Taking an important call in a traffic jam is the order of the day. In 1990, a company in Barcelona already offered this service

Nowadays, as soon as we have some down time, we turn to our mobile: either to scroll infinitely on Instagram or to catch up on email. Although what defined the basis of today’s smartphones was the first iPhone in 2007, the professional point began before, with the blackberry 5810 and your email in 2002 or we can even go back to Nokia 9000 ’96, which introduced the keyboard and its business approach. The late 90s were the beginning of turning the mobile phone into an everyday object. I’m driving and I need a call now. Of course, back in the 90s, carrying a cell phone in the car and answering a work call was unthinkable. Or not, because someone thought of it an exclusive telephone service for drivers in Barcelona pre-Olympic Games. The target audience was those people who were so busy that they could not afford to be disconnected while traveling through the congested business areas of the city. The operation. As they narrate on the Catalan regional television 3Cat, if in the middle of a traffic jam you were lucky enough to find one of those people in white overalls on a scooter, with a fanny pack and the phone stuffed in a shoulder bag, you could ask them. A uniform as characteristic as the backpacks of today’s delivery drivers, but much less common: at that time there were only five workers moving through the busiest traffic points in Barcelona, ​​although they wanted to increase it to 25. If you are standing, they leave you the headset. And if you move, they lend you the device and follow you until you complete the call. The price of the service was 25 pesetas and the minimum call price is 300 pesetas. Because? To begin with, because in 1990 if you wanted to call on the street what there was were booths and analog technology, in Spain specifically MoviLine: the first mobile operator to deploy the original 1G network, owned by Telefónica. And if we talk about devices, the mythical Motorola MicroTAC It was a status symbol for executives. A symbol measuring 23 centimeters and weighing 350 grams. Yes, there were some mobile phones, but they were heavy, with very long antennas and batteries that barely lasted a couple of hours in conversation. On the other hand, having a phone installed in the car was expensive and niche. But the business was not just the telephone, but mobility and time. As businessman Josep Marí says, his idea was “to create the need to find a mobile phone to be able to call to work, home or wherever.” Ahead of his time. This “Automatic Mobile Telephony” service was ahead of its time in that it had a vision of a future need, but faced a market that was not yet ready. As the 90s progressed, telephone technology became more refined and democratized. 1995 brought GSM to the Spanish state on the one hand and, on the other, the liberalization of the telecommunications market, which inaugurated airtel. The operators began to directly control distribution and technical service with franchises and distributors, leaving little room for local independent companies. Scooters before the scooter craze. And if the service itself is surprising, so is the means of transportation: a scooter with a gasoline engine, more specifically the Sport model. of the Go-Ped brand, but quite similar in design and concept to the electric ones that swarm our streets today. His virtue was exactly the same: moving quickly and agilely through the density of Barcelona’s traffic to be able to get in front of the client. In Xataka | This glorious imaginary version of the Galaxy Fold from the 90s is one of those gems that can only be found on the internet In Xataka | A story of pioneers: they already flirted, argued and liked on the party lines of the 90s Cover | 3Cat via Marc Vidal edited with Gemini

We all turn on our emergency lights when we get into a traffic jam. The DGT knows that we are doing it wrong

It is more than likely that when you got your license They won’t mention it, but get into a traffic jam It is easy to turn on the emergency lights while braking. It is something almost instinctive, a warning for the one that goes 120 km/h behind you realize that you don’t brake for no reason. And if you don’t, you’ve probably seen it. However, the curious thing is that the General Driving Regulations do not contemplate this action. Because we do it to avoid accidents, but with the law in hand, the use of warnings It’s not what we have to do when we get into a traffic jam.. And yet, there are even new cars that activate them automatically if the system notices that we brake repeatedly. The most curious thing is that it is not bad nor is it a fault. Simply put, the law was written for cars from another era. Although current cars have been eliminating more and more buttons, relegating them to the screensthe emergency lights is one that has remained a physical and tactile piece. It is logical because it is a security element and it is one that we have well located in the control panel. When braking in traffic jams, it is almost a reflex for many drivers to use the emergency light button to warn those behind them of the situation. In fact, some new cars activate them automatically if the sensors (the accelerometer or the brake pressure sensor) detect a sudden deceleration or if the ABS comes into play. If the braking is progressive, they are not activated automatically. The use of emergency lights in a traffic jam: yes, but no (and vice versa) But… what does the law say? As our colleagues remember Motorpassionhe section C of article 109 The General Traffic Regulations of 2003 establish that the correct way to notify those behind us about this situation is: “The intention to immobilize the vehicle or to brake its progress considerably, even when such events are imposed by traffic circumstances, must be warned, whenever possible, by repeatedly using the brake lights or by moving the arm alternately up and down with short and quick movements.” The problem is that theory is one thing, but in practice, if we are slamming on the brakes It is difficult to walk by lifting your foot off the brake.. Much less by lowering the window and warning with signs. It is much easier to turn on the emergency lights, and the person in the back will also see them better than if we put our arm out the window. Why does the law say this? Because it is an article written in another era. It is an anachronism resulting from times in which the ABS It was not so present and in which, to avoid the wheels locking and the car skidding, we did have to lift our foot off the brake. In this way, we were automatically alerting the person behind us. Therefore, the law does not say that we put on the emergency lights in a traffic jam, but they are not going to fine us for it because the DGT understands the good intention when it comes to notifying other drivers about an anomaly in traffic. In fact, the fact that the law does not establish it, but the cars do, speaks about the discrepancy between the “strict law” and reality. The DGT itself advertises it: In fact, here comes the technicality of “whenever possible”a legal hole that protects us when turning on the emergency lights. Now, where it is mandatory to give these lights is when we cannot travel at the minimum speed on the road. That is, if we are in a traffic jam on a highway and we do not reach half the speed of the road, we will have to turn on our lights. Section 3 of article 49 says: “When a vehicle cannot reach the minimum required speed and there is a danger of overtaking, direction indicator lights with an emergency signal must be used while driving.” Will the regulations be modified at some point to reflect the current situation in which all cars launched these last 21 years Do they have ABS? It is not known, but since it is a universal code to alert of the situation, I imagine that it will not be one of the Administration’s priorities. Of course, you have probably found someone who has used them excessively, giving you a scare for no reason when you turn them on in a non-critical situation. And that, precisely, is what happened with some models from the 2000s that turned on the emergency lights automatically, even when braking to exit the highway. For example, early models of Citroen C4 either Peugeot 307 who were ahead of the rest with something that wasn’t going entirely well. Images | Kathy, Prithivi Rajan In Xataka | The V-16 beacons are here to stay (whether we like it or not): this is all there is to do in case of a breakdown

We are on our way to beat all temperature records in a month of June. The fault is of a “jam” in the atmosphere

Heat is still installed in peninsular Spain. This week a Dana It seems aimed To give us a brief respite but experts anticipate that, as on previous occasions, this will be brief. An exceptional June. There is a week left for the month of June and experts anticipate the possibility of confirming as the hottest in the historical series. All that despite the appearance of tormentous episodes (some of enough intensity) interspersed between extreme heat days. For now the most warm June record The 2017 holds it. That year, the average temperature of the first month of the summer was 24.1 Celsius, three degrees above the average for the period 1981-2010 and 0.1º above the previous record, registered in 2003. That June 2017 was also slightly more humid than it is common for this month, with 3% more rainfall than the average of the period between 1981 and 2010. A stagnant circulation. According to Experts explain As the physicist, disseminator and researcher at Aemet JJ German, the situation could go worse after this week’s truce. An “stuck” atmospheric circulation would be, at least in part, responsible for this month of June anomalous and hot. The situation, if it changes, will be worse. According to German, during the next few days “Subtropical Anticyclonic Dorsal” capable of reaching in itself record levels on the Iberian Peninsula. Meanwhile, under the influence of a Dana. This seems to suggest that the thermal relief caused by the proximity of a Dana will be only temporary. Despite this, the presence of this depression in height implies that we must prepare again for the arrival of instability and rainfall. During the next few days, they will be in force various yellow warnings issued by the State Meteorology Agency (AEMET) to alert the risk derived from these storms. These notices will coexist with those emitted to warn of heat, will concentrate on the north, especially in the northwestern quadrant of the Peninsula. In Your forecastthe agency talks about storms and “locally strong” storms in the northern third, with hail and gusts “very strong”. The situation will affect particularly, says Aemet, north of the plateau, Cantabrian mountain range, Pyrenees and the north of the Iberian system. The risks of a warm summer. Last week, Aemet published its spring analysis and its forecasts for summer. In its presentation, the agency indicated that the first had stood out for high rainfall, while summer could stand out for warmer temperatures. The succession of a wet spring and a summer of heat implies certain health risks: the appearance of some insect pests have put the health authorities alert to the possibility of the appearance of potential vectors of diseases, such as the Tigre mosquito. The hot warm summers also tend to imply a greater risk of fire, although in this case, the rainfall of recent months could play in our favor. In Xataka | We do not know anything about El Niño at this point of the year. That is a meteorological mystery … and good news Image | ECMWF

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