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GPT-5.6 is probably the best AI model in the world. And precisely for that reason, the majority does not need it.

July 10, 2026 by usatoday24

Yesterday OpenAI publicly released GPT-5.6its new family of AI models with three variants: Sol, the most powerful, Terra, more balanced, and Luna, the most cost-efficient. One idea stood out in that release: that GPT-5.6 is probably the best model in the world. And precisely for that reason, the vast majority will never need it. As part of the launch, he published a nice video in which he showed how a farmer in Japan, an entrepreneurial couple in New York and a mathematician in Poland had used it for their work. Then we go back to the video and those three scenarios. But a preview: two of those three stories demonstrate just the opposite of what OpenAI wanted to demonstrate. In the official announcement OpenAI also told us about how this was the most capable family of AI models they had ever released and they included the traditional huge string of internal benchmark results to prove it. According to internal tests, GPT-5.6 Sol is the best existing AI model both in programming and in the use of agentic tools in the terminal (among many other scenarios). Source: OpenAI. Their data revealed that we are facing what theoretically it is the best AI model in the world currently. And the interesting thing is that independent studies like those of Artificial Analysis They corroborate it: in several of its tests GPT-5.6 even surpassed Fable 5, Anthropic’s frontier model that until now was the great reference in this industry. Source: Artificial Analysis. The model certainly appears to be spectacular. Those responsible for ARC Prize, that benchmark in which most AI models repeatedly crash, commented how GPT-5.6 Sol was still the first frontier model to solve one of the puzzles of their new benchmark, ARC-AGI 3. No other had come close to that milestone, and according to this organization “it is the best model when it comes to orienting yourself in a situation that you have never encountered.” All that these tests validate is the idea that we are facing a prodigious model. And the problem is precisely that: that most users will probably never need it. Too powerful for most of us Let’s go back to the video at the beginning. Of the three use cases mentioned, two are quite trivial. GPT-5.6 helped the Japanese farmer create a remote control system for his greenhouse with a Raspberry Pi. He helped the New York couple build a curious cereal box business. Nothing in those two tasks seems to require the best model in the world. In fact, they are precisely the type of projects that have been being resolved for months with much cheaper models. With the third scenario, that of the Polish mathematician, things change: this academic was trying to solve a conjecture that he had been working on for three years. No previous model had been able to help him, but with GPT-5.6 he managed to reveal a totally new idea, he says. One of his final comments precisely makes it clear who GPT-5.6 Sol is for: “If you have that kind of audacity to try to do something really big, you won’t be scared of the incredible computing power because you can organize it with the model.” That is the key to the issue: most users are not trying to solve mathematical conjectures that are almost impossible to solve. Most we use tools in a much more everyday wayand that is completely logical and reasonable. That’s why there are many more more modest and affordable models, and why the GPT-5.6 Sol, even if it makes sense, will be a very unprofitable model for most people. It is not a model for counting R’sof course. In fact, every time a new model comes into our hands, It is very difficult to appreciate if it is really better than the previous ones because the tasks we propose are usually solved very well with the existing ones. There are cases in which differences are seen—in especially complex programming, for example—but here we are faced with a situation that we have lived before on several occasions. This happens, for example, with modern hardware: very few people need the most advanced processors or an RTX 5090 to play, because more modest CPUs and GPUs give access to a truly fluid experience. We don’t usually need a camera either. Hasselblad of 15,000 euros for our vacations, and a good cell phone of 500-1,000 euros at this point solves the problem wonderfully. The good thing about all this is what also happens with those examples that we mentioned before: what is extraordinarily expensive and powerful today will end up no longer being so because other even better (and probably more expensive) AI models will appear on the horizon. The question is no longer “which model is more “intelligent”?”, but “Which model is smart enough to solve this task at the lowest cost?“. That explains why there are variants like Sol, Terra and Luna. Maybe in two years GPT-5.6 Sol will be the cheap model we use to correct an email or plan a vacation. The recent history of AI invites us to think precisely that: today’s frontier models end up becoming tomorrow’s everyday models. Perhaps that is the true meaning of GPT-5.6. Not that today almost no one needs so much intelligence, but that in a few years we will probably we all take it for granted. In Xataka | OpenAI just launched GPT-Live: ChatGPT voice mode has learned to listen, shut up and respond better

Meta, Google and Microsoft will be able to continue tracking your messages until 2028. Despite the fact that the majority of the European Parliament voted against

July 9, 2026 by usatoday24

The European Parliament has once again given the green light for companies like Meta, Google or Microsoft to voluntarily track private conversations of its users looking for child sexual abuse material. The striking thing is that the decision is going to go ahead despite the fact that more MEPs have voted against it than in favor. What has happened? The European Chamber voted this Thursday on the extension of the so-called “ePrivacy exception”, a temporary rule that allows (but does not require) messaging platforms to scan chats, emails and social networks to detect already identified child abuse content. Although more deputies voted against this extension than in favor, the absolute majority of 361 votes necessary to overturn it has not been reached, so the rule remains in place until April 2028. Without absolute majority. Since this is a second reading, it is not enough for the “no” to win. It is necessary for 361 of the 720 MEPs to expressly vote against to block the regulations. If that number is not reached, the proposal goes ahead by default, even if the votes in favor are fewer than the votes against. It’s just what has happened. In detail. The original text, approved in 2021, had expired on April 3 after the European Parliament refused to extend it by 311 votes to 228, with 92 abstentions, according to collect Brussels Signal. To revive the proposal, the European People’s Party (EPP) resorted to an unusual emergency procedure, also promoted by the President of Parliament, Roberta Metsola, and by national governments. This shortcut has allowed the text to be voted on again in the last session before the summer, precisely when many parliamentarians are no longer present during these dates, according to explains the German medium Heise. The rejection proposal was 47 votes short of the necessary absolute majority. Before that final vote, MEPs have managed to approve two amendments that expressly exclude services with end-to-end encryption, such as WhatsApp or Signal, from being traced, as confirm Euronews. These amendments passed with 369 and 362 votes respectively. Between the lines. A good part of the social democratic group, including German MEP Birgit Sippel (the rapporteur on the file), voted in favor of limiting the scope of the rule, according to Euronews. However, that same group had previously facilitated the approval of the emergency procedure that made the entire maneuver possible, something that Heise describelike a previous transfer that has ended up playing against its own intentions. The European Commission has also actively lobbied, as four commissioners sent a last-minute letter warning of a legal loophole if the mechanism was not extended, according to collect Heise. The vice president of the EPP, Tomas Tobé, has defended that summer could not be reached “without tools to protect minors.” The critical voices. Simeon de Brouwer, advisor to the digital rights organization European Digital Rights, countedWired that the standard opens the door for companies to review, if they so choose, any message, email or image that a user shares. On the other hand, activist and former MEP Patrick Breyer has described the result as a “farce” that damages democracy, and has pointed out in a statement collected by Brussels Signal that the real losers of this process are the minors themselves. Breyer points to the European Commission’s own figures, indicating that mass scanning of private chats has only accounted for 36% of abuse reports in 2024. The majority came from public posts and cloud storage services. On the other hand, the German Federal Criminal Police (BKA) warns that 48% of the alerts generated lack criminal relevance, and that 40% of the resulting investigations end up pointing to minors. Furthermore, according to they point From Brussels Signal, 99% of the reports that Meta sends under this mechanism correspond to material already known previously, which provides little value in the face of cases of active abuse. From Heise they mention also to cybersecurity researchers who have warned in open letters of the high error rates of automated scanning systems based on AI, which would put the privacy of users at risk without any connection with crimes. And now what. This vote only extends the current system, which is temporary and not mandatory, since companies can scan messages if they want, but they do not have to do so by law. The permanent and much stricter regulations (known as Chat Control 2.0and which would require a widespread scan) is still being negotiated separately and has not yet been approved. Meanwhile, companies like Meta, Google or Microsoft will be able to continue scanning messages, emails and photos of their users until 2028, with the only exception of end-to-end encrypted conversations, such as those on WhatsApp or Signal. Cover image | Wikipedia, Pexels In Xataka | The camera that watches you while you drive is already mandatory in new cars. And no one guarantees what happens with that data.

The legal shield of the wolf has been cracking for years. Now the majority of communities in Spain have opened the door to hunting them

June 25, 2026 by usatoday24

Maybe not at the level of the housing or corruption, but in the political chronicle of recent years there has been a topic of debate that has exacerbated tempers: the wolf. From 2022 The European and Spanish institutions are immersed in a thorny debate about the degree of protection of the Canis lupuswhether it should be allowed to be hunted or whether it remains vulnerable. The result of this tug of war has not been exactly positive for the species, whose legal shield It has been eroding little by little. Now just received a new setback in Spain, where the majority of communities have made it clear that they don’t look with evil eyes his hunting. What has happened? That the legal status of the wolf has just received a new setback in Spain, where it has become clear (for the umpteenth time) that everything related to the management of the herds is a matter of political dispute. To understand it, we have to go back to last Monday, when the majority of communities and the Ministry of Ecological Transition (Miteco) staged their difference of opinions around a report that, in practice, will influence the really relevant issue: whether or not wolf hunting is allowed in Spain. What exactly was discussed? He sexennial report about the situation of the wolf in Spain. Basically it is a study that shows how the country’s herds evolved between 2019 and 2024 and (importantly) concludes whether or not the current conservation status of the species can be considered ‘favorable’. Said like this, it may not seem like a big deal, but that label (‘favorable’ or ‘unfavorable’) in turn influences whether hunting should be allowed. Furthermore, it is a report required by the European Commission (EC) and which is already a year late: Spain should have sent it before July 31, 2025. Why has it taken so long? Because before the report had to go through the Sectoral Environment Conferencea body in which two parties sit with totally opposite positions: the ministry, in favor of considering the situation of the wolf in Spain as ‘unfavorable’, and therefore in need of high protection; and the majority of autonomous communities, who believe that after years of preservation the species is already in a ‘favorable’ situation. And what did they agree? The positions of each other are so far apart that at Monday’s meeting they were put on the table two reportsboth focused on the wolf but with different conclusions. One was made by Miteco and advocated protecting the herds. The other was presented by the Xunta de Galicia and basically concluded that the herds have increased so much since 2019 that we can now speak of an acceptable level of conservation in the Atlantic and Mediterranean. That last one was (by far) the position that received the most endorsements during the meeting. The autonomous governments of Galicia, Andalusia, Cantabria, La Rioja, Region of Murcia, Valencian Community, Aragon, Canary Islands, Extremadura, Balearic Islands, Madrid, Castilla y León and the autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla supported the report that concludes that the situation of the wolf today in Spain is “favorable.” The only votes against were those of the Government and Catalonia, which delegated to Miteco. Basque Country and Castilla-La Mancha they abstained. What does the Government say? The Minister of Ecological Transition, Sara Aagesen, claimed on Tuesday that “technical and scientific rigor” prevailed and recalled that the objective of the report should be to show the state of conservation of the species in the last six years. Along similar lines, Jordi Sargatal, from the Government, judged “without scientific basis or value” the report of the communities led by the PP. Miteco has actually advanced that it will send to the European Commission “all the information” on the subject, which would include both studies. Just a year ago the ministry published a census which concluded that in Spain there are 333 herds, 12% more than in the previous census, carried out between 2012 and 2014. Although this data is positive, the Government itself accompanied it with a footnote: that 12% is still insufficient. “Scientists consider that, to ensure long-term genetic viability, 500 herds must be reached.” What do the communities say? They argue that the species has recovered ground, which would justify opening the door to hunters. “The current status of the book is favorable and there is no scientific basis to justify it having a special protection regime,” argues the Xunta. At stake are not the herds, but their impact, as remember Joaquín A. Pino, counselor of Castilla y León, who recalled that ranchers “suffer recurrently” attacks from wolves. “The management of the species must be based on the reality accredited by the six-year report to also protect extensive livestock farming and rural areas,” insist the regional government before remembering that damage to the primary sector has been increasing by more than 10% annually and, only in Castilla y León, was it recorded last year 4,474 attacks from wolves to livestock farms. The compensation for these damages (6,294 dead cattle) exceeded four million. Images | Arturo de Frias Marques (Wikipeda) and AR ® Higher School of the Environment (Flickr) and Mytec In Xataka | Mexico desperately needed Mexicans to care about axolotls. So he put them on the bills

The ‘Chinese Netflix’ has designed a plan for AI to generate the majority of its content within five years. It sounds risky

May 14, 2026 by usatoday24

iQiyi, China’s largest video streaming service with more than 400 million monthly active users, announced in its annual content presentation in Beijing which expects AI to generate most of its movies and series within five years. Its founder and CEO, Gong Yu, summed it up before a room of producers and directors with a succinct phrase: “It’s a once-in-a-decade opportunity. We have to go with the tide.” Why is it important. iQiyi is not a minor platform betting on a trend. It is the subsidiary of streaming of Baidu, shares with Alibaba and Tencent the online video oligopoly in China, and operates in the streaming largest in the world by number of users. Whether it decides to pivot towards content generated entirely by AI affects how the rest of the platforms that tend to follow in its footsteps will produce, distribute and monetize audiovisual entertainment. The context. iQiyi has been losing audience for years to Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok owned by ByteDance. Short video has cut into the time that Chinese users spend on long video platforms. The result is that its revenue has fallen by 13% in the first quarter of 2026. The company, listed on Nasdaq, has also applied for a second listing in Hong Kong seeking closer capital. The announcement of the pivot towards AI comes from a certain pressure. In detail. The center of the plan is Nadou Proa suite of AI tools that the company presented on April 20 and that, it says, can manage practically the entire film production process: script, storyboardvideo generation and final assembly. The software does not work with its own models, but rather integrates those of several direct competitors: Alibaba, ByteDance and Kuaishou for the domestic market; Seedance 2.0 and Google I Spy 3.1 for the international version. iQiyi has also launched a library of virtual assets and “signed” talent for third-party creators to generate new content using the platform’s characters and universes. The incentive strategy to attract these external creators involves… An extra 20% on advertising and subscription revenue for those who produce content with Nadou Pro. An inaugural catalog of 16 AI-generated films, in science fiction and anime. A public goal: release a commercially successful AI-generated film before the end of summer 2026. Yes, but. The question that remains to be seen is whether anyone will want to pay to see that. Recent history does not invite optimism. AI-generated video has shown some traction on TikTok and Instagram, where the cost of user attention is practically zero and the scroll Erase any disappointment in a tenth of a second. That this tolerance is transferred to a two-hour feature film for which someone pays a monthly subscription is another story. Between the lines. Gong Yu has said that iQiyi will continue investing in professional production, but in the same sentence he has clarified that this type of content will reduce its relative weight on the platform. The direction is quite clear. The risk is that viewers of C-dramas and the anime Koreans who have made iQiyi great are exactly the type of audience that has the least tolerance for ‘AI slop‘. Main loser? The producers and directors who filled that room in Beijing when Gong Yu announced the pivot. iQiyi has designed a system where independent creators can use Nadou Pro to generate content and earn a percentage of the advertising revenue. It’s the same model that YouTube has applied for years with human content, now transferred to AI. In this scheme, professionals in the sector go from being the protagonists of the production chain to being, in the best case, supervisors of a process that they no longer control. In Xataka | In China, 470 series made with AI are produced per day. 99.9% of them do not reach anyone Featured image | iQiyi, Xataka with Mockuuups Studio

The vast majority are Chinese

July 8, 2025 by usatoday24

Mark Zuckerberg has a goal and is moving heaven and earth To get it. Dissatisfied with the Meta advances in AIthe CEO set out to create a team of ‘Superinteligencia’ to lead the next great jump of this technology. Offered More than 100 million dollars to the candidates and even has signed OpenAi talent. The thing marches and Zuckerberg already has eleven AI stars in his new team. The striking: seven of them are Chinese and six of them come from Openai. And this without counting Alexandr Wang, the director of the new team and founder of Scale AI. The team. After several weeks starring headlines for his aggressive offers, Zuckerberg already has his superintelligence team, or at least part of him. These are the names of the eleven experts that will be incorporated into the Palo Alto offices: Bi Suchao (ex-openai. China): He was co-creator of the GPT-4O and O4-mini voice mode. Chang Huiwen (Ex-Openai. China): Co-creator of the GPT-4O image generator. Before he worked in Google, where he created Maskit and Muse. Lin Ji (Ex-Openai. China): He worked on the creation of several language models, from GPT-4O to GPT-4.5. He also dealt with the reasoning of Operator. Ren Hongyu (Ex-Openai. China): He helped create several models and led the post-training team. Sun Pei (Ex-Google. China): He was the principal investigator in Deepmind and had an important role in the creation of Gemini. Zhao Shengjia (Ex-Openai. China): He directed the synthetic data program and was key in the creation of Chatgpt. Yu Jiahui (Ex-Openai. China) He led the perception team. Joel Poblar (ex-anthropic. Australia): He worked on the creation of inference systems. Bansal Trapit (Ex-Openai. India): Co-creator of several language models and pioneer of the combination between reinforced learning and ‘chain of thought’. Jack RAE (Ex-Google. United States): Scientific researcher at Deepmind. Johan Schakwyk (formerly. United States): expert in language technologies. He also worked in Google and Maya Leakage talent. The target signing list reveals something we already talked about, China concentrates a lot of specialized talent in AI. According to Jensen Huang statementsCEO of Nvidia, “50% of the world’s researchers are Chinese” and this would give China a great advantage in the AI race. However, if the best engineers end up working for American Big Tech, in practice that advantage may not be so great. As They count on South China Morning Postthe announcement has generated reactions in China. Mainly of pride, but also of concern for the departure of that talent towards its main competitor. It is not an unfounded fear: it is currently estimated that 38% of experts who work in the United States have formed in China. Nevertheless, China has a plan And it is not only to produce more talent, but to do even better. They are already prioritizing races linked to AI and are beginning to integrate training related to primary and secondary schools. The race for AI. The United States was very advanced in AI, so that it seemed unattainable, but recently we have seen how China cut distances. The quality gap is smaller than ever: in just one year they have managed to cut it from 9.26% to 1.7%. Although in the United States they still have many more models, in China they are opting for a more efficient approach with less models, much cheaper and that they are getting very good results. The other victim. We do not forget Openai. At first there was talk that Goal had signed four key employeesbut with the new published names it would be at least seven. In an internal statement, Openai’s research director Mark Chen said “I have a visceral feeling right now, As if someone had sneaked into our house and stole somethingChen also assured that they were not going to stay with crossed arms and would make counteroffers, something that does not seem to have served much. Footballer salaries. Zuckerberg’s strategy to capture talent has been extremely aggressive, offering bonds of up to 100 million dollars to engineers, causing him to make him IA experts become the best paid in history. And not to mention the 14.3 billion dollars that he has allocated to take Scale AI and his young founded Alexandr Wang, whom he has given the leadership of this new team. Now we just have to wait to see the fruits that come out of this Dream Team. Image | Goal and David Yu in Pixabay In Xataka | The AI industry has become a kind of ‘game of thrones’. And that reveals a worrying truth for your future

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