player

In 1966 a player from Argentina was sent off but there was no way to explain it to him. Since then there have been yellow and red cards

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When two people want to understand each other but do not speak the same language, they try to do so by speaking louder, gesticulating or resorting to things they do not understand about borders. And be careful, this is assuming that in football we always want to understand the referee: it would not be the first or the last time that a player acts the Swede when faced with a warning or a substitution… if he is winning, of course. Despite the sui generis speech by Tom Cruise In the last World Cup 2026, in modern football we manage with English (however tacky) and the rules of the IFAB, made up of the four football associations of the United Kingdom and FIFA, which allows anyone to know what it means when the referee team raises the flag or a card suddenly appears. It wasn’t always like this, so imagine the pitched battles that took place. The problem. An Italian and a Chilean go and… no, it’s not a joke: at the beginning of the 60s there were episodes of great violence in football and one of the most sadly remembered matches was the match between Chile and Italy in the 1962 World Cup, so much so that it is known as the “Battle of Santiago“. At that time there were no mechanisms to put a stop to that aggressiveness in the form of fights and fouls that occurred as a result of the heat on the playing field. The World Cup that changed everything. The quarterfinal match between Argentina and England in the 1966 World Cup was a before and after. As pick up the Smithonianat one point, an Argentine player tried to communicate with the (German) referee and his vehement gestures and pleas, impossible for the referee to understand, cost him expulsion for verbal violence. The player refused to leave the field until Kenneth George Aston, a member of the FIFA Referees Committee and also responsible for the refereeing of that World Cup, intervened. In that match the referee Rudolf Kreitlein had warned the English Bobby and Jack Charlton and had expelled the Argentine Antonio Rattinbut it was so unclear in the game that those interested they found out better laterthanks to the press. In fact, so much so that the England coach, Alf Ramsey, He went to a FIFA representative to clear up any doubts. Of course, the heat resulting from the match, the ambient noise and the language barrier between players and referee made understanding each other an impossible mission. Aston came to that conclusion, and he left there determined to change it. The solution. So he set out to do something to make the referee’s decisions clearer for both players and spectators. And something came to mind that everyone knows: traffic lights. Aston counts how it came to him: “As I was driving down Kensington Street in London, the traffic light turned red and I thought: ‘Yellow’, you can still get through; ‘Red’ means stop, out of bounds.” When he got home, he told his wife Hilda about his idea, who they count He disappeared from the room to return a few minutes later with two cardboard cards that fit perfectly in his shirt pocket, thus materializing the idea. The system officially premiered at the 1970 World Cup in Mexico, 107 years after the birth of football’s first governing body, and since then it has been adopted in all federations. The power of a simple cardboard. The writer Rob Walker summarizes well the effect that that simple piece of paper has: it has enormous power when a referee displays it in an almost theatrical way in the player’s face. It provokes a stadium full of whistles and exaggerated gestures from the arms of the cautioned player and his teammates. Because everyone knows what it means: the loss of possession of the ball, a free kick and even being left with one less player on the field of play. Kenneth George Aston, who died in 2001, summarized the vision of football where that gesture that he himself invented and that is still valid in each and every match has extreme importance: a dramatic work in two acts with 22 actors and a stage director, the referee, without a script and without a known ending. In Xataka | Argentina 6 – Peru 0: the story of the alleged biggest fixing of the World Cups between dictatorships and missing people In Xataka | There is something in which Uruguay is a true and overwhelming world power: generating elite footballers Cover | Jason Gulledge and Tasnim News Agency

The most viral player of the 2026 World Cup owes his global popularity to AI and Chinese fans

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Erling Haaland has been one of the most talked about players for weeks in a World Cup that is giving endless topics of conversation beyond the games, which at this point are a bit of the least important thing. His imposing physical presence, his deadly style of play and his apparent affability off the field they seem almost scripted to build a cult figure. And there is a little of that. The famous video. In mid-June, a video began to circulate of the Norwegian striker having dinner in a restaurant, and being startled when he saw his own reflection in a mirror. One post on X alone racked up over 31 million views in a matter of days, and currently has more than 42. In reality it is not Haaland, but a sketch by Chinese comedy duo Jin Long and Qiu Qiumuch more exaggerated and clearly false. The comic was polished to make it more realistic and Haaland’s face was superimposed using AI. The account, specialized in shocking videos made with generative artificial intelligence, published similar videos from other points of view in successive days. All false: the internet was already immersed in an unstoppable fever. Big in China. Before the World Cup, Haaland was already a cult figure in China. The forward joined Weibo and Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, on June 6, and in less than a month he added 1.6 million followers on the first platform and 5.2 million on the second. The hashtags related to him have exceeded 490 million views on Weibo alone. The two Haalands. Chinese fans have two versions of Haaland: on the field he is the “Nordic cyborg”, an almost inhuman scoring machine. Outside of him is Habao, a clumsy and charming giant. Besidesin recent months he has starred an advertisement for a Chinese herbal drink and he has tried to speak Mandarin on camera, fueling that contrast that his fans find irresistible. A song about him, titled “Haaland (Ha Ha Ha)” and set to the melody of ‘Moskau’, by the German Eurodisco group Dschinghis Khan, can be heard in Chinese AI montages, including the advertisement. Your personal Snapchat accountwith more than 5 million followers, works as the raw material of this entire ecosystem: selfies from unflattering angles, comparisons to ‘Shrek’, improvised questions and answers. Some real content, made by oneself, which is then reprocessed by others with generative tools until it is impossible to distinguish the origin. Official AI. Not all the synthetic material with Haaland was born without permission. In 2023, photographer David Yarrow He portrayed Haaland alonewaist-deep in an Oslo fjord, dressed as a Viking. Looking ahead to this World Cup, the Norwegian football federation called Yarrow again to repeat the session with the entire team. The result, titled “The Vikings are coming“, shows the 26 players armed with swords and shields in front of a longship, and it was Haaland himself who promoted the idea of ​​this sequel. From there, the iconography got out of hand. Fans flooded the networks with AI-generated variants (Haaland in full battle, with armor and ax raised) that blur the line between mythology sponsored by the federation and fiction conceived by fans. Furthermore, as could not be otherwise, far-right accounts attracted to Haaland as a symbol of a white, blond and physically imposing man, have especially actively shared this Viking content. The fanon. According to Wired in its article, AI is facilitating a new relationship between fans and their idols: fanon (as a nod to “canon”): material that the public invents to fill in the gaps left by the official canon. There has always been this approach to the lives of celebrities, but generative artificial intelligence summarizes the artisanal work of before, of photomontages and manipulated videos, in a few minutes. As a source of astonishingly realistic material (how many of the hilarious images of Haaland on the field of play that you have seen are real?), sponsors, federations and representation agencies have before them a new panorama, which does not only affect footballers. Singers, actors, influencerscelebrities of all kinds… if they don’t have an attractive enough life or personality, fans will make it up for them. The abyss that opens before them is obvious. In Xataka | The biggest mystery of the World Cup is why all the boots are pink: the answer is very simple to understand

How to turn your cell phone into an mp3 player without notifications or distractions

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Let’s tell you how to turn your cell phone into an MP3 playerso you can dedicate it solely to playing music without any other distractions. You are going to do this so much with an old cell phone to which you want to give a new life as with a new one when you want to use it only to listen to music. Our mobile phone is the control center of our digital life, and at all times we receive notifications, notices, updates, and the eternal temptation to use it to write messages or browse social networks. But what happens when you want to isolate yourself from the world and have your phone only serve to listen to music and podcasts? In these cases, you may be tempted to simply buy a new device, a media player that is not so connected to everything and only serves that purpose. But before spending money, you should try doing this on your current mobile to see if it is enough. Let’s tell you two ways to limit your mobile to listen to music. One is going to be less aggressive, that of limiting all notifications and interruptions that could take you out of your musical bubble. And the second will be more aggressive, to directly limit your mobile. First decide where you will listen to the music The first choice you have is to decide where you are going to listen to your music. And here you will have many options, both music streaming services and other native alternatives to have greater control over the musical content you have. Here we leave you a list of alternatives which you can opt for: streaming service: Spotify and Apple Music are the most popular music streaming services, with other alternatives like Tidal quite close behind. If you don’t want algorithms, you can opt for Qobuz, which has better music quality, without music inserted as an advertisement, and a clean experience that is like entering a record store, without sacrificing the ability to have playlists. YouTube-based streaming: You also have available free alternatives to Spotifymany of which they use YouTube or other pages as a source. Come on, they create a streaming service with albums and everything, and use YouTube to extract the music from their videos. Create your own Spotify: You also have applications for create your own Spotify. They usually do this by having an application on the computer to turn it into a server, and then be able to play the music over the Internet on other devices. You will need to have your main computer on, although many will allow you to download music. The most popular option is set up your own Spotify with Plexbut there are other interesting alternatives. Have your music on your mobile and use a player: And then you have the more artisanal method. If you have digitized your music to convert your CDs into mp3, purchased digital music directly, or used any other method to build your own music library, you can simply put it in a folder in your phone’s memory and then use a music player. With alternatives like AIMP, Retro Music Player or Pulsar you can have everything: integration with lyrics, covers, tag editor, and everything you need. And finally, you must think If you will listen to the music having an internet connection or not. In the event that you are not going to have a connection, make sure that if you use a service that takes music from the Internet such as Spotify or the alternatives, you download the albums that you are going to want to listen to directly on your mobile. Set a focus mode The least aggressive way to limit your phone to focus on the music listening experience is set up a focus mode. With this, what we are going to do is prevent notifications from appearing or that no application or phone call can bother us while we have our mode active for when we listen to music. If you want to create a concentration mode on Android, you have to go to your mobile settings. Inside, click on the section Modes. Inside here, click on the option Create your own way to make a custom one. On iOS, the option is called Concentration modes. In both cases, you will have to give it a name and an icon. This is up to you, but I suggest it be something recognizable, such as a reference to listening to music and an icon like headphones. Each operating system has its options, but they are quite unified. The most important thing is that make two specific changes on Android or iOS when you are creating this mode: Don’t create a schedule: This is so that the mode is activated automatically at certain times. In this case, I recommend not setting a schedule and using it manually, activating it only when you are going to use it. Turn off notifications: Disable the option Allow all notificationsand don’t allow any app to send you notifications. Perhaps, you can set an exception such as very close family so that if they call you the call will ring, but what are notifications you can deactivate them all, so that you do not receive any notice, and thus you can escape and not look at what is happening. Make very few exceptions: On both Android and iOS you will be able to set an application as an exception so that its notifications appear. You may want to put something like emails, but always try to remove messaging and social media apps, and this way you will avoid the main distractions. There are apps that make your screens minimalist But of course, with all the changes we have made we have altered the behavior of the mobile, but we still have home screens full of app icons and distractions. Fortunately, There are applications to alter your home screen and make it have … Read more

I am a paddle tennis player and finally a smart watch brand has remembered me

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I have carried a paddle tennis racket in my hand since I was little. I am worse than hunger, I am not hiding, but I like this sport and I must admit that I look with envy at the fans of, for example, golf or the running. As a lover of smart watches, I have always seen from afar manufacturers launch specific models and functions for runners and golf players with cool metrics, interesting analyzes and specific functions: yes, 3D courses, yes, footfall analysis, yes, that niche data that only the pros care about… And meanwhile, the padel players we were still thereusing the “tennis” mode that tells us little or nothing or, if available, the “paddle” mode that also does not give information about performance in the match. That’s why, walking through the halls of the Mobile World Congress, I couldn’t help but stop at the Mibro stand. Because? Because their watches have a paddle mode, but a useful one with relevant information for players of this sport. Yes, we really exist. Padel mode in the Mibro GS Explorer S-Ti | Image: Xataka My what? Mibro, “your brother in sport”, as one of the company’s workers at the stand tells me with a laugh. Mibro is a company of Zhenshi Information Technology, a Chinese company founded in 2015 with financing from Xiaomi and Nokia. The company specializes in sports wearables and has found a way to increase its presence in the European market in paddle tennis. In fact, they openly recognize it: it is not that padel is gaining traction in China, it is that they know that it is important in Europe and they believe they have a way to differentiate themselves there. And what do they offer? The company has a catalog of watches with a rather high-mid-range price. The most expensive model is the Mibro GS Explorer Swhich costs 349.99 euros and is made of titanium (it is the one in the photos and I must admit that it feels scary, although I would change the strap, which looks very good, for a silicone one for sports). However, it has cheaper models, such as the GS Active2which remains below 100 euros. The operating system is Mibro Galaxy OS 2.0, a very fancy to call an RTOS system that is very reminiscent of Huawei’s HarmonyOS. An example of the metrics associated with paddle tennis | Image: Xataka But let’s talk about padel. The key to these watches, and the reason why they have caught my attention, is because of their paddle tennis analysis. For the uninitiated, in paddle tennis there are different shots: forehand, backhand, volleys, spikes, layups, lobs, drop shots, etc. Understanding well which shots you are doing the most and why can help you understand a match and discover your areas for improvement. For example: if you have lost a match in which you have made many layups (cut, high and deep shot to keep the net), you may have to work on the volley and the force you apply when hitting, because they have been constantly knocking you out of the net with lobs (high and deep balls). If you have made many lobs and few volleys, layups or shots, it is probably because they have managed to keep you down and have not let you go up to the net to attack. Analysis of forehands and backhands | Image: Xataka And that’s where Mibro comes in.. As they have shown us at the stand, the watch is capable of detecting the number and percentage of each of the shots we make in a match. The watch allows us to know how many backhands, drives, layups, spikes, forehand and backhand lobs and forehand and backhand drop shots we have made and, for example, manually cross-check them with our heart rate to see which points have put us in trouble. Example of analysis of blows | Image: Xataka Speed ​​of blows | Image: Xataka It also counts calories and, even more importantly, the speed of the strokes. Although it is easy to associate paddle tennis with strong and very loud hits, the truth is that playing slowly is usually much more effective against players… nervous, let’s say. A weak ball to the side wall will probably do more damage than a strong shot or volley, in the same way that a layup does not necessarily have to be very fast. Knowing that information that, until now, we could not know, can be useful to focus training or take action. To recognize hits, the device is based on a six-axis accelerometer and intelligent algorithms, as is already done in many other watches and many other sports. How does it work? Unfortunately, and although we always want a padel, we have not had the opportunity to pick up the racket and throw some balls in the halls of the MWC, but the fact that it exists is already progress. Counting layups and shots | Image: Xataka An ideal world. At the expense of testing the watch in a real match situation, a function that would make a lot of sense (even via AI) is to be able to cross-reference the heart rate with the shot you have made or with the duration of the points, as well as the number of shots. That would allow us to see at what level of intensity we start to make mistakes, what shots we make when we are tired (perhaps we abuse the shot or miss more layups). The higher the intensity, the more the technique is distorted, and that causes errors. That type of information, well interpreted, is valuable if you are looking to train and improve. Images | Xataka In Xataka | I have been playing paddle tennis for years and I think Playtomic is an absolutely brilliant invention

Deportivo has built a system to know how much the player they already have is worth

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A few years ago, the Depor A question was asked that seems obvious but that almost no one in Spanish football had taken seriously: is it possible to gather everything a club knows about its players in one place? Not the goals, not the assists, not what appears on Transfermarkt. All. From the vertical jump that a cadet records on a strength machine to the subjective assessment of a veteran scout after watching a game on a rainy Saturday in Becerreá, province of Lugo. From the history of injuries to the psychological alerts of a 14-year-old boy who has been angry for five training sessions. The answer was to build it themselves. The result is an internal platform without a commercial name. They call it, without much ceremony, “the Dash,” which functions as the club’s digital nervous system. Nacho Louriddirector of Deportivo’s analytical and sports technology department, describes him with an ambition that he does not hide: “I call him, maybe he is a little ambitious, like a ERP sporty”. Perhaps with a play on words. Nacho Lourid. Image: Deportivo de la Coruña. It’s not ambitious. It is exactly what it is. And the interesting thing is not the technology itself, but what it says about the real state of data analysis in professional football: that although clubs have embraced the data culture, the majority continue to work with fragmented information, dispersed between departments that sometimes do not speak to each other, with external tools designed for the scouting but not to understand his own players. What the market did not offer The starting point is a lack. Commercial football data platforms (Opta, Media Coach, Transfermarkt itself…) They are designed mostly for one thing: to help sign. They are tools of scoutingnot internal performance. They provide competition statistics, but they cannot integrate what happens within a club’s facilities: GPS data from training, medical records, anthropometric evaluations, the maturational status of a youth, psychologist reports… Signature of one of the players. Image provided. “What we never find is that these platforms are focused on performance,” explains Lourido. “Why? Because there is data that no external platform can have. It is our data, physical data, medical data, protected by law and collected by devices that we have internally.” What Deportivo wanted to measure was something that sounds simple but that in practice almost no one achieves: the actual performance of a player, decoupled from the result. A team can lose 0-1 and have played the best game of the season. A striker can score a goal and have had an alarmingly poor physical performance. Competition data alone does not distinguish between both scenarios. Everything a club knows, in one place The platform connects all the club’s sports professionals. Everyone: trainers, physical trainers, medical department, nutritionist, psychologist. Each one feeds the database from their plot. The GPS that the players carry during training automatically dumps. The competition data comes from providers such as Opta or Olocip. The scouts’ subjective evaluations are recorded through their own mobile application. The individualized rubrics of the youth coaches are added to the profile of each boy from the time he is a first-year junior. The result is a cumulative profile of each player that is not limited to what he does in games. When a technician or manager accesses the dashboard of a footballer, finds his performance in competition, but also his medical history, his physical evolution, his accumulated GPS data, the assessment of scouts and, in the case of the youth team, his career since the first years of training. “When someone goes to dashboard of a footballer and his performance profile, it is very clear in all areas how that footballer is doing. On a physical level, on a psychological level, on a competition level, his medical history, injuries, everything.“, summarizes Lourid. Detail of injuries of a youth player. Image provided. Image provided. The dashboards adapt to the user profile. The sports management sees a general panorama; the physical trainer, overload alerts; the youth coach, the maturational evolution of his players. It is the same database with many windows. Beyond xG The most striking thing is not the obvious metrics expected by anyone who reads the Brand day in and day out, but also the variables that the team of analysts has been cooking up: Game initiative, which combines circulation rhythm and territorial dominance. Construction efficiency, which measures not only whether the team reaches the rival area but how it arrives. Passes allowed by defensive action: how many touches the opponent gives before you steal the ball. A detail that says a lot: The platform contextualizes the data according to the moment of the partido. “The game plan is until you score the first goal or your rival scores it”, Lourid explains. The metrics distinguish between performance before and after the marker alters the dynamics. It is the type of detail that distinguishes a dashboard as such an Excel that has come to the fore. In the quarry, the platform detects invisible patterns without accumulated data. “We had recorded data on players who are in the first team, who when they were cadets gave data on professional footballers. Efforts above 30 km/h… and perhaps the kid was 15 years old.” The club measures biological versus chronological age to decide promotions. A kid who plays below his maturity level receives a “survivor” profile. And you are not penalized for it, you are simply protected. Image provided. Image provided. Image provided. An example of what Nacho commented in the training phase. A first-year cadet team (14/15 years old) and its players who are divided into four large groups based on their level of maturational development: “survivors”, “sufferers”, “competitors” and “leftovers”. Image provided. What the algorithm does not touch (on purpose) There is a decision that indicates the maturity of the system. The psychological data exists (the first team psychologist eats with the players, travels with them, is on the field…), but they do not feed the … Read more

After invading the development of video games, AI enters an untouchable area with a Sony patent: the player himself

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Sony has registered a patent that proposes a future where video games can complete themselves. The document, presented in September 2024 and released this weekdescribes a system of “artificial intelligence ghosts” capable of actively intervening in PlayStation games. These virtual agents would go beyond traditional guides: they would not only show how to overcome obstacles, but they could directly take control and solve entire levels while the player watches. How it works. The patent details an assistance system with several levels of intervention. For example, “Guide Mode” would allow the ghost to show the solution to a specific problem, such as solving a puzzle or executing a precise sequence of commands, but it would have to be completed by the player. “Complete Mode”, on the other hand, would hand over total control to the artificial agent, which would overcome the obstacle autonomously. More modes. The registration document describes four modes Selectable additional features: Story Mode, Combat Mode, Exploration Mode and Full Game Mode, suggesting specialization in certain tasks, depending on the type of challenge presented to the player. The system would function as a layer superimposed on the user’s character, visible on the screen as a visual reference. In some cases, this digital ghost could even hold conversations with the player’s avatar to offer contextualized instructions. What does it feed on? The technology would be fueled by recordings of previous games, including content shared on YouTube and social networks. The original patent document justifies the need to access these videos by stating that “players can research the game or search for previous gameplay on Internet sites, but that process is time-consuming.” Help systems. Player aids have come a long way. In the ’90s, players who got stuck called support lines (Nintendo’s being especially popular) or consulted guides in magazines, full of maps and secrets. The web democratized access through databases such as GameFAQs and, later, through audiovisual content on YouTube that allowed step-by-step solutions to be seen. In fact, Playstation 5 already incorporates Game Helpa system that displays clips of other users overcoming specific sections of the game. Its application, however, leaves something to be desired. Microsoft, of course, is betting on Copilot in the form of a conversational assistant that answers questions about the game. The proposal for artificial ghosts goes one step further, going from pre-recorded content to direct intervention in the game. AI in industry. The artificial intelligence integration video game development is accelerating. In 2024Unity revealed that 62% of studios that were using its tools implemented AI in some phase of production, highlighting animation as the main application. A survey from the Game Developers Conference of the same year indicates that approximately a third of professionals in the sector were already using these technologies. Data from the Tokyo Games Show raised the figure to more than half of Japanese companies. The automation of gameplay It’s not new either. Kotaku mentions in its article successful titles such as ‘Vampire Survivors’, with semi-automatic mechanics; ‘Megabonk’, nominated for the Game Awards for its automated design; or, in general, all idle subgenrewhich has such popular examples as ‘Ball X Pit’. The debate. This technology poses a dilemma: on the one hand, it would allow more players to enjoy complex content and prevent abandonment due to frustration. It would be integrated into the accessibility options (difficulty settings, control remapping, color blind modes), without forcing anyone to use it. On the other hand… do we run the risk of losing the “challenge” of games by delegating our participation to AI agents? What’s the point of playing then? And of course, it raises multiple questions in multiplayer environments, where there will be a temptation to take credit for victories achieved by the ghost. In Xataka | The new “test” to discover whether or not an AI model is truly intelligent: play Pokémon

The RAM memory market is broken and there are those who point to a new player: Asus

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The RAM memory market it’s gibberish. The voracity of the data centers has caused energy companies to rethink your renewable goals and? RAM memory increases meteorically in price. This short term is so attractive that Micron, one of the three RAM giants, recently announced that killed its branch of Crucial consumption. And, king dead, king in place: leaks suggest that Asus would be considering its arrival in the RAM market for 2016. It’s not going to be easy at all. In short. The middle Sakhtafzarmag is the one that has sprung the hare: Asus would enter the DRAM market over the next few months. The medium now filter previously information about new processors from AMD and Intel so, although we are talking about a rumor, it is not a medium that comes out of nowhere. At a time when reports point to a RAM shortage until the end of 2027it is not uncommon for other players in the PC market to become interested. It makes sense. And Asus is one of the greats. Your income surpass 18,000 million dollars annually and is present as one of the largest PC hardware manufacturers. Apart from its motherboards and GPU, Asus sells complete desktop and laptop computers (for gaming and office automation) and consoles (there’s the recent Asus ROG Xbox Ally). The RAM segment is one that I had not entered, but the way of doing it has other precedents: Corsair. As I say, Asus starting to sell RAM memory makes sense if we take into account that Crucial, one of the most powerful brands in the consumer segment, has ceased to exist. Crucial was a Micron brand focused on the user: if you wanted RAM, you could buy one from Crucial and mount it on your PC, but with this rise of AI, Micron has seen that the mine is in the data centers. Your explanation is that it is a movement to “improve supply to strategic customers.” The reality is that it is a chore for all PC users. Corsair style. If you have built a PC, it is easy that you have opted for Corsair RAM memories. This brand has monitors, boxes or power supplies, but also memories. However, it is not a memory manufacturer: is an assembler. What Corsair does is design its own PCB, stability systems and heatsinks, and then to that PCB solder the RAM modules from manufacturers such as Samsumg, SK Hynix or Micron. three paths. Entering a new segment is not easy, but Asus has three paths: Be a assembler. Buy memories from large manufacturers and integrate them into your own PCBs. This is what it does, for example, with its graphics cards (Nvidia chip, but its own PCB and dissipation system). ‘Pass’ from big manufacturers that are having difficulties supplying data centers and opting for other emerging ones. For example, the Chinese company CXMT, which has recently achieved validate DDR5 memory modules (and which is on the US blacklist). It would be a win-win for both: Asus validates this Chinese company in the international market and CXMT gets a high-profile international partner. The third is the most risky: Become a memory manufacturer. Asus has the financial resources, but not the experience to do it. It would be the best to create a more controlled product, but in the end it means facing a greater risk. wasp nest. As we said from the beginning, the arrival of Asus in the RAM memory segment is a rumor that arrives just when RAM supply chain is broken. It is something that affects us as consumers because we see exorbitant prices, but ‘Big Tech’ also has to pay more for RAM, there is a lot of speculation about the price of machines like Steam Machine that will be launched right in this price hurricane (some RAM modules are more expensive than any console) and even memory manufacturers they may face difficulties in their products, such as Samsung. The arrival of another assembler does not change the balance of power that the big three – Samsung, Hynix and Micron – have since Asus would buy from them, but if it associates with Chinese companies, things change, and a giant like Asus will be lat the gateway of a CXMT or Fujiuan Jinhua would add pressure to the current oligopolistic system. Decongestion? Difficult. Now, just because a new player enters this playing field does not mean that prices will drop immediately. Everything will depend on how they enter, but if they assemble memories from the three most established manufacturers, there will still be no decongestion in the market because they will be more likely to distribute the same finite product. If they enter through a Chinese manufacturer, the situation could be alleviated as long as the stock is not broken. In any case, if they are really going to make some move for 2026, it wouldn’t take long for us to have official news – and CES is just around the corner. We have contacted Asus, we will update when we hear back. Images | Hector Reyes In Xataka | AMD’s problem is not that it doesn’t make good GPUs for AI. It’s not even close to NVIDIA

A player has an insane record, 40,000 games purchased on Steam. That there is a badge to reward him is what is disturbing

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Neither collecting neither gambling addiction: This is pure and simple accumulation. But with a clear objective: to obtain the badge that recognizes the possession of no less than 40,000 games in Steam. An achievement that has already been recognized by databases like SteamDB and that undoubtedly leaves anyone breathless who thinks that the store’s seasonal sales get a little out of hand. We are nothing more than insects contemplating a giant. Sonix the Collector. The milestone has been reached by the user Sonix (SonixLegend), who has become the first person to have more than 40,000 games in his library. The badge is “Game Collector: 40,000+” (the highest of this type that can be achieved) and, according to SteamDB, Sonix reached 40,029 games on September 23, 2025. It now has 40,366. In addition, it adds 22,136 DLCs and the thing does not end here, since it maintains a wish list with 26,936 titles. More data? His favorite game is ‘Alien Swarm’, a semi-unknown free-to-play multiplayer shooter from 2010 to which he has dedicated a whopping 551 hours. A paste. Steam estimates the value of the Sonix collection at $250,041 based on the lowest prices available, but the current total cost would exceed $612,072. And since this includes both purchased titles and free games and promo codes, it is impossible to calculate the true value of what has been purchased. Sonix is ​​based in Shanghai, and has been active on Steam for fifteen years. Your profile shows a level of 303, which is equivalent to activity well above average. Other beasts. The Sonix brand is closely followed by other compulsive buyers. Ian Brandon Anderson is close to achieving the coveted badge, with 39,786 games and is closely followed by a third user, ikun, with 36,888. Interestingly, the three largest collectors achieved new records for the number of games purchased on the same day. We don’t know if it specifically means anything, except that Steam continues to be in enviable health, and that this form of compulsive collecting is not an isolated eccentricity of Sonix: at this moment there are almost 20 users with more than 30,000 games, and the top 50 are all above 22,000. Collecting is not what it used to be. Without a doubt, digital collecting has very different nuances than that of accumulators of physical material: the capacity to store digital material, for example, is practically unlimited. And the constant flow of very substantial discounts in stores like Steam itself makes it possible for collections to multiply at a very notable speed. Or put another way: without realizing it, your Steam library has hundreds, perhaps thousands of items? You have to make a very consistent effort to reach those extremes in physical video game collecting. Playing is another story. Of course, playing all these games is impossible, and we enter into issues that have little to do with the enjoyment of what was purchased: reaching the figure of 40,000 games purchased regardless of what they are or, in the case of physical collecting, buying catalogs of consoles that in a high percentage are made up of low quality games, but that must be had due to completism. There are already studies that define this completism as a form of behavior that has little to do with the acquisition of something we like for our enjoyment and, in these cases, talk about addiction It is not completely left out of the equation. Header | Erik Mclean in Unsplash

Spotify is no longer a music player. It is a “audio netflix” who wants to devour your whole day

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After 18 years palmando money, Spotify premiered its age this year with its first profitable exercise in its history. That milestone has been followed by good news as its latest quarterly resultsthat tell their own story. A story that goes far beyond its 696 million users – 276 million of them, Premium. It is that of a silent but beastial metamorphosis. Spotify has ceased to be a music player to become something different. It is a time to capture time. When Daniel EK says that “people arrive at Spotify and stay in Spotify” is subtly describing its strategy: Colonize more and more sound moments of our day to day. A few years ago, Spotify’s natural competitor was Apple Music. And YouTube Music, Deezer, Tidal. Today their rivals are rather Tiktok, YouTube, Netflix, Instagram, and even your own concentration. Compete for your sustained attention. It is not worth being the one who puts background music. The growth in active users – 11% – is, more than more people listening to music, more people delivering fragments of their day to the same platform: Music to go to work. A podcast while you work. Another music while playing sports. An AUDS AUDIOLIBRO. Videoclips with which to kill dead times. Spotify has been weaving A network that catches routines, not a long time. That is the strategy: assault every moment in which we consume audio. And towards that the company goes, towards being much more than a modern Gramola. It wants to be the entity to whom we delegate the decision to hear in each context of our day. The audiobooks looked like a sweetbeard, something tertiary, but The decision to compete with Audible It seems more and more important. The reason: Spotify needs content that works at dead moments that music cannot fill out at all. Long journeys by car. Hours of cleaning at home. Night walks. The audiobooks, such as podcasts, turn Spotify into a company for all occasions, into the audio netflix they promised to be. Spotify detected that there was a silent war for the moments of “partial attention”. While we drive, we cook, clean, we close. Moments when music works, but where an interesting conversation can hook you more. That is why hundreds of millions were spent in Joe Rogan and company. To occupy temporary territories that escaped their control. With the audiobooks gaining weight, Spotify has completed its transformation. It is no longer a music app. Not a music app that has podcasts. Is A total audio platform that coincidentally also reproduces songs, homogenizing everything in that damn word called “content.” They have resigned to be perfect in something to be indispensable in everything. And it is working: almost 700 million people have decided to be in a space that serves as a unique sound universe and does not dispatch towards several specialized applications. Outstanding image | @felipepelaquim In Xataka | The problem is no longer that Spotify has been filled with artists AI: is that AI is “reviving” dead musicians

Magnus Carlsen is considered the best chess player in history. He has not been able to beat the entire world

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Last April 4 began A very special chess chess game. With white pieces Magnus Carlsen, considered the best chess player in history. With blacks, the whole world. And the world managed to force the tables. Carlsen can’t with the world. On May 20 ended This game Freestyle chess, and did it surprisingly. After 32 movements, “the world” forced tables in a lady end thanks to the triple repetition rule. This rule allows a player to claim a draw (tables) if the same position on the board occurs at least for the third time during a game. Magnus vs. The World. The event, organized by the online chess platform Chess.comhe has faced the ex -champion of the world of classic chess – he had that title by not wanting to defend him – against more than 143,000 users of Chess.com who joined strength to try to beat him. Freestyle chess. The game did not use the rules of classic chess, but those of Freestyle chess, the new modality that Magnus Carlsen is promoting. In this modality, the positions of the pieces of the rear row (towers, horses, alfiles, lady and king) are chosen randomly, although two rules must be fulfilled. The first, that the bishops must be in boxes of different color. And the second, can be continued on both sides, so the king must always be between the two towers. Thus ended the game of Carlsen vs The World. Tables by repetition. A legend. Magnus Carlsen, 34 years old, became the world’s largest score player in 2010, at age 19, and has won five world championships. In 2014, it managed to reach the highest elo score in history, 2,882 points. In recent years, tensions with the FIDE and its own tiredness with the classic chess modality have caused the fight to defend the title of World Champion. He continues to play classic chess tournaments, but is especially interested in fast games tournaments and, in recent times, in Promote freestyle modealso known as Chess960 (chess 960) or random chess of Fischer. Voting movement. After each Movement of Carlsen, in the turn of “El Mundo” a voting system was followed that lasted 24 hours and in which all those involved in the game could participate. It was not mandatory to vote in each movement, and to help the players of “El Mundo” there were several “coaches” who shared their own reflections on the best movements with their analysis of the state of the game. A “solid” game. In statements After the game, Carlsen Indian That “in general,” the world “has played a very, very solid chess from the beginning. Perhaps he has not opted for the most entrepreneurial options, but has remained more in the normal chess line, which is not always the best strategy, but this time it has worked well. The world did not risk and worked. In the last movements the players of “The World” discussed whether to force the tables with triple repetition or try to continue playing to win it, even if that supposed the defeat. In the end the votes favored the most conservative strategy, and preferred to force the tables. The world lost against Kasparov and Anand. There have been previous events of this type. In 1999 Garry Kasparov played against more than 50,000 players via Microsoft Network and won after four months. Last year the great teacher Viswanathan Anand He won a game against more than 70,000 players at Chess.com. In both cases they were classic chess games. How was the game? Chess.com analysts have described the game as “a roller coaster” in which there were a couple of dramatic moments. Carlsen came to have a somewhat more advantageous position, but he could not take advantage of it and confesses that from that moment everything was aimed at the tables because “they did not give me a single opportunity.” Image | Frans Peeters In Xataka | A study says that AIs are “cheating” to chess. That’s what we want to think

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