making

Chargebacks are the silent hemorrhage of e-commerce. A Catalan startup is making money by covering it

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Yesterday Paco bought a product on Wallapop and received it. Then came the problem. Paco called the bank and lied saying that it was not the product he expected or that he did not receive it, thus managing to keep the product and recover his money. Free product for him, headache for Wallapop. This is where a promising Catalan startup called Kloutit comes in. Fictional situation, real problem. Paco does not exist as such and the situation is fictitious, but it is the reflection of a very palpable reality among e-commerce companies: many are affected to a greater or lesser extent by the so-called chargebacks or chargebacks. Kloutit has an AI to solve it. The Catalan startup Kloutit has created an AI tool to manage these chargebacks on e-commerce platforms. Founded in 2024 by Albert Algarra (CEO), Alexis Pairetti and Adrián Algarra, the company already has almost 200 active clients and operates in nine countries, as indicated in CincoDías. Among those clients are Wallapop, Cabify, Playtomic, Factorial, or TaxDown. A problem that they manage to mitigate. The phenomenon of chargebacks negatively impacts 30% of the gross operating profit (ebitda) of companies, according to Kloutit. However, thanks to their AI system, companies multiply the amount of money lost and later recovered by 5.5. Not only that: as those responsible for CincoDías indicate, “Reducing chargebacks not only protects income, but also improves the relationship with payment service providers, and avoids penalties for high ratios.” They may be legitimate, but they may not be.. Unlike a normal return in which you go to the store, deliver the product and receive your money back, in a chargeback the bank withdraws the money directly from the merchant’s account and returns it to the customer while it investigates what happened. Chargebacks typically occur in three cases: Real fraud: someone has stolen your card and made purchases, so you notify the bank indicating that it was not you, and the bank returns your money. Problems with service: you bought something that never arrived, or the product that arrives is broken or the service (hotels, flights) was not as promised. “Friendly fraud”: This is where the problem lies for companies, and it is the fictitious case we have described. A chargeback is not just about losing a sale. For a business it implies a double loss: both the product they already sent and the money from the sale. In fact, after the chargeback the nightmare begins, because the implications are several: Penalty: Banks charge a penalty fee to the merchant for each chargeback received regardless of who is right. Blacklist: If the store has many chargebacks, Visa or Mastercard can blacklist you and prohibit card payments. Expensive defense: defending against a chargeback is a cumbersome bureaucratic process: you have to demonstrate with evidence (delivery notes, screenshots, emails) that the customer did receive the service. AI vs. obsolete systems. The platform developed by Kloutit promises a much more effective alternative to traditional systems that they describe as obsolete: manual processes, a lot of time investment and disappointing success rates. The Catalan startup’s AI system promises to automate these processes and free teams from this burden. That they have more and more clients is a promising sign that they are doing something right. Images | Nathana Rebouças In Xataka | Online commerce was supposed to kill shopping malls. The reality has been just the opposite.

making mistakes as an antidote to the cult of productivity

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They say we live in a secular country, but whoever says that has not encountered the productivity gurus or the stationery YouTubers. bullet journal, intermittent fasting, hobonichi roof, cold showers at five in the morning“atomic habits“, journaling until you end up with blisters on your hands… let’s be clear: productivity and growth aspire to function as civil religions. Therefore, perhaps it is time to look for an old-fashioned way out, one inspired by Saint Augustine. The cult of productivity I know that talking about ‘civil religion’ may seem exaggerated, but the truth is that a very specific aspirational narrative has been normalized: one based on self-optimization. And it’s not all those things that I described above (getting up early, diet, metrics, discipline, etc…), it’s that not achieving it has become a ‘moral failure’. If you make a mistake, if you don’t arrive, if you don’t achieve it… it’s because you didn’t make the effort, you didn’t organize yourself, you’re not good enough. An example much discussed in recent days are all those readers who, given the evidence that they are not going to reach their “reading challenge” of the year, decide to discard books that they would like to read and prioritize short books in order to reach the numbers that had been marked. Error has become something we cannot afford. But Augustine did not agree. Louis Comfort Tiffany But, of course, St. Augustine had its moments. One of the most brilliant people of the late Roman Empire, Augustine of Hippo was a ‘pearl‘ in his youth and early maturity. But it quickly became one of Christianity’s sharpest swords. That, translated, means that he did not agree with many. He has not only written some of the greatest works of universal literaturebut he worked to destroy (theologically, philosophically and literally) Manichaeans, Donatists and Pelagians. That war changed Western thinking, but I don’t think anyone imagined it would be essential to defending ourselves from the productivity gurus. Saint Augustine vs productivity gurus “If I’m wrong, I exist” (“If I fail, add“), wrote the saint of Hippo in book That is, the idea that a mistake is not only a stigma: it is a piece of information, a learning, a reminder that we are human, but we are on the way. We could say that error is also productive (and there are people who defend it); but that’s not the point. The point is that, against what Byung-Chul calls the “performance society” (compared to the self-demand that is sold as freedom, but leads to self-exploitation), compared to the spiritual turn of your trusted technobro, there is an even deeper dimension: the right to be and be without the chains that bind us to the productive system. In a world that asks for “performance” and “utility” to have personal value, Augustine exposes that ancient Christian tradition that says that the ontological value of the person does not depend on anything; that even in the worst of failure, we are worth exactly the same. Because, pay attention to the fact, when Agustín talks about existing he is not just talking about existing. It talks about doing it, about knowing that you exist and about loving those two realities as a non-productivist theory of self. Image | Xataka In Xataka | The Catholic Church changed the psychology of Europe. Unintentionally, it sparked an era of technological innovation

Companies are not just letting go of their youngest workers. They are making them CEO

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The business fabric in the US is experiencing one of its most turbulent periods. Not only because of the coming to power of Donald Trump and his upstart tariff policiesbut because of the challenge in management and governance models that poses to AI. OK to what was published by The Wall Street Journalthe US is experiencing a generational change at the head of the main listed companies. In 2025 alone, one in nine CEOs at the 1,500 largest companies in the S&P 1500 will be replaced, the highest rate since records began in 2010. The demands of AI they are retiring the CEOs more experienced. Relay record at the top. According to data revealed by a study from the consulting firm Spencer Stuart, 168 people debuted as CEO in large listed companies. In more than 80% of these appointments, the new managers lacked previous experience leading companies of that category, although 60% of those appointments were promotions. Furthermore, two-thirds of these incorporations had also not served on boards of directors before. That is to say, its greatest value It was not his experience, but his youth. The trend continues strongly during the first two months of 2026. Top-tier companies such as Walmart, Procter & Gamble, Lululemon, Disney, PayPal and HP have made changes in his highest executive position. This pace marks a great experiment in leadership by large companies in the face of unstable markets, where the pressure to obtain immediate results accelerates the departures of veterans. Younger and younger leaders. The average age of new CEOs dropped to 54 years in 2025, which is almost two years less than the record in 2024, thus confirming that this is a trend that has been occurring for some years. Although only 3% of managers in large companies are under 40 years old, 64% are between 50 and 59 years old, and only 12% are over 60 years old. Some examples are found in recent replacements like disneyin which Josh D’Amaro, 55, took the replacement of Bob Iger 75 years old. This replacement reflects a commitment to fresh talent, but with a deep knowledge of the companies they are going to lead, but without experience in decision-making. The life cycle of a CEO. Spencer Stuart analysts found that CEOs of large companies have “a useful lifespan” at the helm. During the first year in office, the new CEO begins the “honeymoon effect” and his companies outperform the S&P 500 by 10% on average. However, in the second year of office, 73% experience a drop in returns of an average of 21%. Between the third and fifth years at the helm, a reinvention of leadership occurs, which precedes a stagnation between the sixth and ninth years. Beginning in the tenth year, stable leadership is established. The majority cannot taste that stability since, after the third year, 25% have already left the position. 50% do not reach the sixth year as CEO. The average duration of active CEOs is 7.1 years, and 86% of departures are voluntary and agreed upon with the board of directors. Only 9% of CEO changes in the S&P 500 group of companies have been forced removals. It should be noted that only 16% of new appointments to senior management positions they have been womenwhich represents a bittersweet historical record. In Xataka | The average salary of Ibex 35 managers has grown by 172% in two decades: the purchasing power of its employees, not so much Image | Unsplash (Bruce Mars)

the art of making sausages

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a nation hungryan economy to plan and a lot of propaganda to do. Coming across images today of the assortment of sausages that, at least in theory, were available in grocery stores for the Soviet people during the post-war years is a visual spectacle, something that runs counter to all our preconceived ideas about what should be on those starving family tables and also a carousel of alchemical challenges as we see more and more elaborate and exotic sausages. Pure modern art mass produced in the Soviet Union (you will find a wide variety of examples at the end of the post). Account the YouTube popularizer of Russian origin My Name Is Andong that everything took off thanks to trip to Chicago by Anastas Mikoyánthen a senior member of the Politburo, in 1936. He lived there for three months, when the countries were still experiencing an idyllic period of cooperation, and with his stay he not only took down recipes for a lot of products that would later drive his people crazy on their return home, such as ice cream, ketchup or hamburgers, but he learned how factories and companies there were applying innovations produced by the second industrial revolution. Among them, they discovered that extensive livestock farming and the acceleration of processes could help the use of animal waste for its reconversion into sausages, which were stored much longer. The Sausage Doctor. The desired one. All this led to two elements of our interest, the first, the Recipe Album of the People’s Commissariat of the Food Industry of the USSR for the companies of the People’s Commissariat of the Food Industry “Sausages and Smoked Foods”, where production standards were established that no one could ignore for each type of sausage and which gave rise to this beautiful variety of dozens of meat buns. We are pleased to introduce Doctor Sausage And second, the order was given for the production of a lot of new products, of which we are going to highlight one and only one, the Doktorskaya kolbasa, Doktorskaya kolbasa or Doctor Sausage. He was on the verge of calling himself Doctor Stalin because they were so proud of the discovery, but someone thought that it wouldn’t be such a good idea in the long run to associate the leader of the Party with a meat flute. The Doctor Sausage was a natural recipe, without additives, with a very high proportion of beef and pork (60% of its weight) to be talking about a combat product and with the rest of the additives being easily found. It was cooked, it had to be soft to feed from children to adults, low in fat for those with stomach problems, and its nutritional composition would help to remove the most impoverished classes of famine, as well as allowing them access to meat. A good protein for everything, which is why the State spent good money promoting its sausage with the desire that it reach every table. To say it was a success would be an understatement. The divulger’s mother, who did spend her life, childhood included, in the USSR, remembers it. He tells how chopped was not for every day, but the day it was bought was a party. Kolbasa sandwiches They were the favorites of the workers in the street vendors’ stalls. Salchipapas, kolbasa with fried eggskobalsa in the Olivier salad (precursor of what we know as Russian salad)… The old woman fondly remembers what they called the “doctor’s tear”, that the mortadella, if you squeezed it, made it a little greasy. It was juicy. Doctor Sausage is the Proustian madeleine of an entire former Soviet generation, almost a symbol of pride, since, no matter how much variety they had in the capitalist bloc, the poor here also had delicious little luxuries, such as demonstrate posts like thiswhere those nostalgic for the regime instrumentalize these sausages as an example of communal prosperity. If you wanted, you could replicate the original recipe at home. following these steps. What happened? That when things started to go wrong, and despite the institutional vacuum of messages confirming this trend, people knew that they would lose thanks to these sausages. “In the 60s, in the mid-60s… From then on the Doctor stopped being the same. He was no longer good,” recalls the octogenarian. Memory may take a small toll on women here, since the industry did not change the production standard until 1974. The bad harvests of the late 70s caused a decrease in the number of cattle, the kolbasa began to disappear from the stores and people cried, so the State allowed it to be manufactured again under formulas of lower meat purity. The result was a progressive loss of quality until its citizens ended up turning their backs on those sausages that no longer had anything to do with the gastronomic triumph of what they did not know was the golden age of the regime. For posterity, the memory of its flavor and the propaganda images of a political project that found ways to get its chest out even from its guts. In Xataka | In 1970 the USSR secretly developed kryptonite for nuclear warheads: now it sounds like a general rehearsal is imminent In Xataka | In 1950 two scientists wondered if a 10 gigaton nuclear bomb was possible. Your results are hidden under lock and key

While the world fights for the most advanced chips, there is a company making gold with the ones that go inside your washing machine

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If you have walked through an industrial estate, you have surely come across the typical warehouse with the sign “Spare Parts and Bearings (Insert name)”. And it’s easy for you, at that moment, to wonder what the hell a bearing is and how the rest of the businesses are closing, except for ‘Rodamientos Paco’. Well, in the world of technology there is also a ‘Paco Bearings’. Is called Texas Instruments and, in full era of sophisticated chips, artificial intelligence and quantum computingis breaking it with something very specific. Boring chips. In short. Companies are in the middle of the results presentation period. In this round, the managers inform their shareholders about the direction of the company, while allowing us to learn about data on upcoming devices or business plans. Texas Instruments usually goes unnoticed in these more ‘techie’ times, but they are finishing up a fiscal year with very positive numbers. The fourth quarter they closed with 4,420 million and anticipate increasing to 4,680 million in the first quarter. In the last three months, its share value has increased by 18%. Its shares are among the highest among companies in the same sector and, as we said before, the curious thing is that it is doing all this almost silently. Live outside the hype. You can constantly read information about cutting-edge chips on Xataka. It is true that the current nature of components is marked by the current RAM memory crisis either of SSDsbut the snapdragonthe Apple Silicon, the latest from NVIDIA or AMD It is what usually marks the conversation. They are the most sophisticated and interesting chips, but a coffee maker does not need a chip like that. That’s where Texas Instruments comes into play. Because calling their chips “boring” is not an exaggeration. They are outside the AI ​​hype, the data centers and the most exciting features because its market is different: sensors, connectivity, controllers. Where are Texas Instruments chips? In routers, smart refrigerators, washing machines, air conditioners, as secondary chips in televisions, in remote controls, in calculators or in smart smoke detectors. But they not only make chips, but also another series of integrated circuits for wireless communications, signal processing in all types of devices and even sensors that detect tire pressure, engine temperatures or the air conditioning system. Texas Instruments chips and sensors are in… everything. Even in weapons. An example of a tiny sophisticated chip in the headphone stick… with only 16 KB of RAM. Because you don’t need more Huge investment. And the company is not sitting idly by with the huge amount of money it is making with its ubiquity strategy. a few days ago, Bloomberg reported on the agreement that Texas Instruments had reached to buy Silicon Labs. Also American, also with ‘boring’ chips that They are inside ‘things’ of all kinds. The operation is not closed, but the smell of it caused Silicon Labs shares to increase 51% to more than $206. The curious thing? That Texas Instruments is willing to pay more: up to $231 per share to investors. The operation has not been closed, but there is talk of a purchase of 7.5 billion dollars, well above the 4.5 billion that Silicon Labs is “worth.” Great year ≠ perfect year. All of this is… outrageous, but it indicates something very specific: they are spending a lot of money to reinforce a huge, stable market that goes unnoticed in a time when everything revolves around artificial intelligence and sophisticated technology. The purchase of Silicon Labs, paying such a high premium per share, shows that they know very well what they are getting into and the value of a market in which they are a key player. But one thing must also be noted: although revenues rose, annual profits did not increase at the same rate. He total invoiced increased by 13%, but as they have also invested more, this increase in costs reduced the profit margin, which “barely” increased by 4.2%, with some quarters being worse than others (in Q4 they fell by 3.5%). They haven’t had a perfect fiscal year, but there is one thing that is undeniable: they are still the kings of their niche. If we can describe being everywhere as a “niche”. In Xataka | While half the world looks for an alternative to Taiwan, Jensen Huang is very clear about the harsh reality: there is no

Japan has been wanting fewer tourists for years. Now he fears China is making his wishes come true

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Japan has been choked by foreign tourism. And it is understandable. The weakness of the yen, the reactivation of demand after the pandemic stop and the enormous popularity that the country has achieved on networks has triggered its flow of visitors to record levelsstirring up the debate on he oversight and generating discomfort in some particularly congested destinations, such as Kyoto, nara or Osaka. To stop it, there is already talk of a tax increase. There are even cities looking for ways to reduce the flow of international tourists. Now, for reasons that have little or nothing to do with the tourism market, Japan is encountering the collapse of demand in its big market: China. The question is whether that is a blessing or a threat to your economy. Pack of tourists. The data is incontestable. Japan has become one of the most popular destinations among those planning their vacations. Last year the country received 42.7 million of foreign visitors, an absolute record that shatters the data from 2024, when it fell just short of 37 million. Beyond the year-on-year comparison, the data is interesting for two reasons. First, because never before had the Japan Tourism Organization (ONTJ) counted more than 40 million visitors annual. Second, because the data leaves the 31.9 million of 2019, the last year before the pandemic, far behind. If nothing changes, the Government plans to reach the 60 million this decade, which will translate into a powerful injection of resources into the Japanese economy. In 2025 alone, foreign travelers spent more than $60 billion. More than money. The problem is that this flow of tourists not only translates into full planes, hotels with the sign ‘no places left’ and hoteliers and merchants satisfied with their sales. The international tourism boom has generated tensions in some destinations especially congested, leaving almost almost surreal episodes, such as the one lived in Kyoto. There the authorities have had to prohibit “paparazzi tourists” from accessing one of the most emblematic points of the city. The reason: so that they do not harass the geishas. It is not the only proof of the tensions that are emerging due to tourist saturation. In Fujikawaguchiko the authorities, unable to contain the hordes of travelers eager to “hunt” the best selfiethey chose to install a fence that blocks the views of Fuji. In Fujiyoshida they just canceled your festival Sakura because it saturates the city with visitors who clog traffic, sneak into homes and leave trash in parks. And in Yamanashi they decided years ago start charging to ascend Fuji to preserve the mythical mountain. And the Taiwan crisis arrived. Whims of geopolitics and international diplomacy, Japan has just found that this record flow of visitors could receive a severe setback. And all on account of something that has little or nothing to do with the tourist market: Taiwan. To understand it, we have to go back to November 7, when the Prime Minister of Japan, Sanae Takaichi, warned during a parliamentary debate that Japan would not hesitate to mobilize its self-defense forces in case China entered Taiwan by force. Although the Japanese Government assures that its position remains the same as always, the truth is that Takaichi’s words broke the “strategic ambiguity” that Japan has maintained for decades. And that was not liked one bit in China. The relationship between Beijing and Tokyo became strained to such an extent that the Asian giant responded with more than complaints diplomatic: canceled concerts by Japanese artists, postponed the premiere of movies, he claimed the pandas on loan to Japanese zoos and restricted its valuable rare earth exports. What does it have to do with tourism? That in its response to Japan, Beijing also played one of its great economic assets: tourism. The Chinese authorities they advised its citizens to avoid Japan and even canceled dozens of routes airlines with the country. In November the BBC reported that some Chinese airlines were offering their customers refunds for their flights to Japan. Such a movement would not have much importance if it were not for the fact that China is one of the main sources of the Japanese tourism sector. The Asian giant is one of its big markets issuers, along with Korea. According to the Japan National Tourism Organization, in 2024 China was the second largest source of tourists visiting Japan. concentrated about 19% of all demand, only behind Korea (24%). The data is also completed with the 7.3% of Hong Kong and the high weight that Taiwan also has in Japanese tourism. The flow from the Asian giant is key, however, for another reason: as remember The New York TimesChina not only moves many tourists but its tourists spend a lot in Japan. Goodbye Chinese tourists. Although the open conflict between China and Japan is recent, its effects have not taken long to be noticed in the tourism industry. TNYT assures that in December the flow of Chinese travelers already plummeted by 45% compared to the same month in 2024. And the situation does not seem to be improving in the coming months: Japan has fallen on the list of the most coveted destinations for the Chinese to enjoy their Lunar New Year holidays. There are those who already warn that Japanese hotels will welcome 60% less of Chinese. Why is it important? Beyond the percentages, this ‘puncture’ in the Chinese market represents a setback for a sector (Japanese tourism) that until recently seemed unbeatable. Despite how popular Japan continues to be in the rest of the world and the record data it is collecting, its balance of incoming tourist spending registered a drop of 2.8% during the last three months of 2025. It is not a high percentage, but it represents the first decline in more than four years. In November, Bloomberg already warned that the diplomatic row with China threatened to cost Japan’s tourism sector 1.2 billion in income. If the data were not conclusive in itself, it comes at a … Read more

We thought that AI was going to take our position. The reality is that it is making us work more and rest less

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The most pessimistic vision of the future of AI predicted that the automation of processes would mean the elimination of many jobs. The most optimistic assure that AI will not replace employees, but rather will enhance your skills making them more productive, which will translate into shorter days. A analysis of Harvard Business Reviewbased on eight months of observation at a US technology company with about 200 employees, reveals something very different: AI is making employees take on more tasks, but also make them work longer days. Do more with AI. The study observed that the use of AI in the company It did not simplify the work, but rather expanded it. The researchers observed that employees, product managers, and designers began using AI on their own initiative, even though the company did not force them to do so. What it did do was provide business subscriptions to those who decided to use it in their work. This use made employees begin to tackle more and more tasks, not only within the scope of their position, but, for example, employees from the sales department asked AI for help. to program a tool to help them in their task. Employees argued that, with the help of AI, they had immediate response to their ideas and projects, which allowed them to accomplish more tasks. The end of breaks. The help of AI and the elimination of friction in starting new tasks motivated employees to take on more and more tasks, increasing their daily workload. The most curious thing is that the researchers discovered that this additional motivation also implied that employees gave up their natural rest times. The increase in workload, even voluntarily, increased their levels of cognitive fatigue and exhaustion, influencing their decision-making capacity. By not having to stop and reflect in front of a blank page of a report or simply go to a colleague’s desk for help with a question, employees endured greater mental strain. This progressive exhaustion had an impact on worsening of work quality and in personnel turnover due to burnout. Fast pace and multitasking. He productivity increase The initial advantage that AI provided made it possible for employees to have several open fronts. The researchers detected that employees assigned a task to the AI ​​(or even several tasks in parallel processes) and, while obtaining a result, started a new task. This practice caused a state of perpetual multitasking, with frequent interruptions and “juggling” between different ideas and open projects, which contributed to exhausting employees’ cognitive capacity a little more. More work for you, more work for others. Daring to take on tasks that did not correspond to them, in turn caused a supervision overload for the departments to which it did correspond. For example, if someone in the sales department created code to streamline the analysis of their sales data, that would require the engineering department to review that code to make sure it was correct. that is correct and safeincreasing your workload with unplanned projects. Blurred boundaries between work and life. One of the most notable consequences is how AI acts as an always-available “co-pilot,” removing barriers between work and personal hours. The employees who participated in the analysis ended up extending their work hours on their own initiative, reviewing ideas or polishing the work they had started with AI at home. As its authors point out, “organizations could see this voluntary expansion of work as a clear victory. After all, if workers do it on their own initiative, why would that be a bad thing?” However, this apparent initial advantage for companies can mask a long-term problem “Overwork can impair judgment, increase the likelihood of errors, and make it difficult for organizations to distinguish between true productivity gains and unsustainable intensity,” the researchers note. The report ‘Barometer of AI in the world of work’ prepared by PwC, corroborates that in companies with a high implementation of AI, productivity increases between 20 and 30% on average, but it is only maintained at these levels if it is accompanied by ethical governance and redistribution of efforts. Without these adjustments, the promise of efficiency becomes a trap of greater individual effort that ends up burning out employees with heavier workloads and longer hours. In Xataka | “The world is in danger”: Anthropic’s security manager leaves the company to write poetry Image | Unsplash (Christina @wocintechchat.com)

Anthropic has taken Apple’s strategy against Microsoft to the Super Bowl: making using the rival look ridiculous

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Anthropic has opened the Super Bowl by attacking OpenAI with ads that show virtual therapists advertising dating apps and personal trainers selling boosts for short people. The message: “Ads are coming to AI. But not to Claude“(“The ads are reaching the AI. But not Claude.”) Sam Altman has responded in X calling them “dishonest” and accusing them of “doublespeak“, “double speech” in Spanish, although a better adapted translation could be “deceptive language” or simply “hypocrisy.” It seems like a minor skirmish, two rivals fighting over an advertisement. But under that hood is a billion-dollar question: What kind of business will AI be when it’s established? The history of the Internet is summarized in two great models: One free supported by advertising: Google, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok… regardless of whether they have premium versions. Other direct payment by subscription: Netflix, DAZN, Disney+, Apple Music, PSN… The first aims to maximize the audience, the second aims to maximize the revenue per user. The AI ​​is right now deciding which of the two paths it takes. In Xataka AI is breaking one of the oldest economic paradigms in history: that cheap equals "bad" OpenAI has already chosen and is starting to test putting ads on free ChatGPT accounts. Altman justifies it with the classic argument of democratization: “More Texans use free ChatGPT than the total number of people using Claude in the United States.” In other words: they want to reach those billions of people who are not going to pay 20 dollars a month. And for that you need advertising. Anthropic chooses the opposite. “Anthropic offers an expensive product to rich people,” Altman reproaches him. In a way, it is true: Claude is betting above all on contracts with companies and premium subscriptions of 20, 100 and 200 dollars per month. Their model depends on the AI ​​being valuable enough for you to pay for it. And so that you look from time to time to the higher plan with the temptation to go up one more step. Without advertising, without sponsored links and without responses being influenced by advertisers. The difference is not only business, it is product. An AI with advertising has different incentives than one without it. What happens when you ask the assistant what car to buy you and there is a manufacturer paying to appear in their answers? What about medical, financial, legal advice? OpenAI has promised that “ads do not influence responses.” That’s what he said in minute 0. But that promise will be increasingly difficult to sustain as monetization pressure increases. {“videoId”:”x9u4ml2″,”autoplay”:false,”title”:”Does Gemini 3 surpass ChatGPT? This is Google’s new AI”, “tag”:”Webedia-prod”, “duration”:”156″} Anthropic has its own problem: If it only reaches those who can afford to pay, AI becomes a tool of the elites. A technology that promises to democratize knowledge ends up reproducing the class divisions that already exist. We saw this coming with the arrival of $200 plans to access the AI ​​elite. A gap that creates another gap, The parallel with the history of the Internet is inevitable. Free social networks caught (almost) all of us in the 1910s, but in return they built advertising surveillance machines optimized for the engagementnot for anyone’s well-being. Payment services are cleaner, but also more exclusive. So AI is now at that bifurcation point: OpenAI is committed to being the YouTube of AI: free for everyone, supported by ads and with premium versions for those who want to pay. Anthropic wants to be the Netflix: better experience and free of ads, but only for those who pay. It is true that it maintains a free plan, but its limits are a continuous invitation to check out or leave. And now it’s up for grabs What kind of relationship with those machines that know more and more about us and from which we ask more and more?. Whether they will be services that serve us or whether they will be platforms that monetize us. In Xataka | The AI ​​of 2026 brings an uncomfortable truth: the most useful will be the one that watches us the most Featured image | Anthropic (function() { window._JS_MODULES = window._JS_MODULES || {}; var headElement = document.getElementsByTagName(‘head’)(0); if (_JS_MODULES.instagram) { var instagramScript = document.createElement(‘script’); instagramScript.src=”https://platform.instagram.com/en_US/embeds.js”; instagramScript.async = true; instagramScript.defer = true; headElement.appendChild(instagramScript); – The news Anthropic has taken Apple’s strategy against Microsoft to the Super Bowl: making using the rival look ridiculous was originally published in Xataka by Javier Lacort .

Spain is stopping making its potato tortillas at home. And that is why the Mercadona supplier is growing by 20%

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After decades of debate Spain hasn’t decided yet Whether or not the tortilla should contain onion, what thousands and thousands of Spaniards do seem to be clear about is that the ideal is for someone else to cook it. More and more people prefer to go from peeling potatoes, heating oil and making their own tortillas to buying them directly at the supermarket. And so is making gold to one of Mercadona’s allied companies, a Navarrese firm which in 2025 increased its turnover by 20% to reach almost 200 million euros and this year it hopes to make another growth spurt to reach 230. It is the financial data of a company in the food sector, but it also tells us a lot about the market and our consumer habits. Sincebollists V.S. concebollistas. It is not easy to classify the Spanish population into tight compartments, but there is something that does not fail: the majority of 49.4 million of people who live in this country can be defined as sincebollists either concebollistas depending on whether you prefer the potato omelette (one of the great emblems of the native cuisine) with or without onion. The curious thing is that both seem to increasingly opt to abandon the stove and buy ready-made tortillas. At least that’s what they suggest. the latest data from Grupo Elaborados Naturales, Mercadona supplier and one of the largest tortilla manufacturers in the country. One figure: 197 million. The company presume that since its founding in 2006, it has managed to achieve “a dizzying pace” of growth of between 15 and 40% annually. 2025 has not been an exception. His last balance shows that last year it had a turnover of 197 million, 20% more than the previous year. This year it hopes to maintain that pace with another growth of 16.7% that will allow it to reach a turnover of around 230 million. As? Basically with your offer of refrigerated and frozen tortillas, although in the HORECA channel (the professional hospitality industry) also works with processed potatoes and vegetables. 2026, big. To achieve this growth, the company has redoubled its industrial muscle. The firm has dedicated approximately 40 million euros to strengthening its facilities, expanding its factory in Funes (Navarra) by 20,000 square meters and equipping itself with 12 new lines which will allow it to double the production capacity in that plant: from 300,000 units per day to 600,000. The company assures that it will also generate hundreds of jobs. In total, the company has three factories: Funes, dedicated to the production of tortillas; that of Corella (Navarra), which combines the manufacture of tortillas with prepared refrigerated potato-based dishes; and Aguilar del Río Alhama (La Rioja), where 150 people work dedicated to cooking migas and ‘fifth range’ foods (ready to eat) with vegetables. Apart from the national market, the company exports to a dozen and a half countries. The (long) shadow of Mercadona. Beyond its production capacity, there is one fact about the company that draws attention: its weight in the sector. Elaborados Naturales has reached a market share in the ‘potato tortillas’ category of 56% in large national distribution. This enormous footprint is better understood when knowing a key fact about the Navarrese company: its alliance with Mercadona. The firm is a supplier to the Juan Roig chain, which has in turn expanded throughout the sector until it has gained a market share of between 25 and 30%a percentage that has been reinforced thanks to its good rhythm of growth. More than just a business balance sheet. The balance sheet of Elaborados Naturales is nothing more than that: the balance sheet of a company in the food industry. If it is interesting to read beyond the company’s offices, it is because it connects with other underlying trends that are clearly identifiable in both the industry and Spanish society. For example, the growing demand of prepared foods. The latest data from the Ministry of Agriculture and Food (MITECO) they talk to us of an increase in the consumption of prepared dishes of around 6% while that of fish, fruits and vegetables declines. Much of it Of that demand is also satisfied in supermarkets. Rain of millions. A good example is Mercadona, which has seen how its line of ready-to-eat dishes has been taking over a growing gap in that business niche. Its success (also supported by white label) is in turn boosting its extensive ecosystem of suppliers, including Elaborados. In fact, the tortilla manufacturer is just one of the many companies that have seen their turnover grow by close to 20% in recent years driven largely by the commercial expansion of the Valencian chain. Images | Kent Wang (Flickr) and Natural Prepared In Xataka | Years ago Mercadona decided to conquer the market with its white brands. And that is making gold for some companies

A simple gadget is making a species evolve live and direct: hummingbirds

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During the late 1820s, Rene Lesson visited many times the ornithological collection of François Victor Masséna. Every morning, he crossed the doors of the Parisian palace of the Dukes of Rivoli and immersed himself in the more than 12,000 species they had accumulated there. Some say he fell in love there. Sometimes, just before immersing himself in work, he would come across a very young woman Anna d’EsslingMasséna’s wife. Lesson, who was well aware of his social situation, never said anything; but in his papers he described Anna as “a woman of exceptional beauty, elegance and education.” I imagine that, for this reason, when he discovered the amethyst-headed hummingbird among the Duke’s specimens, he thought of her. I imagine that, for this reason, Lesson named it after him. What I can’t imagine is what the French ornithologist would think if we told him that we were “evolving” the hummingbird he gave to Anna until we changed it forever. But that’s how it is. The evolution live and direct. I came to this story (and Global Change Biology study which supports it) thanks to a bluit by Carlos Cabido. It is, as the evolutionary ecologist says, “another case of rapid evolution that has generated observable adaptive changes in a very short period.” The “smoking gun.” But let’s start at the beginning: researchers at the University of California Berkeley analyzed the population expansion and the morphological changes in the beaks of hummingbirds in relation to a very specific device: the feeders that, since the 1930s, have been used on the west coast of the United States. These are simple sugar water dispensers, but (always according to researchers) they have caused a series of very striking changes. What changes? On a regional and temporal scale, “the density/use of feeders appears as the best predictor of population expansion”; well above other variables analyzed. This means that the installation of these dispensers is the key to the expansion of hummingbirds. Linked to that, researchers they observed significant changes in the morphology of the beak: it has become longer (to better access the feeder) and sharper (in a context where territoriality is becoming more important because it is linked to a very concentrated resource). And all this in a couple of decades. That is, in about ten generations. Why is it important? Above all, because it is one more example that a cheap, massive and standardized device (if it creates a new food environment) can reconfigure body structures and behavioral repertoires. And, beyond all that, because it shows that, if environmental change is intense and sustained, natural selection works like a shot. However, all that glitters is not a hummingbird. In fact, Anna’s hummingbird is almost an exception. As far as we know, countless hummingbird species They are suffering (and big time) the changes linked to the Anthropocene: although the Anna is growing, its first cousins ​​are in clear decline. And yes, it is our fault. Yeah this study shows that we have great power to change nature, the overview reminds us that “with great power comes great responsibility.” Image | Robert Bottman In Xataka | The domestication of cats remains a mystery. But we are closer to knowing where and why it happened

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