the history of extraterrestrial impacts Anna E. Hodges is the first and only person (at least reliably) to have been injured by a meteorite. But it is not the only case related to an extraterrestrial rock described in our history. Luckily for the rest, none of them have been hurt, if we can believe their version. Let’s go back to August 1992, in Mbale, Uganda. A boy was heading to the village when a fireball thundered in the sky. Shortly after, a pebble hit the top of a banana and fell on his head. According to reports, a huge meteorite weighing almost a ton would have exploded fourteen kilometers from the surface, disintegrating. Did the fragment belong to that meteorite? We will never know for sure. This is what happens with hundreds of other testimonies that ensure the impact of a meteorite: unlike the Sylacauga meteorite, there is no evidence or analysis that demonstrates the origin of these rocks. That does not mean that there are, as we said, dozens and dozens of stories about meteorites (many of them with tragic endings). An example can be found in the 2016 Indian story in which it was stated that a bus driver had killed by space rock impactafter an explosion was heard. NASA, however, confirmed that this was not possible since the incident did not coincide with any detected or predicted astronomical event. The protagonists of other documented cases have had much luckier in which the meteorite passed very closely, without hitting them. We are talking, for example, about Michelle Knapp, whose Chevrolet was pierced by a meteorite to his surprise, in 1992. Not so long ago, in 2004, an alien rock happily entered through the roof of the Archer family home in Auckland, New Zealand. The rock just bounced and she remained lying, expectant, on the floor of her living room. If you want to join the club of those “hit by a meteorite” you better be patient. Just like calculation an engineer at the German Aerospace Center named Christian Gritzner, a while ago, the chance of this happening is 174 million. To do this, it calculated the surface area we occupy, our average life expectancy and the habitable surface area. That, added to the calculations of meteorites that fall per year, provided the result we were talking about. Fragment of the Chelyabinsk meteorite It is estimated that up to 10,000 tons of material interstellar crashes to Earth every year. It is not a trivial number. Why aren’t stories of meteorites falling on us more frequent? The first and most important reason, without a doubt, is the fact that almost everyone does it at sea. After all, water occupies most of the earth’s surface. On the other hand, a large amount of this material disintegrates in its fall, leaving a faint trail of dust and gas. As we mentioned, there are many testimonies collected in the press and reports from people who have had a supposed meteorite fall on them. In fact, many of the versions date back a long time, even from other times when “the stars fell from the sky.” But we can assure you that Ann Hodges’ case is unique and special. Nobody would want a monster like the … Read more

Meta hit it big, betting everything on the metaverse. Now they have a Schrödinger metaverse

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We often see large companies change the design of their logos. They do it to maintain consistency with the product they are promoting at that moment, but the logo is one thing and the name and the entire brand are another. Facebook fearlessly jumped into the pool in October 2021 changing its name to Metaof ‘metaverse‘. After lose tens of billions and with the metaverse buried, Meta confirmed the inevitable: it will close the Horizon Worlds platform this year. But there is a twist: after announcing the closure, they now say that they will keep it alive for a while longer. How much? Mystery. In short. One of the most iconic moments of the technology presentations was when, in a packed room, Mark Zuckerberg walked between rows of journalists wearing a Quest helmet. The metaverse had arrived, or so Zuckerberg wanted. Years later, the reality is very different from future they hoped for Facebook Goalbut the name change had already been done and had to be accepted. ‘Horizon Worlds’ was the platform on which we could lead a second life, one that nor the employees of the Meta itself they used. To the metaverse he was doing badly, extremely badand Meta tried to make it stick in every possible way taking it to mobile and integrating it with Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp. Meta announced the plan as one to bring the metaverse everywherebut a few hours ago, Meta took the final step: he announced that on June 15 he would close ‘Horizon Worlds’ in the Quest helmets. Lowering the blind. Although the metaverse is everywhere, it is evident that the most natural way to access it is through virtual reality. However, it is clear that they are not going the way they would have liked and, in a release On Discord, the company confirmed that virtual worlds could no longer be created, published, or accessed in VR after that date. It was announced that the closure would be carried out in stages, killing applications from the Quest store starting on March 31 so that no more users can join, culminating with the definitive closure of the VR worlds on June 15. In the announcement, Meta confirmed that ‘Horizon Worlds’ will, from now on, be a mobile-only app. It seemed like the culmination of a process that, apart from burning money, has led Meta to lay off hundreds of workers and hit a 30% blow to the budget of the Reality Labs division. Schrödinger’s metaverse. But it is clear that those who are still in the metaverse did not like the news at all, to the point that Meta has had to come out to clarify the message… and back away. Although they have done it in a curious way. In a question session on Instagram, the company’s CTO, Andrew Bosworth, came to the fore to comment that the dead man is very much alive, that they have thought better of it and that ‘Horizon Worlds’ will remain in VR for “the near future.” The statements are as follows: “The ‘Horizon Unity Runtime’ games do not work on mobile, only in VR, and we will not be introducing new games. Again, most of our strategy is aimed at mobile, but people who already have games they like will be able to download the ‘Horizon Worlds’ app and use it in VR in the near future.” In the units of measurement, “near future” is not that it is very concrete, but at least it seems that they do not kill it yet due to, according to Bosworth, showing support “to the fans who have contacted us.” He has commented on it in stories (something that, conveniently, will be deleted), but here is the video: Other type of glasses. Come on, where I said I say, I say Diego and the Quest metaverse will continue to live for a while longer. As a user, I wouldn’t throw my hat in the ring because it’s clear that they are planning a closure sooner rather than later, but it is always good news that they have listened to those who continue using the platform. Because the Quest, beyond ‘Horizon World’, is an extremely interesting headset for playing and consuming content, but Meta has been betting on another type of glasses for some time. There are the Ray-Ban Meta, “normal” glasses that are used not to consume, but to create. Already in 2024 we said that Meta was giving a flip from your VR glasses to your everyday glasses because the Ray-Ban Meta is not only a tool for content creators and anyone who wants to record their daily lives: it is a device through which Meta can distribute its AI. And an extremely controversial one, based on what we now know about Where can the images we record end up? with those glasses. And AI, of course. Because if years ago it was the metaverse, now Meta’s obsession is AI. The company is focusing on this technology in which it is not very well positioned. They focused a lot on preparing and presenting very good models, but not very consumer friendly and it was the big loser of the AI ​​race last year. Their change in strategy seeks to gain a foothold in a segment in which they are already ChatGPT, Grok, Claude or the chineseand for this it has a double strategy. On the one handa super team of AI stars whose machine will have to start working at some point. On the other hand, a collaboration with NVIDIA and another with AMD to train the AI, as well as the development of own chips for inference. There is 135 billion dollars at stakean investment in one year that exceeds the total of the Metaverse and that indicates why it is logical for Meta to abandon anything that does not work for him in the slightest right now in order to allocate all possible resources to pursue the new objective. Images | Goal … Read more

In 2025, AI seemed to have hit a wall of progress. A volatilized wall in February 2026

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I fondly remember that time in which Intel and AMD fought to create the first CPU capable of reaching 1 GHz clock frequency. That race AMD won it (surprise!)but until that milestone occurred the pace was dizzying. Or so it seemed to us, because with AI the pace of launches is absolutely crazy. What a few weeks we’ve had, dear readers. Let’s see: January 27: Kimi.ai lance Kimi J2.5 February 5: Anthropic lance Claude Opus 4.6 February 5: Same day OpenAI lance GPT-5.3-Codex February 5: Kuaishou lance Kling 3.0 February 12: Z.ai lance GLM-5 February 12: ByteDance lance Seedance 2.0 February 12: MiniMax lance MiniMax 2.5 February 16: Alibaba lance Qwen3.5-397B-A17B Coming soon: DeepSeek v4, Does it call?, Gemini 3.1, … The pace is absolutely frenetic, and the LLMs that a few years ago months weeks seemed to be fantastic now they are not so much. The new versions of these language models do not stop evolving, and AI companies continue to constantly offer new developments. Almost dizzying. That, of course, has its good side and its bad side. We end 2025 with a certain boredom in the face of an AI that promised a lot but ended up changing hardly anything. Only at the end of the year was a palpable revolution seen with that spectacular combination formed by Claude Code and Opus 4.5. The Anthropic binomial amazed the developers, who for the first time seemed to agree when it came to declaring that with this type of platform they could ask the AI ​​for whatever they wanted, and that it would program it for you at once and almost always without problems. Of course there was some exaggeration in that speech, but certainly the capacity of Opus 4.5 and the degree of autonomy and Claude Code’s versatility They seemed to mark a turning point. Then OpenClaw arrived and that expectations for AI agents have once again skyrocketedbut in parallel we are seeing a real fever of launches of new generative AI models, both in video (Kling 3.0 and especially Seedance 2.0 They have been viral phenomena in themselves) as in text/code. And with each new model, the promise of performance surpassing the previous generation. At least, of course, in the benchmarks. On the left, Alibaba’s internal benchmarks for Qwen3.5. On the right, those from Anthropic for Opus 4.6. Each one compares himself with whoever he considers appropriate. Those bar graphs in the image above have become a constant, especially when the model is launched by a Chinese company. If the launcher is OpenAI, Google or Anthropic, tables are preferred. Be that as it may, the result always leads us to the same thing: each model is better than its predecessor and, normally, than many of the competition. AI Subscription Fatigue The problem with this is that this race never seems to end, and a model that seems fantastic today is not so great tomorrowwhen its competitor can barely outperform it, but it can also be considerably cheaper – Chinese models usually are – or offers other advantages such as larger context windows so that we can enter longer and longer texts – for example, large code repositories – as part of the prompt. And of course, that poses a problem for users. If Opus 4.5 was so good, one could sign up for the Pro or Max plan and pay a year in advance, but that is a priori risky, because although you will have access to new models when you release them, you will have dedicated your investment in AI subscriptions to the Anthropic model without having as much room to try those of rivals. Here short subscriptions are required: Subscribe to one model for one month so that I have some leeway in case I want to try another model the next month (or try two or three models in the same month, which is also a common case). The prices of subscriptions to AI services are also not facilitators of these multiple tests. The normal thing is to pay 20 euros for a one-month subscription, and although Chinese models are usually much cheaper, they are also usually one step behind in capacity if one needs maximum performance. But here the problem is repeated again and again: if I subscribe now to GPT-5.3-Codex, which everyone says is fantastic, how long do I pay for it, one month? Or do I also subscribe to GLM-5 to try, and next month I will try Opus 4.6 and MiniMax 2.5? All of these decisions are difficult because the perception of each model depends on each user. Each of them has their needs, their budget and their own experiences with each model, so as much as the benchmarks say one thing, With AI models it is happening to us like with wines: No matter how much they tell us that one is better than the other, we perceive them in a very personal way. And this frenetic advance also means that the expectation for models that really make a difference has been recovered. Vibe coding is not perfect, but it solves our needs better and better, and the same goes for AI agents like OpenClaw, which with their lights and shadows demonstrate that the future in which we have an AI employee—although at first they may be somewhat clumsy—working 24/7 does not seem to be that far away. These are dizzying and fascinating times for AI. Again. Image | Mohammad Rahmani In Xataka | China brought humanoid robots to the country’s biggest television show: it made them practice kung-fu with millimeter precision

In its goal of reaching the Moon in 2030, China has hit the table: it has demonstrated the potential of its technology

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The race for the human return to the Moon has officially entered a new operational phase with China successfully executing the first “lit” flight of its heavy rocket new generation: Long March-10 (LM-10). A test that has not only validated its propulsion capacity, but also certifies the safety of its future crew in the most hostile launch environment. Where. This milestone, achieved since Wenchang launch pad (Hainan), places the Chinese lunar program on a firm and technically verified trajectory to meet its strategic objective: putting humans on the lunar surface before 2030. The litmus test. The essay recently made marks a turning point, since, unlike the tests static or scale models from previous yearsthis has been a real flight with ignition. The LM-10 took off in a prototype configuration with the goal of achieving the maximum dynamic pressure (Max-Q). In aerospace engineering, Max-Q is the critical moment during the climb where the aerodynamic forces on the vehicle structure are most violent. It is the “worst scenario” possible for an emergency that could threaten the safety of the crew, and it is precisely at that moment that the abort command was sent to the Mengzhou manned ship (the successor of the Shenzhou). In Xataka In silence, China is making giant strides in a race that until now it was not leading: space. There are differences. What distinguishes this essay from those carried out by other historical powers is the sophistication of the subsequent sequence. At first, the Mengzhou capsuleseparated from the rocket and activated its escape enginesmoving away from the “danger zone” at high speed, validating its ability to save the crew in extreme aerodynamic conditions. On the other hand, as the capsule descended toward a controlled splashdown, the first stage of the LM-10 rocket was not jettisoned. For the first time in a test of these characteristics in China, the stage continued its ascent briefly and then executed a controlled descent and landed in the sea. A success. This success simultaneously validates the structural integrity under maximum stress, the compatibility of the interfaces between rocket and ship, and the partial reusability of the system, a technological advance that brings China closer to the operational efficiency of companies such as SpaceX with Artemis. All this within a context where China and the United States ‘fight’ to see who is the first to return to the Moon. A change of concept. Wenchang’s success is just the tip of the spear of a much more complex system known as the CMSA’s “Earth-Space Transportation System for Manned Lunar Flights.” This architecture moves away from the “one giant shot” concept and opts for a two-launch and orbital rendezvous scheme. The three pillars. The first of them is the Long March-10a colossus approximately 92 meters high capable of placing about 70 tons in low Earth orbit and about 27 tons in lunar transfer orbit. The most interesting thing is that its modular design and the recovery capacity of the first stage are fundamental for the economic sustainability of the program, since the entire structure is recovered for subsequent tests and missions. The second pillar is Mengzhouwhich is designed for deep space missions and is larger and more capable than the current Shenzhou. Its development, which began conceptually around 2017-2018, has culminated in a modular vehicle capable of supporting atmospheric reentry at lunar return speeds. The third is a dedicated lunar landing module known as Lanyue waiting in lunar orbit. {“videoId”:”x96edv6″,”autoplay”:false,”title”:”China’s space suit to go to the Moon”, “tag”:”China”, “duration”:”64″} Roadmap. This includes two separate launches of the LM-10: one to transport the Lanyue module and another for the crew on Mengzhou. The final objective is that both vehicles will perform a meeting maneuver and docking in lunar orbit before the taikonauts descend to the surface. Chronology of ambition. The path towards this 2026 flight has been methodical, characterized by a strategy of “short but quick steps” that began in 2013 with the first discussions and the development of prototypes. It was in 2020 when an 8-day orbital test flight was made using a Long March-5B and that validated the capsule’s heat shield and recovery systems. Finally, it was this month of February when the flight occurred with an abortion in Max-Q and recovery of the stage. If we look to the future, before the end of 2026, “zero altitude” abandonment tests and complete tests of the Lanyue lunar landing module are expected, all aimed at meeting the 2030 launch window. A duel of titans. The comparison between the United States and China is practically mandatory in these cases. While the United States relies on the raw power of the SLS Block 1a 98-meter and disposable colossus, China is committed to operational efficiency with the Long March-10. And although the Chinese rocket is a little less powerful, its design incorporates a reusable first stage, which reduces costs and is closer to the sustainability model that SpaceX has popularized in the West, contrasting with the immense expense per launch of the American system. On the other hand, NASA has opted for a hybrid and complex scheme: it launches the crew in the Orion capsule with the government SLS rocket, and then docks in lunar orbit with the Starship HLSa commercial lander from SpaceX. In contrast, China has chosen a more pragmatic “distributed architecture”: it will carry out two separate launches of the LM-10, one for the Lanyue lunar landing module and another for the crew on the Mengzhou spacecraft, which will meet directly in lunar orbit. In Xataka Starlink’s dominance in space begins to move: another company already has permission for a constellation of 4,000 satellites On their calendars. The US program, depending on multiple commercial suppliers and disruptive technologies (such as Starship’s in-orbit refueling), faces highly complex logistics that have accumulated delays for the Artemis III mission. In contrast, China’s centralized and vertical model maintains a firm and predictable roadmap to the year 2030. In this way, we are seeing two titanic powers with two different … Read more

We know that the Earth has been hit by 80,000 meteorites. For some reason, most end up in Antarctica

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If we look at the global statistics of finds of meteorites on our planet We may think that they are distributed homogeneously throughout the territory, but the reality is very different. Official data indicates that of the approximately 80,000 meteorites cataloged all over the world, more than 50,000 have been found in Antarctica… And this raises a big question: does Antarctica have something special about having so many meteorites? A contradiction. Although we talk about 60% of the meteorites that have been found on Earth come from Antarcticacollision theory tells us another. Specifically, physics, which tells us that meteorites fall randomly and uniformly throughout the planet, so Antarctica does not receive more impacts than the Sahara Desert or the Pacific Ocean. So… Why do we find so many meteorites on the frozen continent? The answer lies in a perfect combination of glaciologyvisual contrast and a natural “trap” that is now, ironically, being sabotaged by climate change. The conveyor belt theory. To understand why Antarctica is the great archive of the solar system, you have to understand how ice moves. And the secret is not in how the rocks fall, but in how the ice delivers them to humanity. To do this, we must go to glaciological models and studies from programs such as ANSMET, where they point out that Antarctica It is a real meteorite conveyor belt. The process. In this way, a meteorite when it falls inside the frozen continent buried deep in the ice sheet. Once here, the natural flow of the glaciers will push the ice that stores the rock inside from the center towards the coast. At certain points, the ice encounters barriers beneath the glaciers, such as hidden mountains that slow its flow and forces the ice to return to the surface. And this is where the famous katabatic winds come into play, which are truly fierce and dry with a force capable of eroding the upper layers of the ice from solid to gas. The result. It is what scientists call the ‘Meteorite Stranding Zone’ (MSZ) or blue ice areas. It is nothing more than the part of ice that has been worn away, but has not affected the rock it stored in any way. That is why over time, meteorites that fell thousands of years ago and traveled trapped in the depths of the ice now appear on the surface as if someone had put them there. A contrast trick. Logically, finding a meteorite among a pile of red ones can be somewhat complicated in our environment. But when we talk about a black rock on a white sheet like ice, the truth is that visually it is easy to find it. That is why this contrast is the best ally that meteorite searchers have. The preservation. But beyond the fact that finding a rock the size of a walnut in the middle of the jungle is a really complicated task, it must be taken into account that humid climates degrade the meteorite quickly. Something that does not happen in Antarctica, which is technically a polar desert. The dry environment it has acts like a real freezer which preserves the samples almost intact for millions of years. This allows scientists to recover not only the rock, but pristine information about the origins of the solar system. And that is why all these factors together make it more common to find more meteorites in this location than in others, and not because there is a predilection for falling here. An invisible threat. As pointed out a study published in Nature, we have a serious problem on the table: We are losing about 5,000 meteorites a year. Intuition would tell us that if the ice melts due to climate change, more rocks would emerge. But the opposite is true due to the thermal properties of the meteorites themselves. Being dark rocks (and many of them metallic with high thermal conductivity), they absorb solar radiation much more efficiently than the surrounding ice. Even at subzero temperatures, the rock heats up enough to melt the ice just below it. This causes the meteorite to sink and create a small pool of water that refreezes them, burying the rock out of sight of researchers or satellites. Thermal models suggest that this disproportionately affects iron meteorites, which are especially valuable for understanding planetary cores, causing us to have many more chondrite or rocky meteorites. Race against time. Humanity has so far managed to recover 23,000 meteorites, giving us a large cosmic library that allows us to better understand everything around us. The problem is that the clock is ticking, and the most important part of the archive is beginning to sink, so now the most important thing is to hurry up to get the most valuable meteorites for us. Images | Kamran Abdullayev henrique setim In Xataka | In 2011, a collector bought a meteorite in Morocco. It has turned out to be direct evidence of thermal water on Mars

five accessories with which to hit the nail on the head during the Three Wise Men

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The nintendo switch 2 It arrived in stores with a wide catalog of accessories available from the first minute. Some are official and many others from other brands. Therefore, in this article we are going to review what they are five of the best and most useful accessories that we can find for the console, and that are used as a gift or as a self-gift for Three Kings Day. Nintendo Switch 2 Pro Controllera controller that has a function that others do not have. Tomtoc Shoulder Bagan ideal accessory to carry the console, and controllers, games or chargers, anywhere. Joy-Con 2 Supportan accessory to take advantage of the Joy-Con and be able to charge them while we play. MicroSD Expressideal for not constantly deleting games. Chargera charger like the one that comes with the console, but which can be ideal if we want to keep it in our suitcase or backpack to take it on a trip. Nintendo Switch 2 Pro Controller The official console controller has a very useful function: the Nintendo Switch 2 Pro Controller Allows you to turn on the console when it is in rest mode in the dock. It seems silly, but it’s quite practical. Furthermore, it is a fairly complete command, with back buttons and impeccable construction. Yes, it is expensive, but also one of the best purchase options for the console. Nintendo Switch 2 Pro Controller The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Tomtoc Shoulder Bag If you want to take advantage of the portability of the Nintendo Switch 2, one of the most important accessories is a carrying case or backpack. The Tomtoc shoulder bag It is ideal because it comes with plenty of pockets, allows you to store video game cartridges, and is quite compact. Besides, a lot of things fit: mobile phones, eReaders, chargers, controllers, the console, video games and more. Tomtoc Shoulder Bag – Nintendo Switch 2 The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Joy-Con 2 Support If you don’t want to buy a controller for the Nintendo Switch 2 and are looking to make the most of the Joy-Con 2, the official Nintendo adapter It is very useful. It is not the one that comes with the console, it includes some additional features, such as back buttons (like the Switch 2 Pro Controller) or the possibility of being able charge the Joy-Con 2 battery. The price could vary. We earn commission from these links MicroSD Express Although the storage of the Nintendo Switch 2 has grown compared to the previous generation, as soon as we want to install a few games we can stay a little short of space. For this, nothing like the SanDisk microSD Express 256GBwhich allows you to add another batch of digital video games, update files or save data. Sandisk MicroSD Express (256GB) The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Charger It is not that having a second charger is something very important, but if we usually travel it can be practical for prevent us from having to constantly disconnect the charger from the electrical outlet or power strip where we have the console, thus allowing the second charger to always be stored in the suitcase or backpack. Luckily, the official charger It is found in several stores and is usually not very expensive. Nintendo Switch 2 AC Adapter The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Some of the links in this article are affiliated and may provide a benefit to Xataka. In case of non-availability, offers may vary. Image | Alejandro AlcoleaNintendo, Tomtoc, SanDisk In Xataka | The second pack of the Nintendo Switch 2 arrives with the new Pokémon: you can now reserve it in these stores In Xataka | The best accessories for your Switch: cases, carrying bags, batteries, and more

Google hit the red button when ChatGPT came upon it. Now it is OpenAI who has pressed it, according to WSJ

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Sam Altman has activated high alert on OpenAI. Just like share From Wall Street Journal, the company’s CEO announced this Monday in an internal memo that the company enters “code red” to improve ChatGPTthe tool that has catapulted the company to stardom but that now sees its rivals closing the gap at breakneck speed. what’s happening. OpenAI is postponing several important projects to focus all its resources on improving the daily ChatGPT experience, according to the internal memo to which WSJ has had access. According to Altman, the chatbot urgently needs advances in personalization, speed, reliability and the ability to answer a broader range of questions. Among the postponed projects are initiatives to include advertising in the free version of ChatGPT, AI agents for health and purchases (the latter was announced very recently), and Pressa personal assistant in development. why now. The pressure comes mainly from Google. Your model Gemini 3released last month, has outperformed OpenAI in industry benchmarks and sent the Mountain View giant’s stock soaring. Just like assures In the middle, Gemini’s monthly active users went from 450 million in July to 650 million in October, a meteoric growth that sets off all the alarms at OpenAI. Although ChatGPT maintains the lead with approximately more than 800 million weekly users, the speed at which Google is gaining ground is worrying. The underlying problem. OpenAI is in a delicate position. The company it is not profitable and it needs constant rounds of financing to survive, which puts it at a disadvantage compared to Google and other technology companies that can finance their investments with their own income. It’s also spending more aggressively than its main startup rival, Anthropic. According to their own financial projectionsOpenAI will need to reach revenues of approximately $200 billion to be profitable in 2030. All while being committed to investments of hundreds of billions in data centers. The last setbacks. The company has had a difficult time lately balancing the security of its chatbot with making it more attractive to users. The GPT-5 model Launched in August, it disappointed some users, who complained about its colder tone and problems answering simple math and geography questions. OpenAI had to update the model last month to make it warmer and better able to follow user instructions. OpenAI’s response. According to point In the middle, Altman has established daily calls for those responsible for improving ChatGPT and has encouraged temporary team transfers. WSJ assures that the company uses three color codes: yellow, orange and red, to describe the different levels of urgency necessary to address problems. According to the outlet, prior to this “code red”, OpenAI had declared a “code orange” in its effort to improve the chatbot. Nick Turley, Head of ChatGPT at OpenAI, stated in X that ChatGPT represents 70% of global AI-assisted activities and 10% of search activities. An unexpected script twist. This represents a radical change compared to three years ago, when it was Google who declared its own code red in response to the threat posed by ChatGPT. And after a groundbreaking Google I/O Last May, those from Mountain View have witnessed brutal growth in all the directions in which the AI ​​race is currently pointing, with improvements in their chatbot, the deployment of countless AI agents, improvements in their applications and more. Now it seems that it is OpenAI who must defend its position. And now what. Altman advertisement that next week OpenAI will launch a new reasoning model that, according to internal evaluations, surpasses Google’s Gemini 3. However, he acknowledges that there is still a lot of work to be done in the everyday chatbot experience. Cover image | OpenAI and Xataka Android In Xataka | China already has an army of 5.8 million engineers. His new plan involves accelerating doctorates

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