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a 10-story building in 29 hours

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There are those who think that a solution to housing problem is to build more (although the Polytechnic of Catalunya don’t think the same), but that inevitably takes time. Faced with this need, there are those who have resorted to the prefabricated housingwhose acquisition and assembly is more agile compared to traditional constructions. In fact, in Madrid They have already opted for them to build public flats quickly. But China is simply on another level. A skyscraper against the clock. Because if the work to remove the gotelé, change the floor and assemble the kitchen has cost me a long month in my new apartment, in the Asian country they are revolutionizing architecture with express constructions quite far from the modest prefabricated modules to which we are accustomed. However, in Changsha they have built a 10-story residential building in less than 29 hours. But don’t let the final result fool you: it is still a prefabricated construction. An XXL LEGO. This building of broad It is not new, in fact it dates back to 2021, but five years later it still leaves people speechless due to the synchronization and speed of execution. Furthermore, this project did turn out well, unlike the Sky City that he wanted to build in 90 days. Obviously having more personnel and the three cranes helps, but what is truly different is that we are dealing with a modular off-site construction. Come on, a large part of the work comes from the factory (the manufacturing there It was 15 days) and then it’s time to assemble the pieces. Moving a project of this magnitude to a factory has its advantages in that we are in a controlled environment and not out in the open. The Chinese company has been working on prefabricated steel structures for years. ISO size of a standard shipping container (12.19 meters x 2.44 meters x 3 meters), so they can be transported to the facility without problem by truck. In addition, they can be assembled in height and width as appropriate. The entire building could be dismantled for transportation if necessary. Their secret: B-core steel. These containers are manufactured in B-Core steelwhich consists of two outer stainless steel plates that wrap a core of steel tubes like a sandwich. The structure is joined by fusion by brazing with a copper sheet. In this video From Broad Group you can see the step by step of its manufacture. More important than the technical details is what is gained with this material. To begin with, the carbon footprint drops considerably by minimizing the use of cement (one of the biggest polluters on the planet), so we are facing a more sustainable construction. But it also offers high resistance to corrosion and since it has high ductility, it better supports seismic movements. According to the corporation, it is an earthquake- and typhoon-proof material. Finally, it is ten times lighter than concrete and assembly is faster, so costs, time and labor are reduced. Almost everything comes from the factory. The modules arrive by truck to the building construction site in standard trucks, the finishing and plumbing and electrical assembly already completed. There, the cranes are responsible for lifting them to place them exactly where previously planned, the walls and slabs are deployed in situ and finally, they are fixed with high-strength bolts. All that remains is to connect the supplies. The video is in timelapse. You don’t need it. The Broad group has documented the project in a video which looks like an authentic dance of synchronized choreography where the industrialization of the process on the one hand and the careful planning on the other show in fast motion a process that in real time was equally dizzying: three hours per floor. In Xataka | China opens a new paradigm in road construction: 157 kilometers, 10 machines and a total of zero humans In Xataka | Spain’s obsession with black and white: all new construction buildings are becoming the same building Cover | Broad Group

AI saves you eight hours of work a week. As long as you’re the boss and you don’t have to use it yourself

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The AI ​​that was going to change everything and revolutionize our work He doesn’t seem to be doing any of that at the moment. What there is is a great polarization between those who believe in that promise and between those They do not see it at all clearly or they fear it. And if there is a place where this love-hate for AI is palpable, it is in companies, where CEOs see things in one way and employees in a quite different way. what has happened. The consulting company Section has conducted a survey of 5,000 workers and managers in US companies with a fundamental question: How many hours of work per week is AI saving you? Survey results, displayed in The Wall Street Journalsay a lot about the vision of CEOs and employees about the impact of AI tools. Source: WSJ. CEOs love her, employees not too much. According to data from that survey, two out of three employees indicated that AI does not save them time at work or that at most it saves them less than two hours a week. These responses contrast with those of managers and CEOs: one third affirm that it saves them between 4 and 8 hours, another third affirms that it saves them 8 or more hours, and the other third affirms that it saves them 4 hours or less. The big difference is precisely in this negative view: 40% of employees say that they do not save any time, and only 2% of CEOs agree with that opinion. AI screws up more than anything else, some say. A user interface designer named Steve McGarvey indicated in that text how managers “automatically assume that AI is going to be the savior (of the business).” His experience is different, however, and he tells how “I have lost count of the times I have looked for a solution to a problem, asked an LLM, and they gave me a solution to an accessibility problem that was completely wrong.” And it’s not that big of a deal. This professional also indicates that he uses Perplexity as an assistant to research on various projects and that it has saved him time. However, part of their job is to ensure that visually impaired users can access websites, and chatbots have not been of help in that task. The employees are somewhat afraid. There’s another important aspect to the findings: Employees were much more likely to report feeling anxious or overwhelmed by AI than excited by it. That 40% who responded that it did not save them time added that because of them they would never use AI again. Employees are the ones who are most overwhelmed by AI, managers are the ones who are most excited about it. Source: WSJ. For now AI is used like Google. But there is another problem and that is that many of these professionals are using AI as an alternative to the traditional search engine from Google. They do not use it for practical applications of their work—perhaps because they do not know how—and, for example, it was used much less for topics such as code generation or data analysis. It saves me time, but like it doesn’t. Software companies like Workday participated in the survey and pointed out an interesting fact: this technology imposes an “AI tax” in terms of productivity. Although 85% of its 1,600 employees surveyed indicated that they save between one and seven hours a week thanks to AI, that doesn’t help them much: Much of that saved time ends up being used to correct errors made by AI or modify content generated by AI. AI isn’t much use (yet). An additional and also recent survey conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers focused on 4,500 CEOs. The result: only 30% of them were confident that there would be an increase in revenue thanks to AI, although they admit that having a good AI foundation can help boost that return on investment. The adoption of AI, however, at the moment is not compensating them too much, and only 12% of companies claim to have obtained benefits in revenue or costs, while 56% claim to have “not obtained anything” with that investment. These data are in line with those of the MIT study of August 2025 according to which 95% of pilot projects with generative AI were not paying off to companies. But. The data is negative, but there may be factors that point to a change in trend. The surveys do not indicate how much time users are spending learning how to use AI versus the time it saves them. The benefit may be negative now, but in the long term it will be positive. Furthermore, there are sectors in which AI has clearly become a clear tool to assist workers, as in the field of programming. Although there is, of course, a necessary phase of code review that AI generates, the massive use of these tools indicates that productivity may have gained in whole. Image | Redd F In Xataka | “We will lose social permission”: the CEO of Microsoft knows that either they do something valuable with AI or it will have little progress

It took a hacker two and a half hours to steal thousands of personal data from Endesa customers. Endesa took a week to notify

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Endesa Energy has confirmed a cyberattack on its trading platform that has exposed critical information of millions of customers. The breach includes identity documents, bank accounts and data from electricity and gas contracts, which places those affected at risk of fraud and identity theft. What exactly happened. A cybercriminal has managed to circumvent the security measures of Endesa’s commercial platform and access sensitive customer information related to their energy contracts. According to has recognized the company in communications sent to those affected, during the security breach contact information, ID and IBAN numbers from bank accounts would have been extracted. The company ensures that the access passwords have not been compromised. The magnitude of the incident. The hacker responsible, who identifies himself as “Spain,” posted on January 4 on BreachForums, a popular forum in the dark webdetails of the attack claiming to have obtained more than 1 TB of information corresponding to more than 20 million people, according to reported the Digital Shield medium. The cybercriminal assured this medium that he had gained access in less than two and a half hours, and has gone so far as to leak data samples from a thousand clients to demonstrate the authenticity of the stolen information. What type of data is at stake. The hacker claims to have obtained basic personal data (names, surnames, postal addresses and contact information), financial information (IBAN, billing data and account history), energy data (CUPS, active electricity and gas contracts, supply point information) and regulatory data. The risks for clients. Although Endesa considers it “unlikely” that the theft will result in “a high-risk impact on the rights and freedoms of users,” the company warns of several real dangers in its official statement. Cybercriminals could try to impersonate customers, post the data on digital forums, or use it for phishing and spam campaigns. Josep Albors, Director of Research and Awareness at ESET Spain, explains that “the risk does not end with the notification of the breach” and that the exposed information can be reused for months or years to launch targeted fraud. Endesa’s response. The energy company has taken almost a week to publicly acknowledge the incident since the leak became known. The company claims to have immediately activated security protocols, blocked compromised access and notified the competent authorities of the case. In addition, it has enabled telephone lines to resolve doubts: 800 760 366 for Endesa Energía customers and 800 760 250 for those of Energía XXI, its distributor in the regulated market. We have contacted the company to find out more information about it, so we will update the article in case of news. What should those affected do? The problem with this security breach is that the data is surely used for advertising campaigns. phishing and targeted spam. As explained by ESET, the first thing we should keep in mind as affected parties is to distrust any communication that appears to come from Endesa and that includes links, attachments or urgent requests, always contacting the company through official channels. This has not been the case, but it never hurts to frequently review bank accounts to detect unauthorized movements and change passwords, even if the company claims that they have not been compromised, activating security protocols whenever possible. two factor authentication. Free and useful websites like ‘Have I Been Pwned‘ allow us to check if the data has appeared in other known breaches by entering our email. The extortion attempt. According to account According to Escudo Digital, the hacker has tried to negotiate directly with Endesa through emails, although at the moment he has not set a specific ransom figure. The cybercriminal, who says he is not affiliated with any group of ransomware known, has received offers from third parties of up to $250,000 for half of the database, although he claims to have not sold anything yet. “I prefer to wait for Endesa to decide,” he told the media. A worrying trend. Just like they count From the media Expansión, this attack places Endesa on the growing list of large Ibex 35 companies that have suffered cyberattacks in recent months. Companies such as Iberdrola, Iberia, Repsol and Banco Santander have been victims of similar incidents that have compromised customer data. And they have not been the only ones, since cyberattacks and data leaks They are now much more common. In the case of Endesa it seems that we will have to wait for the company to offer more information on the matter. Cover image | Endesa In Xataka | OpenAI just assumed an uncomfortable truth about AI browsers: there is one type of attack that is impossible to block

Five technology offers to take advantage of MediaMarkt’s VAT-free Day that ends in a few hours

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If after Christmas you are looking for a good mobile phone, headphones or a reader to devour digital books, for a few hours MediaMarkt will have its particular campaign active Day without VAT. It ends tomorrow, January 13 at 9:00 a.m., so in this article we are going to review the five best deals on technology that are available. Sony WH-1000XM5SA by 189.26 eurosa very reasonable price for one of the brand’s best headphones. Google Pixel 10 Pro by 751.24 eurosthe best price the store has had (without coupons) on this Google mobile. Kindle Paperwhite by 139.67 eurosAmazon’s eReader with the best quality-price ratio. Samsung Galaxy Watch8 by 230.58 eurosa very elegant smart watch. Samsung TQ55S85FAUXXC by 774.38 eurosa TV with a very low price to include an OLED panel. Sony WH-1000XM5SA If you are looking for good headphones, MediaMarkt has them right now. Sony WH-1000XM5SA with one of the best prices we have seen to date. By 189.26 euroswe are talking about a model that offers a very good active noise cancellationThey are very comfortable and their battery offers a range of approximately 30 hours of use with ANC. In this case, it includes a soft carrying case. The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Google Pixel 10 Pro Google mobile phones have been dropping in price in recent months and now we can find one of the best discounts on the Google Pixel 10 Pro. On the Day without VAT it remains for 751.24 euros and it is ideal if what you are looking for is a small size with a 6.3-inch screen, that has a very elegant design and a photographic section with an excellent camera configuration. Google Pixel 10 Pro (128GB) The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Kindle Paperwhite One of the most popular eReaders on Amazon is the Kindle Paperwhitesince it has the best quality-price ratio, especially when it is on sale. Now, during the Day without VAT, it remains for 139.67 euros. Set up a screen seven inchesso it is a good size for reading at home or taking on a trip. It also offers a good autonomy of up to 12 weeksits screen is anti-reflective and is water resistant (IPX8). The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Samsung Galaxy Watch8 If what you are looking for is a good smartwatch, the Samsung Galaxy Watch8 in its 44 mm Bluetooth configuration has dropped to 230.58 euros. It comes with a good assortment of sensors to monitor physical activity, has 32 GB of internal storage and its operating system is WearOS. In addition, it incorporates a pair of side buttons, includes Google Gemini and has more than 100 sports modes. Samsung Galaxy Watch8 (44mm) The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Samsung TQ55S85FAUXXC Today we can find some televisions with OLED panels for less than 1,000 euros, as is the case of the Samsung TQ55S85FAUXXC which on MediaMarkt’s VAT-free Day has dropped to 774.38 euros. It is a 55-inch smart TV that incorporates a anti-reflective panel with OLED technologyin addition to a 100 Hz refresh rate, compatibility with HDR10+ and Dolby Atmos, Alexa and HDMI 2.1. 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. Images | MediaMarkt and Compradicción (header), Sony, Google, Amazon, Samsung In Xataka | The best mobile phones, we have tested them and here are their analyzes In Xataka | The best smartwatches (2026): their analyzes and videos are here

Óscar Puente wants to connect Madrid and Barcelona in less than two hours. The fastest solution goes through China

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Last month we learned that the Ministry of Transport tendered for 2.3 million euros two studies that analyzed the possibility of increasing the speed in the Madrid-Barcelona corridor to 350 km/h. Minister Óscar Puente’s promise was to reduce the travel time between both cities to less than two hours. However, to achieve this it is not enough to improve the infrastructure. Rolling stock capable of running at those speeds is needed, and that is where the capacity of China’s trains comes into play. The problem is in the deadlines and prices. In Spain and Europe we have a large railway industry, although delivery times are reducing the local choice compared to other alternatives such as China. Deliveries are around 60 months and the prices offered by European manufacturers are higher. “Chinese manufacturers deliver trains at half the price within six months to two years,” counted Bridge to the SER Chain. Renfe urgently needs to renew its fleet, especially after the Avlo disaster in the Madrid-Barcelona corridor, and China seems the only viable alternative according to the searched criteria. China dominates global high speed. With 48,000 kilometers of high-speed roads compared to 4,000 in Spain, the Asian country leads the sector by far. Its star manufacturer, CRRC Changchun Railway Vehicles, produces the Fuxing platform and has developed the CR450 prototype, capable of reaching 400 km/h. These trains already circulate in China at 450 km/h, although they would need adaptations to operate on the Spanish network. The minister and the president of Renfe, Álvaro Fernández Heredia, recently made a visit to the facilities of the Chinese giant to learn first-hand about its production capabilities. Europe looks askance the entry of china. The European Commission investigate CRRC for alleged state subsidies that would allow it to compete with artificially low prices, a case similar to that of Chinese electric vehicles. Bulgaria already tried to buy 20 trains from the Asian company for more than 600 million euros, but the investigation by the European organization forced the manufacturer to withdraw from the contest. Spain, however, is pressing to facilitate the entry of these trains or, failing that, to create an “Airbus model” that improves the competitiveness of the European railway industry. European alternatives are on the table. In addition to CRRC, Renfe is considering options such as Siemens’ Velaro Novo trains, which can reach 400 km/h but have yet to demonstrate mass production. There is also Hitachiwhose ETR-1000 is used by Iryo in Spain, although underused because the network does not allow speeds to exceed 300 km/h. Alstom, CAF and Talgo complete the list of candidates for the tenders that the public operator will launch at the beginning of 2026. It is estimated that each unit will cost around 27 million euros and that Spain will go to the European Investment Bank to finance the purchase. The infrastructure also needs changes. The studies They include new variants of access to Madrid and Barcelona, ​​a high-speed station in Parla with connection to Cercanías, another in El Prat de Llobregat linked to Rodalies, and a direct Lleida-Barcelona section that avoids passing through Camp de Tarragona. The current route is already designed to withstand 350 km/h, according to the Ministry, and Spanish Aerotraviesa technology will be used to allow these speeds without increasing maintenance costs. The renewal of the line will begin when the Madrid-Seville line ends. It remains to be seen whether Europe will allow it. Puente’s institutional trip to China has served to strengthen commercial ties and explore cooperation with the manufacturer. The Ministry of Transport defend that the country is “at a time of enormous expansion” of its railway network and needs quick solutions. And right now China is possibly the only country that can offer the material in the desired times. Cover image | Miguel In Xataka | In the race for autonomous driving, China is ready to literally take the next leap: L3

This is the new offer that ends in a few hours

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He Apple Watch SE It was born in 2020 with the premise of being an Apple watch with the most basic functions and a much more reasonable price. But the latest generation has taken a step forward by incorporating many functions until now available in more expensive watches. He Apple Watch SE 3 It is a good gateway to the brand, especially now that you can buy it at MediaMarkt for 299 eurosthe store’s lowest price to date on its LTE configuration. Apple Watch SE 3 (GPS+LTE, 44mm M/L) The price could vary. We earn commission from these links A cheaper Apple Watch He Apple Watch SE 3 It is the watch from the SE range that the brand launched this year (in fact, a few months ago). It has a most elegant design and incorporates some functions that until now we only saw in models of the Series range. In this sense, the Apple Watch SE 3 comes with always on screenits battery supports fast charging, incorporates Apple’s S10 chip with advanced gestures, comes—in this case—with WiFi and LTE connectivity and includes a good assortment of health sensors, temperature measurement or health notifications. sleep apnea. Among other things, it should be noted that the Apple Watch SE 3 mounts a Retina LTPO OLED display which offers a brightness of up to 1,000 nits, has 64 GB of internal storage, offers water resistance (IP6X) and its battery offers a range of up to 18 hours of autonomy. According to Apple itself, its fast charging offers an 80% charge in 45 minutes. You may also be interested Spigen NeoFlex Screen Protector compatible with Apple Watch SE 3/2/1 (40mm), Apple Watch 9/8/7 (41mm), 6/5/4 (40mm), 3 Pack, TPU Film, Wet Installation, Full Coverage The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Apple AirPods 4 Active Noise Cancellation, Wireless Headphones, Bluetooth, Adaptive Audio, Ambient Sound Mode, Custom Spatial Audio, USB-C Charging Case and Wireless Charging 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. Images | Pedro Aznar in Applesfera, Apple In Xataka | Best sports watches with GPS. Which one to buy and most recommended models from 199 euros to 749 euros In Xataka | Best wireless headphones. Which one to buy and 21 models from 15 euros to 470 euros

The polar vortex collapsed for just a few hours, but it showed us how unstable this winter is coming

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Although it sounds complicated, the stratospheric polar vortex is, quite simply, the Earth’s large system of cold air and low pressure. One to the north and one to the south, rotating around the poles, acting as a barrier that keeps the frigid air away from the temperate zones of the planet. . And that’s exactly what happened in November. A sudden warming of the Arctic stratosphere (rises of up to 30 degrees in a few days) caused a huge mass of air to enter the troposphere and, in response, the westerly winds plummeted from strong values ​​to almost 0 meters per second. El vórtice se paró. Something extremely rare at the end of November. And it’s not just a scientific curiosity; but it entails a brutal redistribution of air masses. However, the vortex did not break completely: it was a quick and strong blow that left the system in stand-by, but it started again relatively quickly. That’s why, the spectacular consequences that were expected So? While it is true that the warming was “historical”, “very rare” for the dates on which it occurred and “very abrupt”, it must be understood (above all) as a warning that the atmosphere is very unstable this winter. Like a wake-up call: something we have to monitor. What the models say. As explained by MeteoVigothe models indicate that the strength of the stratospheric winds (the “muscle” of the vortex) will decrease again in the coming days; But facing the last days of December (around the 26th) the vortex will tend to recover a more circular shape and an intensity close to the climatic average. And what does all this mean? For Europe (and specifically for Spain), the vortex is something important: determines the probability of cold winters, anticyclonic blockages in high latitudes and trains of Atlantic storms. That is to say, if the vortex strengthens heading into December there will be less probability of extreme arctic irruptions and, possibly, a greater weight of storms. However, all scenarios are open: the models continue to draw the busiest winter of the time. Image | In Xataka | The last hope of winter in Spain is desperate, but increasingly possible: the breaking of the polar vortex

avoid cell phone use and sleep 12 hours

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While in Silicon Valley they brag about hugging the culture of “996” with eternal days With no time to rest, Pavel Durov, co-founder and CEO of Telegram, has built a routine that clashes head-on with that model. Instead of living glued to your cell phone, opt for long hours of rest and phone use reduced to its minimum essential expression. All this taking into account that he runs an app with hundreds of millions of users around the world. Sleep as a tool for creativity Durov does not forgive time to go to sleep. The millionaire explained in an interview on Lex Friedman’s podcast that books every night between 11 and 12 hours to be in bed. That It doesn’t always mean you sleep. all those hours, but the founder of Telegram, instead of getting nervous and getting up when he can’t fall asleep, simply limits himself to staying in bed thinking. “Some people hate it. They tell me ‘Take a sleeping pill’ but I never take pills. I love those moments because I have so many brilliant ideas, or at least they seem that way to me in those moments, while I’m lying in bed,” said the stoic millionaire. In fact, the scientific literature corroborates what Durov says and associates it with a moment in which inactivity causes the brain to wandera moment in which the brain’s abstraction mechanisms are activated that are responsible for assimilating knowledge and relating concepts. This process is closely related to creativity as it fosters new connections by helping to find solutions to complex problems. It is the same process that explains why the best ideas or solutions they occur to you in the shower or when you wash the dishes. The mobile phone is not the center of life Another curious habit of the founder of Telegram is that he avoids picking up his cell phone at all costs. just get upand delay as much as possible entering the torrent of notificationsnetworks and messages, as a deliberate way of protect your concentration. Friedman himself confirmed this point, ensuring that in the previous two weeks that he had shared with the millionaire I hadn’t seen him use his cell phone. to share content on social networks or respond to messages. Durov considers that the telephone is, above all, a constant source of distractions that prevents people from developing their own ideas and decide for themselves what they pay attention to. “If you open your phone first thing in the morning, what you end up being is someone who is told what to think about for the rest of the day,” Durov said. The millionaire summarizes his position with a very clear phrase: “My philosophy is quite simple. I want to define what is important in my life. I don’t want other people, companies or organizations of all kinds to tell me what is important today and what I should think about.” Durov’s case is even more striking if his career is taken into account: before Telegram, he had already founded one of the largest social networks in Russia, and now he is in charge of one of the most used messaging services in the world. He himself recognizes that it may seem contradictory to promote products that encourage constant connection and, at the same time, opt for the minimum possible exposure to mobile phones in their personal life. In Xataka | There are big billionaires obsessed with having dozens of children. And then there is the CEO of Telegram, who has 100 Image | Flickr (TechCrunch)

from working 120 hours to thinking that in 20 years work will be optional

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Elon Musk gained his reputation as a tireless worker when became public that his days at Tesla stretched beyond 120 hours a week and that he even slept in his office at the Austin gigafactory during the production crisis of Model 3. However, the millionaire seems to have changed his mind upon seeing the evolution of AI and has surprised the world with a futuristic vision about work: “working will be optional,” assured the richest person in the world in a recent speech at an investor forum in Saudi Arabia. From 996 to “working is optional”. Elon Musk, famous for defending 80-hour days to achieve great goals, published a message in November 2018 on his social network wrote the millionaire In an interview on the podcast ‘People by WTF’ by Nikil Kamath, Musk has changed his mind and has come to believe that, in a period of “between 10 and 20 years, work will be optional. Like a hobby” thanks to the increase in productivity promised by the evolution of AI and the progressive arrival of humanoid robots like Optimus that Tesla is developing. In his talk with Kamath, Musk compared working to growing vegetables in your own garden: “You can grow your own vegetables in your garden or you can go to the store to buy them. It’s much harder to grow your own vegetables. But some people like to grow their vegetables, and that’s fine. But it will be optional, that way, is my prediction,” said the Tesla CEO. Its formula: universal income. Musk believes that a universal income It will cover all the basic expenses of the population, eliminating the need for mandatory employment. This would allow people to live in the countryside or the city without depending on a job near an office. The businessman added: “You won’t have to be in a city for a job. If you can think of it, you can have it, that will be the future.” This vision of a population financed by a universal basic income aligns with the experiments with basic income funded by Sam Altman, former founding partner of OpenAI and Musk’s current rival. The future of AI comes together. With this change of heart regarding the workday, Elon Musk aligns himself with figures like Bill Gates, who predict that AI will automate almost everything and lead to three-day work weeks in less than a decade. Eric Yuan, CEO of Zoom, also pointed out in an interview with The New York Timesto the theory of the three-day week thanks to the increase in productivity. Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, it coincided a few days ago with Musk on stage at the Saudi Arabia Investor Forum. There he agreed with the Tesla CEO’s postulate. Huang has long argued that AI will boost the four-day work week, promoting idea generation and projects beyond current capabilities. AI is a concern for Gen Z. While the predictions of technological CEOs come true, the reality is that the evolution of AI has become a serious concern for young people of generation Z who are starting your working career. The first data They already point out that some large companies are reducing hiring in entry-level positions, which were usually occupied by recent graduates. A recent survey from the Deutsche Bank Research Institute revealed that generation Z was “very concerned” about AI stealing job opportunities. As the question moves to older generations, that concern fades away. In Xataka | We still don’t have a four-day week and there are already CEOs dreaming of the next level: working only three days Image | Flickr (Gage Skidmore)

There’s a reason you spend hours watching reels on Instagram until 3:00 AM: the science of doomscrolling

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It’s one in the morning. We should be sleeping but the finger is still sliding across the screen, scrolling through videos on TikTokreels on Instagram or posts on X. A viral meme, a new fire in the area or a new political crisis has us hooked on the screen. And although we may be exhausted, it cannot be stopped. If this scene sounds familiar to you, then welcome to the club. doomscrolling. A term that became massively popular during the pandemic and which can be defined as the habit of consuming prolonged form negative news or distressing, mainly through social networks. But behind this process, which may be very common in society right now, there are numerous chemical processes in the brain that science has not hesitated to investigate. The trap mechanism. To understand why we do doomscrollingwe must first understand that our brain did not evolve to have X or TikTok, but rather it evolved to survive. And it is not so long ago that humans were hunting for food or fleeing from a threat in nature, and it is something that our brain is still very much aware of. According to the most recent scientific literaturethe fact of sliding our screen down activates our reward brain circuits such as the dopaminergic system in each interaction. This drives us at all times to continue searching for information and evolutionarily knowing “where the danger is” was vital. The problem is that in this case the algorithm has no purpose, and we can spend 24 hours watching this type of news. But the reward system, which gives us ‘pleasure’ when knowing where the danger is, is not alone. It is accompanied by the amygdala which is the fear center in our brain. When seeing all this information, such as a war nearby in our territory, the brain interprets it as a potential threat that results in a large release of cortisol. This hormone is precisely known as the ‘stress hormone’, because it keeps the body in a state of hypervigilance. The result of these two circuits is quite clear as point out publications in Frontiers in Psychiatry and Brain Behavior: The brain seeks relief from information, but only finds more threats. This results in a toxic cycle being generated in which one seeks to calm down, becomes more scared, and searches again. The rotten brain. On social networks there is already a lot of talk of the term brain rot which translates to ‘brain rot’ like a real meme. but science has a very different opinionsince recent research suggests that repeated exposure to these fragmented stimuli with high emotional impact, with 15-second videos and alarmist headlines, have a high physical cost. The impact is located above all in executive functions (planning, organization, decision making…). And the constant alternation of these catastrophic contexts forces the brain to jump from one idea to another in milliseconds, and it is not something free. The cost we have to pay can be summarized in three points: Mental fatigue due to the high consumption of glucose that the brain has to make by having to constantly change focus. Deterioration of the prefrontal cortex, which is associated with a reduction in the efficiency of the area responsible for planning and impulse control. Processing blockage when the brain is on hyperalert. This makes it difficult to transfer information to long-term memory. Do we no longer know how to concentrate? This is the question we can all ask ourselves due to this phenomenon. The short answer from science is: we know, but it is much harder for us to “get started.” Studies on digital multitasking indicate that it is not that we have lost ability physiological of sustained attention, but we have trained our brain to expect interruptions. Deep attention (what you need to read a book for example) requires a “warm-up” time. He doomscrolling and the constant stream of notifications resets that counter constantly. Research collected in BMC Public Health they point out that attention remains “anchored” waiting for the next update. Even when you are not looking at your phone, a part of your cognitive resources is focused on it, reducing your performance on the task in front of you. It is not an irreversible decline, it is an atrophy due to lack of use of deep concentration circuits. There is hope. Despite the apocalyptic tone of the studies themselves on the subject, the scientific conclusion It’s not that we’re doomed. to be distracted automatons glued to a phone. The great advantage that humans have is neuroplasticity. With this term we mean that just as the brain learns to scroll compulsively, it can “unlearn.” Experts agree that the damage is not permanent unless the behavior becomes chronic for years without intervention. Evidence-supported strategies for breaking the cortisol-dopamine loop include: Set strict times to inform yourself and never before bed. Do exercises mindfulness as a tool to restore the default neural network. Allowing the brain to rest and ‘get bored’ without stimuli to help cleanse itself and regain the ability to focus. Images | Yazid N In Xataka | Young people have decided to stop posting (so much) on Facebook and Instagram. “AI-generated garbage” has free rein

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