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They promised us that 20 minutes of sparking was equivalent to 4 hours in the gym. Science says it’s more complicated

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Since humans became aware of the existence of electric current, they have tried to apply that power to their own body. As detailed in a report by The Wall Street Journalthis fascination goes back a long way: from the ancient Roman belief in the healing impact of torpedo fish, to the famous vibrating belt machines that promised to sculpt silhouettes in the 1950s. Today, the industry fitness has taken it a step further with whole body muscle electrostimulation (WB-EMS). The concept itself seems straight out of a science fiction movie: users don a wet suit covered in electrodes that delivers simultaneous shocks to major muscle groups for about 20 minutes. The marketing hook is irresistible, as these strength and bodyweight training sessions are sold as the ultimate shortcut to replacing hours of sweat in the gym. On social networks, dozens of influencers They upload videos doing squats and arm lifts while wearing this bionic suit. But, beyond the aesthetics and the promise of a toned body with little effort, what is true in all this? From the clinic to global fashion The technology behind electrostimulation is not a recent invention nor was it born in a trendy gym. Initially, it was used in hospitals and rehabilitation settings for a strictly medical purpose: to relieve pain, prevent muscle atrophy in bedridden patients, and improve circulation. However, in recent years, it has experienced explosive growth as a business model. fitness. The data is there. On the ClassPass platform, the number of centers offering EMS training worldwide increased more than 16% between 2023 and 2025. International franchises such as the French Iron Bodyfit plan to open more than 50 studios in the United States in the next three years, while the Californian company Body20 has gone from 46 to 67 locations nationwide since 2023. All this despite the fact that it is not an economic activity: classes cost between $40 and $100 per session. To understand the phenomenon, you have to understand how the experience works. The wet suit—water is necessary to conduct electricity effectively—sends electrical impulses directly to the muscle. This forces a greater percentage of muscle fibers to contract simultaneously involuntarily. As described by journalist Ellen Gamerman in The Wall Street Journalthe physical sensation is similar to that of receiving a call on a mobile phone in vibrate mode, with the difference that, in this case, “you are the phone.” Combined with core exercises, the level of muscle contraction makes the effort feel as intense as a high-intensity interval (HIIT) class. If you extend one arm without bending it slightly, the current can cause it to lock up completely until the trainer lowers the intensity of the machine. But who is attracted to this technology? Helge Guetzlaff, business development director of the German brand Miha Bodytec, joked in the American newspaper claiming that it attracts “a lot of lazy people.” However, Sabine Padar, owner of the exclusive Body Alchemist NYC studio, points out that she often has to convince her clients that spending more hours in the gym is not the only way to gain muscle. She insists that EMS sessions aren’t necessarily easier than traditional training, they’re just faster. The user profile is varied: from women concerned about losing strength during menopause to fashion professionals, such as Max Auth, a director of the Wolford brand who confesses to spending about $300 a month on these sessions to maintain his figure with a minimal investment of time. The reality bath Faced with marketing claims that “20 minutes are equivalent to 4 hours in the gym”, the scientific community has decided to take action on the matter. Cedric X. Bryant, executive director of the American Council on Exercise, points in WSJ that these claims are hyperbolic and that what one should expect from these workouts is being greatly exaggerated, while acknowledging that they may offer mild to moderate improvements. To shed light on the matter, various studies have analyzed the real impact of WB-EMS on different population groups: In older and sedentary adults: A research published in Clinical Interventions in Aging demonstrated the effectiveness of this technology in sedentary and thin older women, at risk of sarcopenia (loss of muscle mass) and abdominal obesity. After subjecting a group of 23 women to 18 minutes of WB-EMS (three sessions every 14 days) for 12 months, the results showed significant and positive differences in appendicular muscle mass and a reduction in abdominal fat mass compared to the control group. The study concluded that, given the good acceptance of the technology, WB-EMS is a valid and less daunting alternative for subjects who do not want or cannot do conventional exercise. In recreational athletes: Another essay published in Frontiers in Physiology analyzed the effects of WB-EMS in male recreational runners. For 6 weeks, participants reduced their running training to a single day per week and added a weekly WB-EMS session. The results indicated that the electrostimulation group improved their maximum oxygen consumption (VO2max), their ventilatory thresholds, their running economy and their vertical jump. This suggests that WB-EMS may be an effective stimulus to maintain and even improve performance in periods where resistance training volume is reduced. The definitive comparison (The WB-EMS is not a miracle): To check whether electrostimulation is really superior to classic sweating, the FIT-AGEING project evaluated 89 sedentary middle-aged adults. A rigorous study also published in Frontiers in Physiology divided the subjects into three 12-week programs: traditional concurrent training (recommended by WHO), high intensity interval training (HIIT), and HIIT added to WB-EMS. Finally, all types of exercise induced similar increases in cardiorespiratory fitness and muscle strength. In fact, the scientists explicitly concluded that the changes observed in the WB-EMS group were not superior to those of the other conventional exercise programs. The suit does not provide any extra decisive advantage compared to sweating the shirt in a traditional way. The silent danger of overexertion Despite the obvious benefits, WB-EMS is not a toy and carries risks if not properly supervised. As he … Read more

The Tax Agency has not made the income tax return manual accessible for decades. A Valencian man did it in three hours

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“Javier, has the program PADRE come out yet?” Every year, at the end of March, my father—not to be confused with my FATHER—asked me the same question, because I was like an AI alerting him that he could finally get down to it. the income tax return every year. For him that was not just an obligation. I would say it was a hobby. Almost a passion. Something to which he dedicated hours and hours in his office armed with his pens, his tight handwriting, his calculator and of course with the Nobel package next to it. He is no longer here, but if I have not inherited something from him, it is that passion for filing income tax returns. In fact, I have never done it, perhaps because as I saw that he dedicated so many hours and effort to making it perfect, that caused me some trauma. “Ugh, this costs too much,” I told myself then and I continue to tell myself now. And here I am, with a reverential fear of completing that task, which I end up entrusting to a manager because time, they say, is money. And yet, it is a small outstanding debt that I have. Last year I tried to try it, and this year I told myself that maybe with the help of some local AI model (because of privacy) I should try it again. But while I was thinking about it, these days the practical manual of Income 2025and one person decided to do something very interesting with that information: he turned it into something useful. This is how the LaRenta.es Open Source project emerged This manual, no matter how complete and detailed it may be, has a problem: it is very inaccessible. The information is there, but neither the wording nor the structure or its organization make it a particularly useful document for most users. That’s where it came into action. Paul March (@paumrch), a public administration worker who lives in Valencia and who, at 31 years old, has a profile completely aligned with the so-called civic technology. Although his training is not technical, he is a very restless self-taught person who has been “tinkering” with all kinds of personal technological projects for more than 15 years. And the latter has become especially popular. We have had the opportunity to speak with Pau and he told us that by working in public administration and being interested in the application of technology to his field, “I have always been interested in the issue of digitalization of the administration because I know it and I know the room for improvement there is and I am convinced that citizens need that improvement.” When the Income 2025 practical manual appeared, he realized that he could try to do something with it. With the experience of previous projects and the new AI tools that he had been using for months, he got the ball rolling. In just three hours, he confesses, he created LaRenta.esa web service that allows any user Know what state and regional deductions you can take advantage of in this statement. The first question of the questionnaire is important: where we pay personal income tax. The deductions to which we may be entitled depend on this parameter. To do this, it has created a very simple system in which, from a small questionnaire that takes two minutes to complete, we can obtain information about these deductions. The process is reduced to going through seven stages of this questionnaire with a few questions, from which it is possible to obtain a final summary with deductions to which we may end up being entitled. And in each of them, we will have an indicator to know what percentage of the total of each deduction we may be entitled to, as well as detailed information about each particular deduction. In these details, the information present in the 2025 income manual is used more clearly and directly, but although the language is still somewhat harsh, at least in this project only that which is directly related to that deduction is shown in a more readable format. We are therefore faced with a project that is not intended at all to prepare your income tax return, but rather to at least provide the information that exists is more accessible and easier to understand. And as March says, it is far from being a perfect project, but it certainly shows that all that information offered by the public administration can be converted into something even more useful in a relatively simple way. From idea to application in three hours These days this entrepreneur explained the process of creating this webapp in an article posted on his Twitter account (X), and as I said there, the cycle was surprisingly simple. AI was his companion throughout the project, and he took advantage of his experience with previous projects to then take advantage of several tools: The interface design was carried out with the help of GoogleStitch The programming was done with the plugin Claude Code in Visual Studio Code. He used Opus 4.6 to plan the entire project, and Sonnet 4.6 to program it, although for some basic tasks he indicates that he also used Anthropic’s basic model, Haiku. He did it all on March 19, right during the Cremá, the big day of the Fallas in his city, Valencia. The project absorbed him so much that he didn’t even enjoy the party and he spent that afternoon and part of the night polishing the errors he was detecting. The result, as can be seen on LaRenta.es, is a fully functional, fast, clear and practical web application. Not only that: it is totally private. Pau explains that no data is saved except for the email if a user wants the summary PDF report to be sent to them. The potential of civic technology When the project was finished, Pau decided post a message to share it through your Twitter … Read more

an interoceanic corridor capable of connecting the Pacific with the Atlantic in seven hours

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If you are in the Atlantic and want to reach the Pacific (or vice versa), the only viable option from the point of view of time and distance is pay the fee and cross the 80 kilometers of the Panama Canal. The options of surrounding the northern or southern part of the continent are directly unfeasible, whether due to distance, climate, geopolitics or danger. But Panama is not the only country that has a privileged location from a logistical point of view: there is Colombia, Costa Rica, Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua or Mexico. In fact, a few years ago Nicaragua already tried his own channel without success. Now it is Mexico that has put an ambitious project on the table: the Interoceanic Corridor of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec (CIIT). Of course, it is not an artificial waterway that unites the two oceans, but rather a combination of ports and railways to connect both coasts of the North American country. A “dry canal”. The Interoceanic Corridor of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec is a multimodal infrastructure project that combines three railway lines, which exceed 1,200 kilometers of tracks (including branches) with two ports, the from Coatzacoalcos (Veracruz) and Salina Cruz (Oaxaca). The idea of ​​passage is the following: the containers disembark at a port, cross the territory by train and are re-embarked on the other side, all of this in less than seven hours. Your goal is transport 1.4 million containers a year. The three railway lines of the Interoceanic Corridor of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec Why is it important. The Mexican government itself refers This project is considered to be of great importance for the economic development of the country for three reasons: the improvement of its railway and port infrastructure, promoting the transfer of goods and also becoming a competitor to the Panama Canal. It will be especially interesting for those boats that do not fit in the canal, such as post-Panamax and Ultra Large ships. The corridor is also a blessing for the nearshoring at a time when the American market (and its president) is inviting companies to leave China in favor of localizations closer ones like Mexico: being able to move goods from the Pacific to the Atlantic and vice versa is a real boost. Finally, this infrastructure will contribute to the development of the region: crosses 79 municipalities46 from Oaxaca and 33 from Veracruz. The infrastructure, in detail. The system is articulated in three axes: Line Z, from Coatzacoalcos to Salina Cruz, 214 km. The FA Line, from Coatzacoalcos to Palenque, 308 km. Line K, from Ixtepec to Ciudad Hidalgo, 476 km. As for ports, although Coatzacoalcos on the Atlantic and Salina Cruz on the Pacific are the main nodes, Dos Bocas and Puerto Chiapas are complementary. Furthermore, it carries the industrial impulse under its arm: the project includes the construction of 14 industrial parks along the corridor forming different clusters. The government provides logistics infrastructure and access to suppliesthus tax benefits to promote companies to establish themselves. The roadmap. The Government of Mexico formalized the CIIT roadmap for the period 2025–2030. Regarding the railway lines, the Z has been operating since December 2023, the FA line since September 2024 and the one that is still under construction is the K line. However, its completion is planned by June 2026. As for the ports, the project contemplates the modernization of all of them to reinforce their capacity and increase their depth, essential to allow the docking of larger and more ships. The objective of the Mexican government is that the Corridor operate at 100% by mid-2026. Bottom line: In theory, it’s just around the corner. Yes, but. The real success of the Corridor depends on the railways, ports, roads and industrial parks functioning as a single perfectly assembled and optimized system. At the moment, ports, trains and industrial estates are going at different paces. Currently, the Corridor is partially operational and the difference between installed capacity and real demand is abysmal: according to the 2024 Railway Statistical Yearbook of the Railway Transport Regulatory Agencythe railroad moved 111,000 tons of agricultural cargo and 1,000 tons of industrial cargo, well below what is expected for a competitor to the Panama Canal. In addition, it has handicaps compared to its neighbor’s structure: having to unload, load into a wagon and reload is a structural disadvantage compared to a direct transfer. The project brings with it challenges such as environmental threats not only derived from the seismic conditions of the Isthmus and high rainfall, but also the risk of deforestation, endangered species or water stress derived from industrial activity. Finally, insecurity and the lack of qualified labor can also cause a dent in its real impact in Mexico. In Xataka | Saudi Arabia’s impossible bridge to join Africa and Asia: a 32-kilometer megastructure over the Red Sea In Xataka | The Mayan Train has become a nightmare for Mexico: what seemed like a great plan has run into justice Cover | face islam and Alex Pagliuca

I spent 8 hours a day watching porn to train the AI. Today he leads the workers union that fights against that

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Spend a workday tagging porn there’s nothing fun about it. Content moderators They have been denouncing terrible working conditions for years and now The same thing is happening with data labeling to train AI. In 404media They tell the story of Michael Geoffrey, a Kenyan who spent months working for two AI companies, until they completely destroyed his mental health. The jobs. Michael stayed in front of his computer for eight hours watching porn, describing what was happening in the images in great detail. It was no affiliation, but rather he worked for a data labeling company that then used all those descriptions to train AI models. When the day was over, his second job awaited him at a sexual AI chatbot company. In this job, Michael had to maintain sexual conversations with users, adopting whatever role was necessary each time; I had to pretend to be a man, a woman, straight, homosexual… and of course adapt to the context in each conversation. Behind the AI. Although they have the last name IA, in reality These sexbots have a lot of human work behind them. That is, when someone talks to their girlfriend or boyfriend AIyou may be talking to a real person. Michael wrote his testimony and said that he had to fake intimate connections with anonymous users. Their interactions were then used to train the AI. In the case of data labeling, workers are exposed to all types of content, some extremely violent. For example, for AI to be able to detect content of sexual abuse and violence, these workers must see thousands of images of abuse and extreme violence, and all for ridiculous salaries. In a Time reportthey said that one of these companies paid between 1.3 and 2 dollars net per hour. The consequences. After several months on the job, Michael suffered from insomnia, stress and began to have problems having sexual relations. He tells 404media that “there came a point where my body no longer responded. When I saw someone naked, I didn’t even feel anything.” Endless hours, exposure to very unpleasant content and very low salaries. Some claim that it is like a form of modern slavery. The companies behind. One of them is Sama, a San Francisco-based company that defines itself as “the perfect example of ethical AI.” It’s the company that paid 2 dollars an hour. Another company that has also been at the center of the controversy is Remotasks, a Scale AI subsidiaryone of the largest labeling companies. It was founded by Alexandr Wang, current head of AI at Meta. By Remotasks it is said that he pays late and often not the amount that was originally promised. These and other similar companies They are outsourced by OpenAIGoogle, Meta and more to train your AI models. The workers organize. Currently, Michael is the secretary of the Data Labelers Association of Kenyaan organization that wants to give voice and make visible the work of these underpaid and invisible workers. Other organizations have also been created such as African Content Moderators and Tech Workers who demand better working conditions and resources to care for the mental health of workers. In Xataka | People Blaming ChatGPT for Causing Delusions and Suicides: What’s Really Happening with AI and Mental Health Image | Data Labelers Association

It took eight months for the French Academy to bring Jim Carrey to Paris. It took the Internet eight hours to decide that it wasn’t him

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On February 26, Jim Carrey received a prestigious Honorary César for his entire career in Paris, after years of semi-retirement. But what was born as a touching emotional tribute at the center of a conspiracy theory: was it really him who took the stage, or an impersonator with prosthetics? The story of how an Instagram post unleashed chaos (and how it ended up being denied). A tribute. Jim Carrey has received this year’s Honorary César: the French Oscars rewarded his “exceptional versatility” with an award that Julia Roberts, Christopher Nolan and David Fincher had already received. It also arrived at a time when Carrey’s career was at a peculiar point: in 2022, at the press conference for ‘Sonic the Hedgehog 2’ he announced that he retired. But he came back three years later. with brutal honesty: “I have bought many things and I need the money“Frankly.” Therefore, Carrey arrived in Paris after a false retirement that had made him partially disappear, yes, from the red carpets and premieres. And now he was on the most elegant stage in European cinema. He had not disappeared from the public light, however: in November, had been seen at Soundgarden’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony in Los Angeles. But his appearances have always been, in recent years, spaced out in time and without warning. The delivery. The first unexpected moment of the night came when Carrey, after being introduced by Michel Gondry, and with an aesthetic that left behind the lush beard of recent years, gave the acceptance speech completely in French. The accent was unmistakably American, but it was very worked. As Gregory Caulier, general delegate of the Caesars, would later reveal, I had prepared it for months. In it revealed a connection with France that no one knew: his ancestor Marc-François Carré (the family’s original surname before Anglicization) was born in Saint-Malo and, from there, emigrated to Canada The change. In fact, already at the aforementioned Rock & Roll Hall of Fame ceremony its appearance It had aroused some surprise: it already had the aesthetic that it repeated at the Césars, with shoulder-length hair and slightly different facial features than usual. The first speculations pointed to the cosmetic surgery as a possible reason and some experts on the subject speculated about what those interventions could have been. Dr. Millicent Rovelo speak of an upper blepharoplasty (to remove excess skin from the upper eyelids) and a significant volume of Botox on the forehead. Another surgeon, Dr. John Diaz pointed out to a possible cervical tightening procedure. The very media Dr. Tony Youn pointed out signs of an endoscopic brow lift that would explain the slight displacement of the hairline. and joined the hypothesis of blepharoplasty and Botox. Finally, Dr. Raffi Hovsepian, dissented: The changes in the forehead and eye area seemed compatible with natural male aging, without surgical evidence. Let’s not forget that in 2003, Carrey appeared at the Teen Choice Awards completely blindfolded, wearing sunglasses, pretending to come out of surgery. By then rumors arose about the tweaks to his physique. The mask artist. Four days after the ceremony, Alexis Stone posted a carousel of three images on Instagram. The first two featured Jim Carrey. The third was a latex mask, false teeth, a dark wig, and various makeup materials arranged on a table with the Eiffel Tower out of focus in the background. The caption was simply “Alexis Stone as Jim Carrey in Paris.” Stone is a self-taught effects designer who has built a career on hyperrealistic transformations that have allowed her to pass herself off as Madonna, Jack NicholsonLana Del Rey, Robin Williams’ Ms. Doubtfire or Glenn Close’s Cruella de Vil. Stone usually documents his process in detail, but this was not the case: we only saw a mask that even had details that some users saw themselves as belonging to an AI generationwith excessively perfect contours and a blurry background typical of synthetic images. but when famous like Megan Fox or Katy Perry spread Stone’s posts, the rumor germinated all over the internet: the Césars were not Jim Carrey, but an imposter. Because. The arguments that the conspiracy theorists maintained They appeared almost at the same time as the gala. For example, the color of the eyes, usually dark brown, here a more greenish tone. More: Carrey is left-handed, and several short videos showed him in Paris using his right hand to sign autographs. The third argument was the speech itself: that someone who was theoretically retired and had no active ties to France spoke for ten minutes in French with very elaborate pronunciation, it was, for a part of the public, tremendously suspicious. The interviews that prove it. Of course, this is the moment that conspiracy theorists have been waiting for to bring up interviews from Carrey’s past with ambiguous, philosophical or downright incomprehensible answers. In 2017 declared that he did not believe in personalities, that the fashion party he had gone to and at which he was being interviewed seemed to him “absolutely meaningless” (from a metaphysical point of view) and that “there is no self, there are only things happening” (later the actor himself I would rate the interview “existential experiment”). In a previous interview, he calmly said “I’m dead“, but it was in the context of a conversation about spirituality and ego. We recommend fans of the most disconcerting Carrey to check out the incredible documentary ‘Jim and Andy’, which documents his literal transformation into Andy Kaufman for the filming of ‘Man on the Moon’. Official confirmation. The first official statements came from Marleah Leslie, Jim Carrey’s publicist for decades, with a brief message and that left no room for doubt: “Jim Carrey attended the César Awards, where he accepted his Honorary César Award.” That same day, the aforementioned Gregory Caulier told Variety what the eight months of preparatory conversations had been like and the months that the actor dedicated to working on his French. Carrey went to Paris accompanied by … Read more

We have been obsessed with doing more hours of sports for years. Science points out that we were wrong

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For decades, the main message that medicine has conveyed to us is that physical exercise should be a priority and it has been summarized with one word: move. Accumulating hours of activity per week has been the great objective that many have had; However, a new study has come to turn this around, to give great importance to the type of exercise and how varied the training menu we follow is when we go to the gym. More and more complete. As we investigate more, the way we exercise is changing, and now a study published at the end of 2026 has suggested that combining different types of exercises reduces the risk of mortality, regardless of whether we do a lot or a little sport in total. That is why the message we must keep in mind is that, instead of doing many hours of a single exercise, it is worth diversifying a little between different modalities, dedicating a little time to each of them. How they have done it. To reach this conclusion, the research team used data from two large groups of people to bring together more than 100,000 people who were followed for more than thirty years. In this way, with different questionnaires, the team measured the active time that each of the people to be analyzed had, establishing a minimum threshold of 20 minutes of activity per week to estimate that someone was really doing it and that it was significant. The objective was to find a correlation between activity levels, the number of these activities and, above all, how they reached adulthood and even when they died in the event that they had not reached the end of the study. The results. The most striking finding is that the group of people who practiced a greater variety of exercise had 19% less total mortality compared to those who limited themselves to a single repetitive routine. But the most important thing is that this good effect of variety in activity is independent of the total volume of time invested in playing sports. That is, the mere fact that exercise is varied has a protective effect in itself, reducing the risk of dying from cardiovascular, respiratory, cancer and other pathologies by between 13% and 41%. The best sports. The study also broke down the individual impact of each discipline, showing a non-linear dose-response relationship, making the greatest benefits noticeable at the beginning, when we went from doing nothing to doing something. In this way, the best sports according to science are the following: Walking: 17% less risk. Racquet sports (such as tennis): 15% less risk. Rowing and calisthenics: 14% less risk. Weight lifting: 13% less risk. Jogging/Easy Running: 11% less risk. Cycling: 4% less risk. Its limitations. Logically, this note has important limitations, since the data were self-reported by the participants with questionnaires and the population analyzed was not too varied, being mostly white, so we must look to see if these percentages may vary by demographics. However, the consensus is clear, since just as nutritionists have been recommending for years that we eat a “rainbow” of different vegetables instead of gorging on just spinach, sports science is now asking us for an “omnivorous movement diet” in which we combine different types of exercise on a daily basis. Images | Anastase Maragos In Xataka | Neither walking nor running: science suggests that the squat is the true “drug” for healthy aging

Dubai was a mecca for expats. Now they are driving 10 hours and paying thousands of dollars for a flight to escape from there

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Iran has shown it needs very little to upend Middle East air traffic and hit the United Arab Emirates (UAE) where it hurts the most: the image of reliability that has been built for years at an international level, with great benefitsby the way. The wave of attacks launched by Tehran to neighboring countries that facilitate US military deployment in the region, such as Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait or the UAE itself, has affected thousands of flights and left a curious image: expats desperate to leave Dubai. There are those who are shelling out large sums to fly on private jets and those who have even driven 10 hours to get to Riyadh and get on a plane there. What has happened? If Tehran wanted to damage the image of stability of neighbors like the UAE, it was completely right. Although the country managed to intercept most of the drones and missiles launched by Iran, the truth is that some of the projectiles reached Dubai, the tourist and financial heart of the region. In practice, this translated into fires in luxury hotels, towers with windows shattered by explosions, a knocked out airport and, above all, considerable reputational damage for a city that has spent years building the image of a safe and comfortable destination for expats. Sums it up beautifully Elizabeth Rayment, a consultant caught off guard by the Iranian attack in Palm Islands: “You never expect to hear missiles flying overhead in Dubai.” Have there been more consequences? Yes. The most serious are undoubtedly the victims. Arab News I was talking yesterday about three deceased and 58 injured in the United Arab Emirates. There are not many if you take into account that the country’s authorities claim to have detected a total of 156 ballistic missiles and several cruise missiles, in addition to more than half a thousand drones, most of them intercepted and destroyed. The other consequence is the chaos generated in air traffic in the Persian Gulf, where some airports and airlines have had to suspend their operations, affecting both customers in the region and others who had planned to pass through Dubai, Abu Dhabi or Qatar to take connecting flights between Europe and Asia. Have many been cancelled? FlightAware estimates that around 2,800 operations and on Sunday more than 3,1500. Added to these are the flights canceled and suspended today by Gulf airlines. For reference, Financial Times assured this morning that more than half of the services that had been booked for today in the region have been cancelled. The Iranian attacks have altered to a greater or lesser extent the programming of Emirates, Etihad Airways and Qatar Airways and the airports of Dubai, Doha and Abu Dhabi, as well as other terminals in Kuwait and Bahrain. The BBC has chatted with travelers who have found flights canceled upon arriving at the terminal. There are those who already talk about the biggest crisis aviation since the pandemic. How do I leave the country? That is the question that expats and tourists have been asking themselves since Saturday. The Iranian attacks have surprised them in the region and now they find that there are few (or no) regular flights that take them to other parts of the globe. Faced with such a scenario, there are those who have armed themselves with patience, those who have drawn on their checkbook and those who have resigned themselves to traveling kilometers and kilometers to reach airports with flights. So I told it a few hours ago FTwhich speaks of “tens of thousands of passengers” stranded in the region and assures that there are Dubai residents who have traveled to neighboring Oman to get a flight. What’s more, some have even driven 10 hours to get on a plane in Riyadh. They don’t have it easy. Most scheduled flights these days between Muscat (Oman) and Europe are reserved. And what do they do? The wealthiest, pull out their checkbook and try their luck with private jet companies. EnterJet, which is dedicated to intermediating between customers and available planes, says that reservations have skyrocketed 40% since the weekend. The problem is that the sector also has its limitations. Its founder explains to Financial Times that “the only viable option” to operate is the Muscat terminal, which makes it difficult to obtain landing slots. Added to this are the difficulties in finding ships. The businessman hopes that as traffic recovers in the Gulf, private flights will increase. Are they very expensive? The situation in the Gulf has caused a curious effect: while the price of airlines such as International Airlines Group or Air France-KLM they resent the price of private services skyrockets. The JetVip agency (Oman) explains to Guardian that a flight to Istanbul on a small Nextant jet costs around 85,000 euros, about three times the normal price. The same media reveals that seats on private charter flights to Moscow are paid for about 20,000 euros… per person. Rates vary depending on the company, but they usually always range in the five digits, or even more. It may sound strange, but we must keep in mind that Donald Trump has hinted that the offensive against Iran could continue even further. “four weeks” and the question remains as to how Tehran will respond. Added to this is that over the last few years the UAE has managed to position itself as a priority destination for thousands of expatsa position largely based on reliability and stability that Tehran has now managed to damage with missiles. Images | Michael Ranzau (Flickr) In Xataka | The arrival of the B-2s to Iran can only mean one thing: the search for the greatest threat to the United States has begun

Sam Altman has spent his entire life saying one thing and doing exactly the opposite. And this time it didn’t even take 48 hours.

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A Mecano’s great song —I know, this is very Kiss FM—he said that ‘the face you see is a Signal ad’. And in case any of our painfully young readers don’t know, Signal is a brand of toothpaste. And if there is anyone whose face is exactly like that, it is Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, who with a perfect and convincing smile tries to convince the world that his company is just as perfect and convincing. For many people, today is not the case. what has happened. These days we have seen how the US and its Department of Defense (or War, as they like to call it now) have decided that if any AI company wants to work with them, they are going to have to let them use the AI ​​as they see fit. That we have to massively spy on people? He spies on her, totally, we have already done it. What should we tell AI to develop lethal autonomous weapons? Well too. Anthropic stands. But lo and behold, precisely the company that was working with the Pentagon He said that oranges from China. Anthropic, which had been collaborating with the Government for months—Claude was used for the arrest of Nicolás Maduro—, has made it clear that there are red lines that he will not cross. If Anthropic doesn’t want to, let OpenAI do it. At the Pentagon they have threatened to turn Anthropic into a pariah company, but at the moment they have not made any official move. What has happened is that the US Government has decided to change its technological partner. OpenAI has replaced Anthropic and appears to have reached an agreement to work with US defense and security agencies. Sam Altman seizes the opportunity. This has been indicated by Sam Altman, who in an ad on Twitter (I still resist calling her “X”) explained that her company had agreed deploy their models on the US War Department’s classified network. The curious thing is that this agreement establishes the same red lines that Anthropic had: no espionage on American citizens and no autonomous weapons. In the official announcement they even highlight that their agreement “has more safeguards than any previous agreement for classified AI deployments, including Anthropic’s.” There is, for example, one more requirement: that their models not be used for “social credit” systems with which citizens are rated based on the information collected from them. But. Although both Sam Altman and the company’s blog appear to place limits on the War Department’s use of its AI, the terms of that agreement contradict Altman’s claims. The announcement mentions a specific paragraph of the agreement that explicitly states the following: The War Department may use the AI ​​system for all lawful purposes, consistent with applicable law, operational requirements, and well-established security and oversight protocols. “The AI ​​system will not be used to independently direct autonomous weapons in any case where human control is required by law, regulation or Department policy, nor will it be used to make other high-risk decisions that require approval from a similarly competent human decision-maker.” Mass spying on American citizens is legal in certain scenarios as part of the Patriot Act that was passed after the 9/11 attacks, and that would allow AI to process data and communications collected by mass surveillance systems. Jeremy Lewin, a State Department official, has indicated that this agreement “flows from the pillar of ‘all legitimate use’”, and points out that what Altman proposes regarding red lines is not as clear-cut as it seems. Internal protests. Last Friday at 5:01 p.m., Anthropic was due to accept the Pentagon’s terms, but it did not do so. During that morning, several OpenAI and Google employees showed their support for the ethical and moral positioning of the rival company, and almost 800 of them (681 from Google, 96 from OpenAI) signed an open letter entitled “We will not be divided.” Altman says one thing, does another. In an interview with CNBCSam Altman said on CNBC that despite all the differences he has with Anthropic, “I trust them as a company, and I think they really care about safety.” On Thursday, the CEO of OpenAI sent an internal statement expressing his desire for “things to de-escalate between Anthropic and the Department of Defense.” The message came to nothing less than two days later, when he announced the agreement with the same Department. Altman says one thing, does another. In an interview with CNBCSam Altman said on CNBC that despite all the differences he has with Anthropic, “I trust them as a company, and I think they really care about safety.” On Thursday, the CEO of OpenAI sent an internal statement expressing his desire for “things to de-escalate between Anthropic and the Department of Defense.” The message came to nothing less than two days later, when he announced the agreement with the same Department. The world against OpenAI. Many have ended up criticizing OpenAI’s way of acting on social networks. On Reddit they appeared several messages that encouraged users to “Cancel ChatGPT” with thousands of positive votes and also thousands of comments in which the tone was indignant with the way in which OpenAI and Sam Altman have taken advantage of this circumstance. We have seen critical movements in the past —Facebook, Netflix—, but it usually happens that after these first moments, companies end up recovering from the criticism and even come out stronger for a simple reason: Human beings have very bad memories. In Xataka | OpenAI has a problem: Anthropic is succeeding right where the most money is at stake

the subtle change on your screen that your eyes will appreciate after eight hours of Excel

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If you work or study for many hours every day in front of the PC screen, It is very likely that you will end up with tired eyes: reading a lot of text, watching videos, going from one Excel to another (and then to another, and another), writing, editing images or videos and a very long etcetera of tasks sustained over time will almost certainly cause you to have eye fatigue and a tiredness in your eyes that is as uncomfortable as it is unhealthy. If you have no choice but to be in front of the monitor for a good handful of hours each day (something quite common in many cases, in these times), you can always do everything possible on your part to minimize it and even remedy it: Get up every now and then, don’t stare too long at a time and look at distant objects, stand at a distance that prevents you from straining your eyes too much, and more similar tricks. And added to all this, I am going to give you an idea that perhaps you had not considered and that is not going to solve your life, but it will make you gain visual comfort (and I say this from experience): using a monitor with a high refresh rate. Even if you don’t play. Because having more than 60 Hz (120 Hz, 144 Hz and even more) is an excellent idea outside of the field of video games. And (spoiler) nowadays, the price difference between some monitors and others is so small, that I can tell you that it is very worth it that little extra investment. What is refresh rate (and what does it affect) Okay, on paper, purely speaking of specs, 120Hz is better than 60Hz. And 144 Hzbetter than 120 Hz. That has become clear to us. But exactly what are we talking about? We are talking about hertz, which in short determine the number of frames per second that the screen in question is capable of displaying. In other words: the number of still images that appear, one after another, in one second of time. The greater the quantity, the more fluid the image, which can be a video game, a video or the apps we use in our daily lives. The latter, just what we are looking for. In practice, having more than 60 Hz and therefore a higher refresh rate translates into fluidity. Fluidity in everything: transitions, application effects, window and cursor movements, scroll much softer and, ultimately, everything that generates movement on the screen. Something that may seem minor, but in the long run, and after spending hours in front of the monitor, it is noticeable. A one-way road. At this point, we must take into account the ‘price factor’. Because long ago, going above that base 60 Hz from which monitors start was expensive. However now, with refresh rates that even exceed 360 Hzwe find 144 Hz (or 120 Hz, or 165 Hz and even more) options at great prices. Which means that for a fairly contained investment you can make a huge leap in quality. The good and the bad, face to face Although the theory is simple, the differences between one type of monitor and another can be confusing if you are not familiar with it. Then, This table as a summary will clarify it a lot for you.. 60Hz 144Hz THE GOOD 🟢 Cheaper (and you can allocate more budget to other specifications: resolution, size…) Great fluidity in images and a standard to play today THE BAD 🔴 They offer less fluidity and are somewhat outdated in 2026, as they can make the jump to 144 Hz or more at similar prices Slightly more expensive than 60 Hz and, in general, more striking gaming design IDEAL FOR Users who do not feel visual fatigue, who feel comfortable at 60 Hz and do not want to spend more Gamers (or non-gamers) who want to take a leap in visual comfort Which one may interest you more: we do the math As we have already mentioned, price is not a determining factor today when deciding between a 60 Hz monitor and another with 144 Hz or more. Even so, if a 60 Hz one is enough for you, you can dedicate that extra investment in other aspects of the screens, such as the resolution, the diagonal or the format. Actual use: 60 Hz is enough for you and you prefer to spend what 144 Hz would cost you on a ultrawidebecause you need more horizontal space on the screen. What experience you get: similar to what you have been obtaining with previous 60 Hz monitors, but you gain in those other characteristics that are important to you (more diagonal, different format, more resolution…). If, on the other hand, you notice that after finishing the work day your eyes are very tired and it seems that applications, transitions and other movements are not as fluid as you would like, then going from 60 Hz to 144 Hz or more is an excellent decision. Spending little more than you would with a 60 Hz monitor, you double (and even more) its refresh rate and the view thanks you. Actual use: It bothers you that the animations of the operating system, the scroll or the passing of the cursor across the screen goes in fits and starts and you decide to go above 60 Hz. What experience you get: From the first second, you see that everything runs more smoothly and is more comfortable for the eyes. Where before there were almost imperceptible but existing cuts, now everything is going smoothly. It even looks like you’ve upgraded to a better PC! In summary: 👉 Choose 60 Hz if: You don’t notice visual fatigue because you don’t spend too many hours in front of the screen, you don’t want to spend more and you also don’t play games or plan to do so in the short term. … Read more

With Plenitude, the kWh will cost you the same 24 hours a day and, at the same time, you get a gift card for Netflix

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If you have an electricity rate with time slotsthe watch is your greatest ally. You probably try to organize yourself as much as possible to turn on the washing machine or dishwasher in the off-peak sections, thus saving money along the way. This creates stress in many homes.especially when unforeseen events arise or there are small children at home. What alternative do we have? A rate where the kWh has exactly the same price 24 hours a day. That’s just what it offers Plenitude’s Easy Ratethat now bring a gift with you in the form of a Netflix gift card. Of course, only if you hire before next March 2. A fee to be able to put on the washing machine (or whatever) without looking at the clock Although it may not seem like it, there is a fairly considerable difference between the price per kW between the cheapest and most expensive hours. If you can use the most demanding appliances at off-peak hours, there is no problem. But, What if you get home at 7 p.m. every day? There you will have to pay the most expensive price, which can make your electricity bill skyrocket. That does not happen with the Plenitude Easy Rate. with her, the price of electricity will be exactly the same all day (at the time of writing, 0.128306 per kWh). This way, no matter how many unforeseen events you have during the day, you won’t have to worry about how much electricity costs at a certain time of day. Furthermore, once you contract the rate, the price of kWh will remain stable for 12 months. This means that, if, for example, an energy crisis occurs that increases the price of electricity, you will continue paying the same. And it does not have any type of permanence, something that not all electricity rates on the market offer. Hiring can be done in several ways, although you have the option of doing everything through the Plenitude website. In this way, you will have a 100% digital process which will only take you a few minutes. We are talking about the Easy Rate for electricity, although Plenitude also offers the same for gas, as well as for having both supplies together. Now it’s time for the promo we mentioned above, active only until March 2. Any of these rates include a 50-euro Netflix gift card that we will receive after the first month of contracting. We can use this for both a new account and one we already have. If we do numbers, it’s great: It gives you almost four months of the Standard plan. Everything together gives us an opportunity to save every month, both on the electricity bill and by removing a subscription for a while. Although yes: only if you hurry and you contract the Easy Rate before March 2. 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 | Patrick Schneider on UnsplashPlenitude In Xataka | What do you need (according to the EU) for your survival kit and how much will it cost you? In Xataka | Best power banks to charge your mobile phone. Which one to buy and recommended external batteries

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