talking

We have been talking about microplastics for years without being very clear about how they affect us. Science is close to solving it

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Plastic no longer only wraps our food or makes up the clothes we wear, but it has silently colonized our body. And microplastics have been found almost everywhere in the body: placenta, blood, lungs, testiclesbreast milk, brain human… But when faced with the big question of What effect does it have on the body?we are already having answers. The measurements. Studies already suggest that we could hold up to five grams of this material in our own brain. The image is shocking: the equivalent of a plastic teaspoon lodged in the deepest part of our being. Microplastics are particles, in this case they are very tiny, that come off from packaging, synthetic clothing, tires, cosmetics and countless everyday objects such as lettuce. But some are so small that they are able to cross the barriers of our lungs and intestines, travel through the bloodstream and deposit in our internal organs. What happens once there is the great unknown that scientists strive to clear up. The studies. Dr. Christian Pacher-Deutsch, from the University of Graz (Austria), recently presented a study in which he exposed human intestinal bacteria to five types of common microplastics. The result was quite clear: bacterial populations were altered, producing chemical changes, in some cases reflecting patterns observed in patients with depression and colorectal cancer. Although the researcher himself was cautious in pointing out that “although it is early to make definitive statements, reducing exposure to microplastics is a sensible precaution.” But the effects don’t stop in the intestine. Dr. Jaime Ross, a neuroscientist at the University of Rhode Island, conducted a revealing experiment: gave a group of mice water contaminated with microplastics to drink. Soon, the mice began behaving strangely, anxiously venturing into open spaces, an atypical behavior that is associated with aging and neurological diseases. Analyzing their brains, Ross found plastic in all organs and a reduction in GFAP, a key protein for brain health. This same pattern of exhaustion is seen in humans with depression and dementia. Caution. In this case, microplastics have been detected in arterial plaques, and an analysis concluded that people whose plaques were loaded with plastic were almost five times more likely to suffer a heart attack, stroke or die within three years. The practice. Faced with this avalanche of data, The Guardian wanted to move from theory to practice. The British journalist herself decided to undergo a test from the company Plastictox which, for £144, promises to reveal the amount of microplastics circulating in the blood. The test result indicated a concentration of forty microplastics per milliliters of blood. And although this figure placed her in the 25% of people with the least exposure, the laboratory gave her the total result: about 200,000 plastic particles in the bloodstream. However, other experts urge caution. Professor Stephanie Wright, a researcher at Imperial College London, calls this evidence “very premature.” He points out that although an analysis shows that there are 40 particles per ml, it is unknown if this is good or bad or if it will depend on the type of plastic it is or its origin. We live in real uncertainty. The advice. Although it is impossible to avoid exposure completely, there are a number of tips to avoid consuming this type of microplastics. For example, you can choose not to use plastic kitchen utensils or drink hot liquids from plastic cups. Even with the tap water either bottled we can have the same problem. Outside of food, the material composition of bedding or pajamas should also be reviewed, as they can release these types of particles, making cotton the best. Images | FlyD Chad Montano In Xataka | When Tap Water Tastes Like Hell: The Invisible Chemistry of Drinking Water That Explains Why It Tastes How It Tastes (And Why It’s One of the World’s Greatest Inventions)

The digital detox has been fashionable for years. It’s time to start talking like what is: a myth

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Social networks have helped us in many aspects of our life, allowing us for example to strengthen some social relationships, or taking a way to express our creativity. But all this has come with a price to pay. A cost that has noticed our mental health, which has led many to try with a time to “digital detoxification.” The problem is that it may not be too useful strategy. Not so effective. Withdraw a time from social networks It is not an effective “disconnection strategy”according to a meta -analysis carried out by a Belgian team of researchers from the universities of Antwerp and Gante, at least if we are looking to improve Our well -being. The good news: at least we do not have indications that disconnection does us badly. “The findings (…) suggest that temporarily separating ourselves from social networks may not be the approximation (…) optimal to improve individual well -being,” Write the teamwhich also points out in his study the need to continue research on alternative disconnection strategies. Ten studies. The new work is a meta -analysis, that is, a “quantitative study of studies.” The team conducted a systematic search for scientific literature that addressed the relationship between social media abstinence and one or more than three variables: positive and negative affections, and vital satisfaction. They found 10 quantitative works with a total sample of 4,674 participants. The analysis showed no significant effects of refraining from social networks in any of the three variables studied. The team also did not find indications that the duration of the period of “Digital detoxification“It will be relevant. The details of the study were published In an article In the magazine Scientific Reports. Need to investigate more. The team emphasizes the need to advance in research on this issue. According to the team itself, the study presents one of the usual problems in the meta -analysis, and is the diversity in the methodologies followed by the works included in it. A radical change. Social networks have remarkably changed how we interact with technology, for better and for worse. The problems that this poses have appeared so suddenly that our ability to adapt, to look for solutions with which to repair the possible damage has exceeded in many contexts. In Xataka | How to recover the concentration that social networks and multitars have taken us Image | Xataka with Gemini

The AI ​​is obsessed with which we are talking to her. He has a golden opportunity in an unsuspected place: our lounge

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Microsoft has sneaked into Samsung’s teles. This has been announced by both companies, which have reached an agreement so that Copilot is part both of the future Smart TVS and the company’s monitors. It is an interesting announcement not so much for what it means for these two companies, but for the tendency to which it points. Why is it important. Here Microsoft achieves a small triumph for its artificial intelligence solutions, and does so by the hand of a giant like Samsung. But here what attracts attention is that First great integration of AI in products that until now did not want to know much about it. Talk without stopping with TV. Our televisions are perfect candidates for adapted systems specifically to them, and this is a striking step in that direction. The command continues and will continue to be better in many cases (button to rise volume instead of “rises the volume a bit”, for example), no doubt. However, The Chromecast or the Fire TV Stick They already showed us that saying “reproduces the trailer of ‘Superman’” or “reproduces ‘Stranger Things’ in Netflix” is also a very powerful option. An AI to go further. Those functions of the traditional voice attendees of the teles are interesting, but having a model of AI as a co -pilot will allow that experience beyond and Interact with TV in a more versatile way. You can ask for time and visual information will appear accompanying audio information, for example, or by a movie and a card with its IMDB or Rotten Tomatoes qualification will also appear. Where did I stay with this series yesterday? And of course, we can ask us to recommend a movie – “What mystery film must be fun?” – Or that gives us related information about it – “What more movies has made the director of this film? We can talk with Copilot Normally on any subject, because after all, it is a generative AI and are designed for that purpose. The speakers, the next border. There is another hardware element that awaits the arrival of AI as a May water: smart speakers. That intelligent have never had much: Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, already said years ago that these devices “They were more silly than a stone“. The option of being able to talk to these products when they are enhanced by a generative model such as Chatgpt or its rivals is very promising, and the curious thing is that at this point we should already have a great protagonist in this field. What vadis, Alexa+? Amazon is undoubtedly the great absentee of the AI ​​segment, and for months now Alexa+ presentedits new platform with generative AI models that in theory Ibn to flood your family of Amazon Echo devices. The deployment, however, is being infuriatingand the project still has a very limited reach, we assume that because they prefer to go on safe. The privacy dilemma. It is inevitable to think that one of the possible risks that will involve the use of these devices with this technology will be the invasion of our privacy. We already know How do TVS manufacturers spend them With its users in this section, and the traditional smart speakers have already built many suspicions about it In the past. In addition, where is the limit between a useful and an annoying or invasive presence in the living room? The battle to conquer your lounge started has. It seems inevitable that AI ends up being an integral part of our televisions as it begins to be in our computers or mobiles. Smart speakers are specially prepared so that in the future we talk more than ever with them, but will there be other hardware solutions that go further? Domestic robots, maybe? There is in this segment a huge challenge in many sections – non -invasive experience and, as far as possible, private – but also an extraordinary opportunity. And Microsoft, for the moment, has seen it. Image | Jens Kreuter In Xataka | There is a new fever among ultra -ups: fed up with technology, they want houses as “dumb” as possible

We have been talking for months that there is an AI bubble. The worrying thing is that even Sam Altman agrees

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One thing is that AI pessimists tell us that there is a bubble. Another very different is that Sam Altman suggested, CEO of Openai. But it is what has happened, and that is a worrying indication of the situation in which this segment is located. Every time More expert voices They warn of danger of a bubble from AIbut there are not only voices: there are data that raise a potential crisis. One that could be even more harmful than that of the Puntocom. What has Altman said. The head of OpenAI, the company that develops ChatgPT, invited a group of journalists to comment on the launch of GPT-5. During that meeting, they indicate in The Vergesaid the following: “When bubbles occur, intelligent people are excessively excited about (which is actually so alone) a pinch of truth. Are we in a phase in which investors in general are too excited about AI? My opinion is that yes. Is AI the most important thing that has happened in a long time? My opinion is also that “ Remembering the story. Altman compared the current dynamics with which he experienced During the bubble of the Puntocom In the late 2000s. Between March 2000 and October 2002, NASDAQ lost about 80% of its value: many of the companies that signed up for Internet fever and the web failed La Hora to generate income or benefits. The value of the 10 most important companies of the S&P 500 index is today much greater than the one in the 90s, and that points to a potential (and huge) bubble. Source: Apollo Global Management / Tornsten Slok. Worse than the bubble of the Puntocom. Economic analysts and experts have long offered arguments that point in the direction of a potential bubble of AI. The chief economist of the investment firm Apollo Global Management, Torsten Sløk, indicated in a report That this bubble could be worse than that of the Puntocom: the 10 most important companies of the S&P 500 index have a value well above the 10 that occupied those positions in the late 90s. Too much speculation. Ray Wang, director of the Futurum Group semiconductor firm, showed two faces of the same currency. As he said In CNBC, “From the perspective of a broader investment in AI and semiconductors … I do not see it as a bubble. The foundations of the entire supply chain remain solid, and the long -term trajectory of the trend of AI supports the continuous investment” But at the same time, he stressed that there is a problem with this segment: there is too much speculative investment in companies that have less solid bases and in which there is only one perception of its potential without real foundations – Hello, Safe Superintelligencehello Thinking Machines-. It’s hard, but bubbles have their good side. As Alberto Romero points out In your Newsletter“In a way, bubbles are an inevitable and welcome phase between short -term selfishness and long -term progress.” In his opinion and That of other experts Like Mills Baker, manager at substock: “He Hype It is acceptable under the premise that only an optimistic character, prone to exaggeration and hyperbole, can build the new world for which a bubble is only the starting point, his big bang. The cynical and pessimistic character is a useful counterweight to excessive optimism (…). While optimism is an active creation force, pessimism is a reactive modulation force. “ Source: Paul Kedrosky. When the trains were the AI. Or what is the same: for the world to advance, bubbles are (or can be) necessary. We saw it with the Puntocom: it is true that the crisis existed, but that uncounted optimism in the future of the Internet ended up making sense. Of course, only a few companies (the great current empires) ended up benefiting. But it is that something very similar happened with the railroads at the end of the 19th century. At that time the investment and the capex in these infrastructure was colossal –five times greater that the one who lives now in AI – and although many companies broke, but from that bubble we left with an absolute revolution both at the level of transport and economic and social. But this bubble can be very, very large. As points Romero, the difference here between optimistic and pessimistic (or realistic) speeches is growing, and that is worrying. The expectations that the companies of AI and their CEOs are creating (with Altman in front, The man-hype) They are increasing. They constantly tell us about How are we close to reach the AGIbut the reality is that there are no real indications that this is so and in fact there is a Founder of AI. Faced with the promises of the revolution that theoretically should have begun to generate AI, the reality is that the advances do not seem extraordinary. In fact, a study of the MIT discovered that after asking 150 entrepreneurs and 350 employees of companies that have integrated AI in their processes, 95% had not seen any benefit in doing so. Better Wait for GPT-6. GPT-5 has demonstrated, a model for which we expected A historical jump And that in the end raises an improvement that for now it is discreet and that he introduced changes They were Very criticized. The launch of this model has been a small disaster that He has forced To the company to give reverse In several of your decisions. As He pointed out Walter Bloomberg, Altman himself admitted that GPT-5 had been a failure, and now bets on GPT-6. Source: Michael A. Arouet. The data worries. Seemingly excessive spending In data centers either In talent It is not the only concern. There is also that absolute concentration of companies that concentrate the value. An analyst named Michael A. Aouet published these days A graph in which he showed two income growth trends. On the one hand, that of the 490 companies of the S&P 500 excluding … Read more

Instagram and Tiktok advertising has become short videos of people talking to a microphone. There is a reason: clippers

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You enter Tiktok and Instagram and you start seeing ads that (no longer) surprisingly have a great similarity to each other despite promoting a very different product: a startup, a podcast, an application or an event. The key, as the Wall Street Journalis the way to viralize content that these platforms have, which has resulted in the emergence of a figure to earn money working online, Clippers. Mom, I want to be older clipper. The Clippers They are editors who take the long contents of platforms such as YouTube, Twitch or Spotify and make them short viralizable content in Tiktok, Instagram Reels and YouTube shorts at the request (or not) of its creators. They also do the same with promotional videos of companies that want to increase the visibility of a specific product. Getting an attractive and effective video is not simple, but there is an ingredient that is almost always present, subtitles. There is Influencers farms and of clicksso there are also advertisements. You don’t have to have a big account. Nor generate videos to upload them to the corporate account of a client: companies pay in many cases because these editors upload videos to small accounts, but that also manage the contents thanks to FUncionation of algorithms. In addition, in the face of more advanced edition work, a clipper You can use online or free and powerful editing tools such as Capcut. There are even specialized platforms. WHOP is a platform for selling digital products and putting communities in contact. A kind of “app store for creators”. Before the rise of Tiktok, Shorts and Reels, the company identified that short clips were a bomb as viral advertising format, and created Whoop Clips, an ecosystem to contact brands and creators with Clippers. This activity is also promoted on websites such as Clipthis, YT Jobs or even In Reddit. There are also simple ads published as Tiktok videos. The explosion of these videos leads entrepreneurs as Pieter Levels (@levelsio) to offer video tools made with AI which generate subtitles using the Capcut subtitles API. In his day, Levels already said that All marketing around its apps and services would move to Tiktok After getting impressive results. Examples of 1x robot clips, Cluelly and the Smartphones nothing manufacturer The business model. According to the campaign, in whop between $ 0.50 and 5 dollars. He Wall Street Journal Speech reduces the maximum figure to about 2 dollars, dating examples such as Kanoah Cunningham, a former financial sector worker who now leads an eight team Clipperswith what generates monthly between $ 20,000 and $ 30,000 per month. Another case on the same line is that of Nathan Resnick, which pays $ 15,000 per month to about 50 clippers. Unlike what happens on platforms such as Fiver or Upwork, where a client pays an editor A fixed price for a final jobin whop there can be hundreds of Clippers making videos of the same ad and then upload it to small accounts. Only those who manage to obtain a considerable number of visits manage to make money. For others it will be lost time, so there is a strong incentive to optimize creations. The key to having a successful clip, according to Cunningham, is “building a story.” The numbers that explain the phenomenon. The brands, instead of paying an influencer for a video, manage to generate hundreds of clips and millions of low cost views. Roy Lee, founder of the Startup Cluely, states that “you are stupid if you are making a podcast of an hour and only public it in a channel.” His reasons to say it: 800,000 visits a day on Instagram and Tiktok. Max Peterson, who directs a clips market in Discord, directed a Tiktok campaign for the series’Adults‘which achieved 12 million visits in total. Peterson also says that a budget of $ 40,000, 1x technologies, the company after a Advanced humanoid robothe achieved 500 million total visits on the product on Tiktok. Yes, but. That the brands themselves want to see their video in hundreds of channels does not mean that Tiktok or Instagram will not mark it as stolen or copied content of others. So Clippers They have to work well how they cut their “creations” so that they do not eliminate their videos. Another problem of the practice of mass virality is that the veracity of the clips suffers at the will of the editor. According to Cunningham, it is often lie in the subtitles or a different meaning is given to the video looking for more visits. Image | EACH and Alpha film co In Xataka | A disturbing reality makes its way on social networks: we no longer use them to connect with friends

We had been talking about the most lethal Russian weapon that seemed like Ukraine fallen asleep. His answer is called Liutyi

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If drones have become The protagonists From the Ukraine War, the model that has marked Russia’s offensive offers no doubts: The Shaheds of Iranian origin, then converted into different versions assembled in MoscowThey are the basis of Russia’s offensives. And in Ukraine? There they also have been perfecting a device that has become key to attacks on critical objectives of the enemy. The strategic weapon of Ukraine. Yes, kyiv, aware of its lower industrial and resources capacity, has opted for a different approach: Use surgical attacks with drones of own manufacture against strategic objectives deeply located in Russian territory. The jewel of this strategy is the AN-196 Liutyia lodging ammunition system designed to achieve precision Critical facilities of military logistics, oil refineries, air bases and essential industrial centers for the Russian war effort. Development and technical characteristics. Dron Liutyi began to develop In 2022 by Antonov in collaboration with Ukroboronpromconceived as a long -range unidirectional attack vehicle. The first version weighed between 250 and 300 kilosmeasured 4.4 meters long with a wingspan of 6.7, and was promoted with a gasoline engine that moved a rear propeller. It incorporated a V -tail design to improve stability and aerodynamics, and initially carried 50 kilos of explosives at a range of 1,000 km. The most recent versions have practically doubled their benefits: increased load capacity to 75 kilos and a range of up to 2,000 km, for an estimated unit cost In 200,000 dollarsfigure greater than that of the Shahed but still much lower than that of a cruise missile. And more. Your navigation combines inertial and satellite systems In the initial phase, while in the final approach it resorts to artificial vision to execute evasive trajectories, dodge defenses and hit with precision. First operational deployments. The use of Liutyi was made visible in 2024 With deep attacks in Russian territory. In January, an attack against An oil tank In St. Petersburg, he was attributed to drone, as was the March attack against the Ryazan refinery that caused a great fire. In June, the Mozdok Air Basein Norte Osetia, which houses bombers Tu-22m3 and fighters MIG-31it was also beaten. These incidents showed that Ukraine was in a position to project power hundreds of kilometers from the front line. Expansion of your role. The improved Liutyi versions began to be used massively this year. On March 13, an attack reached a Gas pipeline control center In Sátov, affecting the Russian energy sector. In April, several waves of Liutyi impacted the base of the 112.ª missile brigade in Shuya, destroying facilities of command and barracks. In July, two Liutyi penetrated 1,400 kilometers to Izhevsk, where They hit the Kupol plantproducer of anti -aircraft Tor-m and Harpiya drones, causing significant damage. That same month, different videos They documented attacks against objectives in the Leningrad region, in the city of Pensa and at the Sochi airport, where a fuel tank was reached. These blows have had a double effect: disorganizing Russian logistics and forcing Kremlin to allocate resources to the defense of the rear. International response. Despite his successes, Ukraine faces the disadvantage of not being able to manufacture Liutyi in quantities comparable to Shahed’s mass production by Russia. External support is, therefore, crucial: Germany has committed investments to produce 500 additional unitswhich will allow the pace of operations. Thus, the Ukrainian strategy will continue based on the selective use of these drones, with emphasis on precision attacks and not saturation. To maintain its effectiveness, Liutyi must adapt continuously, incorporating advances in artificial intelligence, computer vision and electronic countermeasures resistance. Strategic role in war. In short, although less known than The ShahedLiutyi has become a symbol of Ukrainian capacity to innovate and hit in depth, eroding the perception of security in the interior of Russia. Their attacks have affected energy facilities, refineries, industrial plants and air bases, weakening critical infrastructures and forcing Moscow to disperse their defenses. In this way, the drone not only compensates (in part) the Ukrainian material inferiority in front of the Russian military industry, but also opens a new psychological and strategic front by demonstrating that no Russian area is out of reach. Thus, everything indicates that its role will continue to expand in the coming months, consolidating itself as one of the key weapons in the Strategy of Resistance and Counteroffensive of Ukraine. Image | Open Source In Xataka | Not that war in Ukraine has become a laboratory of the future, is that there are drones saving lives with bicycles In Xataka | If you want to learn to handle a combat drone, the best school is Ukraine. And there have been infiltrated Mexican narcos

We have been talking about high speed between Lisbon and Madrid for years. Portugal is looking elsewhere: Galicia

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Galicia and Portugal share cultural, economic ties and a intense very intense cars flow forced to circulate on one of the highways more dangerous from Spain. That last could change in a few years. Portugal has activated His administrative machinery to build the first high speed between Aveiro and Porto, a key piece of the Lisboa-Oporto railway corridor that looks beyond Portugal and aspires to link with Galicia. With the echoes of the debate of whether Lisbon, high speed must be prioritized with Madrid or Galicia, the public body infrastructure of Portugal (IP) is very light: Aspires to link Lisbon with Vigo and A Coruña to leave a population bag of 11 million people only three hours from the Portuguese capital. What happened? That Portugal has just given A key step For the implementation of the Lisbon-Porto high speed line, a railway corridor that will link the two main cities of the country and will continue north to the border with Galicia. A few days ago IP and Advance Norte- Gestão Da Ferrovia de High Speede signed A concession contract of the first high speed between Lisbon and Porto: 71 km between Porto and Oiãin the Aveiro district. What exactly agreed? What they signed is a concession and financing contract, which in turn clears the design, construction and maintenance of the Porto section to Oiã for 30 years. “When it is finished, it will allow the connection between Lisbon and Porto in an hour and 15 minutes, with an expected use of almost ten million passengers a year,” Clarify Carlo Fernandes, from IP. In addition to the 71 kilometers of line, the project will incorporate a station in Vila Nova de Gaia, a bridge over the Duero and an electrical substation in Strare. And what about investment? The signing of the agreement also served to present the financing agreement between Advo Norte and the European Investment Bank (BEI) for 875 million euros, part of the global loan of 3,000 million euros approved in 2024 by the BEI to support the new line. Vigo lighthouse It states that in the first phase the Next Generation funds will also contribute 447 million. “This is a true turning point,” Celebrate Nadia Calviñoformer Minister of Economy and current president of the BEI. And why is it important? Because those 71 km are the first step of a much more ambitious race, the first phase of the new Lisbon-Support line. In total that initial corridor will be extended 143 km Between the Porto-Campanhã and Soubo station, in Coimbra. The high -speed corridor between the two major cities of Portugal, Lisbon and Porto, is divided into several phases that extend to Oiã, from that town to the district of Coimbra and the latter to the Lisbon area. A few months ago, In MayInfrastructure of Portugal also guaranteed that its objective is that the works for the new line between Braga and Valença do Minho, already at the northern end of the country, touching the border with the south of Galicia, start in 2028 and that the infrastructure is completed shortly after, in 2032. But … how does Spain affect? How important is the future high -speed future line between Lisbon and Porto or plans to extend the infrastructure even further north of the country? Simple. Procedures such as that of a few days ago, which seems to have cleared the future of the Porto-Oiã section, gradually shaping the new railway axis that will link the Portuguese capital with the north of the country and, ultimately, will link with the Galician rail service. It is not theory. Although the project takes time on the table and over the last years has taken both steps forward and backwards, the high speed connection with Galicia is linked to the development of the Lisbon-Oporto corridor. It He has made clear Fernandes himself, vice president of IP: “We will get with the Lisbon-Porto-Vigo axis to place A Coruña and about 11 million inhabitants at a distance of three hours from Lisbon.” The objective is not only to connect the lusas (large and intermediate) cities but to extend through the Atlantic strip. Is it the only project? No. The Lisbon-Porto High Speed Line and its connection with Galicia has been on the table, but in the neighboring country they handle another key project: the corridor Between Lisbon and Madrid. What is a priority? Which one is most interested in Spain? And to Portugal? In the past both countries have signs that their answers to those questions do not always coincide. During the summit Hispanic-2004 The Spanish government promised to “boost high speed between Madrid and Lisbon by 2030”. On the section of Porto to Vigo, assured “Share with the Portuguese Executive the commitment of 2032”. For the Portuguese president, Luis Montenegro, things seem to be somewhat different. After the bilateral assembly, he wanted to “make clear” that his “priority” is the Galician connection and that Madrid is actually a “second priority.” Is it the first time that happens? At all. It is not the first time that dissonance is revealed. In 2020, with António Costa in the Portuguese Government, it was even clearer when after the XXXI Hispanic Summit the Minister of Cohesion Territory, Ana Abrunhosa, left black on white Your posture. “Our priority is not the connection between Madrid and Lisbon because from Madrid to Lisbon we go by plane. We already have connection. Our priority is the Lisbon Atlantic Axis, Porto and Vigo”, He stressed Abrunhosablunt. Galicia and Portugal share economic ties and an intense flow of vehicles, which converts the A-55 highway, into Vigo, into The great door for filmed traffic between both countries. The Lisbon-Madrid connection that would limit the three-hour trip is expected a priori by 2034. Images | John Worth (Flickr), Nuno Morão (Flickr) and Infrastruturas of Portugal In Xataka | Renfe has just published his first punctuality report. Result: the bird is not punctual

We have been talking about the ‘Miracle Inditex’ for years to explain its growth. That phenomenon is coming to an end

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Inditex has just confirmed what many feared: it is no longer the unstoppable growth machine we knew and faces a more mature stage, without the double digit that until very recently was the custom. Why is it important. The first quarter marks a turning point in the history of the Galician giant. Sales grow just 1.5% compared to 7.1% of the previous year, and the benefit stagnates at 0.8%. They are figures of any European textile company, not the empire that used to other numbers. In figures. The numbers are devastating: 8,274 million in sales … … When analysts expected 8,380 million. Is The weakest growth since 2018excluding pandemia. The stock market does not forgive: the shares collapse more than 4% and touch the 46 euros in intradic minimums. The context. Three factors explain this unexpected normalization. The strong euro devours international sales with an impact of 3% that the company did not know how to foresee. Torrential rains in Spain (15% of global sales) have stopped spring clothes purchases. Operating costs grow above income for the first time in years. Between the lines. The data of the balance They show something more worrying: Inditex is losing efficiency. Stocks rise 6.3% when the company is proud to maintain Stocks minima. The net financial position falls by 7.3%. They are symptoms of a company that can no longer control all variables as well as before. Now it remains to see if it is something temporary or goes further. Yes, but. The second quarter offers a respite: sales are growing 6% between May and June. Even so, it is half of the 12% registered a year ago in the same period. The improvement exists, but it is still that of a normal company, not that of a phenomenon as it was so far. The latest. The Jose Arnau exitvice president and right hand of Amancio Ortega for 24 years, symbolizes the end of an era. Your substitute, Roberto Cibeirainherits a prosperous but mortal company. The transformation is complete: Inditex has gone from being a business unicorn to a solid, but predictable multinational. The miracle is over and gives way to the era of maturity. Outstanding image | Inditex In Xataka | Amancio Ortega: the billionaire who lives as one more neighbor (except for private jets and superyates)

It’s not just talking, it’s really competing in conversation with Chatgpt and Gemini

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Anthropic has become one of the key names in the artificial intelligence career. So much so that Some see her as Apple’s great trick not to be left behind OpenAi or Google. However, his assistant Claude had a pending subject: the voice mode. A function that its main competitors had already integrated and that, finally, It also arrives at the Anthropic app. With this incorporation, Claude takes an important step to compete on equal terms. Claude already speaks: This is how the new voice mode works. Claude’s new voice mode allows you to hold complete conversations spoken from the mobile app, available both in iOS and Android. It is not simply to issue commands: Claude now responds in voice, shows the key points on the screen while speaking and maintains the context of the conversation even if it skips between voice and text. This function, which is only available in English, will be deployed in the coming weeks for all users, including those of the free version. Even so, payment plans offer more voice messages per session and access to advanced functions, such as integration with Google Calendar, Gmail or Google Docs (the latter exclusive for business users). Among the controls included are options to interrupt Claude’s response, send spoken messages, or easily change between ways. In addition, you can choose different voices to customize the experience. All chats are saved, just like text conversations, and voice transcription is shown in a summary way. Thought for occupied hands, fast ideas and spoken creativity. Anthropic highlights several scenarios to take advantage of this function: from organizing the day while having breakfast to maintain rain of ideas while walking or cooked. The voice mode seeks precisely that: eliminate the keyboard when the speed of thought brakes. It also allows you to practice interviews or record ideas on the march, something especially useful for creators or professionals who work in motion. To guarantee a fluid experience, the company recommends using the system in environments with little noise and good connection. In addition, it has incorporated security limits: voices are predefined to avoid imitations and the model avoids reproducing literal text to minimize supplant risks. Comparison with OpenAi was inevitable. The arrival of the voice mode to Claude occurs in a context where the bar is higher than ever. Openai has long presumed its advanced voice mode that reminds us of the movie ‘Her’. Other rival services have also opted for audio, such as Google with Gemini Live and Grok, XAIwith a dedicated voice mode in your mobile app. Images | Anthropic In Xataka | “As a pathetic that sounds, chatgpt is my only friend”: more and more people confess to having an AI like friendship

that we end up talking to an AI

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Most of the time the keyboard is our way of using chatgpt. The same goes for Gemini, Claude, Llama or any other market model. And yet direct interaction with our voice He earns whole. Talking with the machines little by little is being less strange. And less than it will be. Call 4. In Financial Times They cite sources close to the development project of the new Meta Model. Call 4 – if it ends up calling himself – he will focus on improving voice interaction characteristics. There will also be options aimed at that future of AI agents, without a doubt, but the voice seems to be a special protagonist. This new model is expected to arrive “in the coming weeks.” Native voice. Chris Cox, one of the maximum managers in Meta, indicated that he calls 4 will be an “omnimodelo” in which “the voice will be native.” Until now, he explained, the process was cumbersome. You had to convert voice to text, send the text to the LLM, get the answer in text and turn it in a voice again. It is a revolution, they say in goal. That native conception of voice is an especially important option for interaction with chatbots but also with hardware. And here the target ra-ban can be the big beneficiaries. As Cox said, it is important “for the product interface, the idea that you can talk to the Internet and ask anything. I think we have not yet done to the idea of ​​how powerful it is.” All for the same. But it is that goal is far from being the only one who thinks that. Google has been offering for a long time Voice functions in Gemini In our mobile phones, and it has an advantage because we were already used to using Google Assistant. OpenAI We were amazed months ago with GPT-4o And that voice that even became professor of any discipline. Elon Musk and his startup, Xai, have raised a Grok 3 of the most Parlanchín and that can adopt personalized tones as a “deranged” and another “sexy” to talk to us. Claude seems more lagging here, but even Alexa+, the new Amazon model, has a very strong conversational component with AI, something logical coming from where it comes from. Almost human voices. And while the voice assistants of a few years ago offered adequate but somewhat flat voices, the current AI models achieve voices practically indistinguishable from human. Yesterday we talked about Sesame and of that synthesized voice that pauses and changes tone to adjust to the conversation as a human would. In that same career are others as Eleven Labs either What to type. Although the keyboard has always had the advantage of allowing us to “think before speaking”, direct interaction with AI models seems much more powerful in many scenarios in which this conversation in real time is a winning option. ID preparing you to talk to the machines. All these efforts are directed to the same place: talk to an AI. One that is probably at the moment in the cloud, but that can work immediately on our mobile, but also in connected glasses such as the finish line-very future there-some headphones or a smart watch. And as was the case with ‘Her’, we may see a lot of people who wear glasses or a headset and seem to talk alone. But that is actually talking with an AI. Image | Warner Bros Pictures In Xataka | Are we prepared to talk to the machines?

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