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Haiti wanted an epic jersey for their return to the World Cup. He has managed to piss off FIFA and make everyone talk about Poland

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Toward more than half a century that Haiti was not participating in the World Cup and yet, ironies of history, in the country (and the sports press of the rest of the planet) they are not talking about their players or their chances of success today in their debut match against Scotland. What is being talked about is his t-shirt. About its meaning, its colors, what exactly its designers wanted to capture in it and whether FIFA has acted well by demanding Haiti to change it. To understand it you have to go back to the 19th century. What has happened? We don’t know how Haiti will fare its world premiere today against Scotland (the match is played at 9:00 p.m. ET in Boston), what we do know is that, no matter what happens, their participation in the FIFA Cup is already football history. First because it did 52 years that the Caribbean nation did not qualify for the tournament. In fact, he had only achieved it once. in 1974when he participated (with little success) in the World Cup in West Germany. The second reason is that, even before the ball began to bounce on Thursday at the Azteca stadium, Haiti was already one of the teams with the most headlines in the World Cup. And the reason is surprising: his uniform. Or rather, a detail in the lower right corner of his shirt that FIFA did not like. What is the shirt like? We could see the shirt of the Haitian team a few days agoduring the friendly match that played on Friday the 5th against Peru. The design has also been shown in the profiles of the Haitian Football Federation (FHF) or even in the official website of FIFA. Also in publications of Saeta, the clothing brand Colombian sports that took on the challenge to shape the uniform and that at the end of 2025 he was already thinking about the design and its details. On March 28, the company finally published a post on his Instagram account in which the three Haitian team shirts could be seen: one blue (home), another white (visitor) and a third red. A nod to the colors of the country’s flag and two concepts: the sea and passion. Otherwise, the design was very simple: red collar and sleeve ends with a white stripe, the FHF shield at chest level, the Saeta brand… and a kind of very faint illustration, made up of shadowed silhouettes, at the level of the right hip. What does that flag mean? The image in question shows a group of men with a clearly highlighted silhouette in the foreground holding a flag. The key is… What colors does that banner look like? If we look at the t-shirts with a white or red background, it seems that the flag shows a blue stripe on a red stripe, the colors of Haiti. If we look at the shirt with a blue background, the bluish part of the flag however fades so much that it appears white. That last was the option the team used in your game on friday 5 against Peru and automatically led some to see a nod from the Caribbean nation to Poland. Is it really like that? A tweet from the 9th that ended up going viral points in that direction and many other international media (generalists and sports) have jumped on the bandwagon by publishing that, indeed, the Haitian shirt includes a deliberate tribute to Poland. Others believe that if the flag appears white and red (an effect that occurs in the home kit, but not in the others) it is the result of a factory error. In recent days they have circulated on networks voices who insisted on one and another version: intended tribute either optical illusion. Click on the image to go to the tweet. Poland, for the sake of what? If the doubts had been pointed towards the flag of the Netherlands, Italy, Russia, the United States, Japan or any other nation on the planet, they would probably have been cleared up soon, but not with Poland. The reason is very simple: with history books in hand, Haiti has reason to be grateful to the Poles. To understand it we have to go back to the beginning of the 19th century, more specifically to the Battle of Vertieres (1803), in which the Haitian revolutionaries defeated Napoleon’s troops, ended colonial rule and cleared the way for Haiti to achieve its independence. In that episode the Poles played an unexpected role. What role? Its role was explained in 2003 by Dr. Zdzislaw Wesolowski in a speech pronounced in the USA: in 1802 5,000 Poles from a legion attached to the French army were transferred to the Caribbean to quell the uprising in the colony of Saint-Dominguethe current Haiti and Dominican Republic. It is assumed that many fought on the side of France for Napoleon’s promise to restore freedom to his Poland. Shortly after arriving in the Caribbean, however, the Poles began to disobey the command and joined the rebels. At the end of 1803, in Verières, allies were already fighting with Jean-Jacques Dessalineswho proclaimed the independence of Haiti shortly after, in January 1804. What do we know about the happy shirt? When he started thinking about the design, in December 2025, Saeta explained that he was “collecting ideas, cultural references and identity elements” to “create an authentic and representative garment.” He wanted to “reflect the history, energy and resilience of the town.” With that starting point, it is supposed that the silhouettes located on the right hip refer to the Ballata de Viertières and the Haitian Revolution. One of his iconic moments actually came when Dessalines tore the white stripe off a French tricolor flag to create the banner of the first republic free black, an episode that was celebrated every May 18. What has FIFA said? Whether it represents one thing or another, whether its effect is more or less intended, … Read more

Where electricity comes from in each country in the world, told on an essential map

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To stop climate change, it is essential to “clean” electricity, that is, decarbonize it to reduce global carbon dioxide emissions. The reason is clear: the electricity sector is to blame for approximately a third of global emissions, according to IEA data for 2025. What this world map does is shed light on the origin of the light that reaches us when we press the plug because knowing where the electricity comes from in each country is the first step to knowing what needs to be changed and how long it takes to achieve it. This map of Our World in Data sample for each state what is the main source of electrical energy for the period 2024/25. Behind this data visualization initiative is the University of Oxford and for its preparation uses information from Global Electricity Review Ember. There are 215 countries in their database, although for this representation they use 91 states that represent 93% of global electricity demand. Viewing and understanding the map is simple: one color for each dominant technology: orange is gas, gray is coal, blue is water, purple is nuclear, yellow is solar. In addition, it offers the percentage of that dominant technology to know how much this source represents in the state total. This point is important because a state can be colored orange because gas accounts for 40% of the total even though it has 35% renewables in total. It is a map of the present, not of how we want it to be or where the trend is going. The first thing we see on the map is that andCoal remains the largest single source of electricity generation in the world, a ranking that has been leading for more than half a century and that in this visualization represents 35% of the global generation. Of course, it is the lowest percentage since the founding of the IEA in 1974. One of the reasons why the global electricity sector continues to have so much weight in emissions is precisely because of the leadership of coal. Another reason is gas. In fact, in 2024 fossil fuels still generated almost 60% of the world’s electricity. Broadly speaking, the map shows how gas is hegemonic in rich countries in the northern hemisphere while coal dominates in Asia. In South America and parts of Africa, hydroelectricity is historically what makes the difference. However, Europe is a true rainbow, the result of decades of political strategies and investments. In fact, the big green shoot for the decarbonization of electricity goes through renewable energieswhich in 2025 surpassed coal for the first time in history: solar, wind, hydroelectric and others together produced more than a third of the world’s electricity. The good news is that almost all of the increase in electricity demand in 2024 was covered by clean sources. But there is one that shines with its own light: solar energy, which in 2024 surpassed wind power for the first time globally. Two states that are true powerhouses in solar generation are Spain with 22% and Chile with 25%. What is the main source of electricity for the countries of the world. Our World in Data What the map doesn’t say Our World in data map has small print: While it is true that renewables have grown, so have coal and gas. Thus, in 2024, developing Asian countries they consumed 80% of all the coal used for electricity in the world, when in 2000 it accounted for 40%. And there is a problem that the map leaves out: there are hundreds of millions of people who They do not have access to electricity. More specifically, 730 million in 2024. Of all of them, Africa concentrates 80%. These countries will have to build their network from scratch and the million-dollar question will be whether they will have the financing to do it with renewables or will they rely on the classic fossils, which are cheaper and more readily available. Another important fact that this world map omits is where does the fuel come from. That is, a country colored orange may depend on a neighbor with whom it has a strained relationship. Without going any further, in 2021 45% of imported gas by the EU came from Russia. When war broke out between Ukraine and Russia, that dependency made electricity more expensive overnight. Europe reacted, but at what price: now imported LNG it is more expensive. It is not the only one: Southeast Asia too suffers from energy dependence of the coal that matters. In Xataka | How much electricity each country on the map produces with renewable energy, displayed on a graph In Xataka | The most fascinating map you will see today: the entire electrical infrastructure of the planet, in an interactive infographic Cover | Our World in data

It seemed impossible to surpass Qatar as the worst organizer in the history of the World Cups. The US is getting it

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Can a democratic country offer a starker image than an authoritarian one when organizing a sporting event? The United States seems to be searching for the limits. With the connivance of FIFA, of course, which in recent years has awarded its most media and important sporting event to Russia and Qatar and which will repeat in this series of controversial awards with Saudi Arabia. And it has found in the United States a country that has stepped on the accelerator to catch up with what we consider authoritarian regimes. It is true that the World Cup has been used as a weapon of sportwashing since long before we knew what this meant. This has always implied a certain opening of the most reactionary policies during the time the event lasted to offer a friendlier image to the outside world. That is why it is even more surprising that the United States has barely made concessions in its way of doing politics. The competition hasn’t started yet and we already have a referee who has had to return home, public searches of players as if they were terrorists. A team that has tried to be expelled. And the constant threat towards its own citizens. Welcome to the 2026 Soccer World Cup. The World Cup in Canada, Mexico… and the United States. Hold my cubata, Qatar Standing on the shoulders and cheered by thousands of people in a packed stadium. The images of Omar Artan received as a national hero They surprise. They are surprising because Omar Artan is a referee. And I don’t think a referee has ever received such a welcome back to his country. The reason: being rejected by the United States. And Artan, a Somali, will not referee in the 2026 World Cup because one of the host countries He has not let him cross the border. The United States prohibits entry to citizens of Somalia. And he has made no exception with Omar Artan, who was going to be the first referee from his country to officiate a World Cup match and one in which, according to The CountryFIFA’s director of refereeing, the Italian Pierluigi Collina, had high hopes. The reason for the rejection?: “Concerns in the background check.” There are no more details. There are no more reasons. With those words the United States Customs and Border Protection Service (CBP) has settled the matter. Although it has been known that FIFA has tried to mediate in the matter, the organization has only issued a weak statement in which it points out that they do not have any type of influence on the migration policies of the host countries. The Artan case is the latest in a list of controversial decisions that continues to grow. In March, Donald Trump tried to intimidate the Iranian team football team, assuring that their safety could not be guaranteed if they went to the United States. Iran’s first two games are being played in Los Angeles and the third in Seattle, and the United States has toyed with the idea of ​​banning players from entering, citing national security risks. In April it was put on the table that it was Italy, out of the World Cup for the third consecutive time, which Iranian will take over but it was rejected by FIFA. In May, Donald Trump assured that he would allow the Iranian team to enter in statements in which he assured that Gianni Infantinopresident of FIFA who has been very close to the president of the United States until now, would have given him carte blanche to accept or not the Middle Eastern team. Finally, Iran will play in the United States. Yes, but his players will have to concentrate in Mexico, 15 members of the delegation have been rejected and Their fans will not be able to go to the stadium. Click on the image to go to the original tweet Click on the image to go to the original tweet Obviously, Iran is the most striking case but by no means the only one. According to BBCmore than 25% of the countries participating in the World Cup have border restrictions with the hosts. This has led to intense searches of the Uzbekistan and Senegal teams in which metal detectors, dogs and controls on the airport runway itself have been used before giving them the go-ahead. From the official account of the Senegalese team on X They assure that this procedure was carried out on the airport runway to speed up airport control procedures. However, the country’s own soccer federation indicated a few months ago that They would not send fans to the United States on an official trip because the applications had been rejected. Entering the United States is increasingly complicated for a greater number of travelers. Since 2016 to the Spanish It is not possible for us to travel to the United States without a visa if we have previously visited Iran, Iraq, North Korea, Sudan, Syria, Libya, Somalia and Yemen since 2011. And from 2023 the same thing happens with Cuba if we have passed through the island in the last five years. These types of measures are those that on other occasions have been omitted in favor of give some sense of normality in sporting events that take place in authoritarian countries. In Spain we know well how the whitening of authoritarian regimes through sport works, How to bring the Spanish Super Cup to Saudi Arabia and even defend the regime and equate it with Spain, like Xavi Hernández did as coach of FC Barcelona in 2023. FIFA will take the 2034 World Cup to Saudi Arabia, with the approval of FIFA, which created an adhoc competition for the country to win the award and overlooked any risk of attacks on human rights to the point that the candidacy has been the best score in history in a selective process. Some human rights which they also seem to want to omit with the United … Read more

Mexico has turned the opening of the World Cup into its greatest showcase. A wave of protests threatens to turn him against him

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Welcome the inauguration A World Cup is always a guarantee of something: visibility. There are few ‘showcases’ comparable to being the city in which the ball of a FIFA tournament begins to roll, something that will happen tonight (peninsular time) in Mexico City. What is not so clear is what the rest of the planet will see through that showcase: the Government hopes to offer a great sports festival, but there is seven protests summoned that threaten to spoil the day and leave a very different image. The World Cup ball is not the only one that rolls. And the day came. If you like sports (and if you don’t, too) it is likely that you had March 11 marked in red on your calendar. Barring an unforeseen catastrophe, this afternoon, at 9:00 p.m. peninsular time, the teams of Mexico and South Africa will play the opening match of the 2026 Soccer World Cup. They will do so in the Azteca stadium from Mexico City, after an opening ceremony in which several artists will participate and which will experience its climax when Shakira and Burna Boy perform the song of the World Cup, ‘Dai dai’. More than football. The normal thing on a day like today is that the host country of the World Cup dedicates itself to talking basically about football. Mexico knows it well, which has experience in the matter: this will be the third time in which it hosts the World Cup tournament, something it already did in 1970 and 1986. Today, however, the Mexican authorities (especially those in CDMX) are awaiting something else: half a dozen calls of protests that will start from different points of the city towards the vicinity of the stadium where athletes, authorities and fans will meet. What protests? The diary The Universal speaks of at least seven calls confirmed and organized by groups of transporters, health workers, peasant associations and pensioners who basically want to take advantage of two things: the media attention generated by the World Cup and the Government’s interest in avoiding any conflict that tarnishes the FIFA tournament. There are two mobilized groups that stand out above the rest due to the exposure they have achieved in recent weeks. The first are the ‘seeking mothers’that they cry out for justice for your missing relatives. The second, the teachersorganized in the National Coordinator of Education Workers (CNTE) and who have been demanding labor improvements for some time. Although the Executive has tried until the last moment reach an agreement with them to deactivate today’s protests, both parties (Education and CNTE) remain very distant. Claudia Sheibaum’s team does has been luckier with the farmers, who also threatened to mobilize. @lajornadaonline Hours before the soccer festival begins, the pain of the families of missing people is manifested in Mexico City. Collectives of searching mothers walk towards the Mexico City stadium, but the capital police prevented them from passing through Tlalpan. ♬ original sound – lajornadaonline – lajornadaonline “They want to provoke us”. The conflict does not catch the Government by surprise. The CNTE it takes months showing its discomfort and its relationship with the Sheinbaum Government has been strained in recent weeks, which has even led some of its members to break into the headquarters of the Ministry of Public Education. The most critical episode occurred a few days agowhen a teacher lost an eye after being hit by a rubber bullet while participating in a march. Incidents like this are the ones that now, a few hours before the start of the World Cup, the Government wants to avoid at all costs. “There are groups that want to provoke us, and they are not necessarily teachers. In other words, what they are looking for is repression, I say it clearly. What they are looking for is that before the opening of the World Cup the international note is: ‘The Government of Mexico represses teachers’. That is what they are looking for, but they are not going to have it,” Sheinbaum assured on Monday. The scenario is not simple. Both the president and the Government of CDMX assure that will respect the right to protest, but at the same time they are taking measures to shield the Azteca and prevent the protests from altering the World Cup agenda. “National Security Facility”. The Secretary of Government of CDM, César Cravioto, it was very clear about it on Tuesday: the capital’s stadium, he warned, “is already a national security facility.” Hence, access controls and protection have been reinforced. “They will have to understand that in less than 48 hours the World Cup will open here, in the stadium, and we have to protect it.” Cravioto insisted also that fans are “guaranteed” access to the Azteca, although he asked them to arrive “early” to avoid “complications.” ABC assures that there are professionals (journalists, stadium workers, sponsors…) who are already considering heading to the area at seven in the morning, six hours before the opening match starts. The focus is not only on the Azteca. The Secretariat of Citizen Security has also deployed a special device on the perimeter of the Mexico City International Airport to anticipate the arrival of CNTE protesters. Of laws and pensions. In the background is the clash between the Executive and the teachers represented by the CNTE, who on May 1, Labor Day, presented a document with their requests to the Government. In general lines propose eliminating the ISSSTE law of 2007, changes in educational reforms, recovering a solidarity pension system for teachers and a salary improvement. For now, and despite the eight-hour meeting held in extremison the eve of the World Cup, there has been no agreement with the Government, which maintains that the change in pensions would skyrocket its cost. The teachers’ protests will match today with those of the ‘seeking mothers’, who have been demanding that the Executive not forget the tens of thousands of people with unknown whereabouts that Mexico accumulates. Before, the group has … Read more

The world was tired of depending on TSMC to manufacture all its chips. This is what is causing Intel’s great resurrection

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Who has seen you and who sees you, Intel. The legendary semiconductor firm seems to be leaving behind its painful journey through the desert, and the latest news points to a true resurrection. The signature has achieved a spectacular contract to manufacture three million Google TPUs, and Nvidia is also studying the possibility of use Intel 18A node for future multi-die GPU designs. This is spectacular news for the company. Promising future, at last. The agreement with Google’s cloud division is a huge boost for the chip manufacturing business (foundry) from Intel. This deal will see Intel produce millions of AI chips at its advanced 3-nanometer node. With it, the firm achieves a decisive step to compete with TSMC, which until now was the absolute reference for those who wanted to access advanced semiconductor manufacturing processes. There is another crucial geopolitical factor here: part of these chips will be produced in the US, which helps in the objective of not depending so much on Asian countries for this process. Flirting with Nvidia. But Nvidia also seems to be interested in Intel’s 18A photolithographic process. The company led by Jensen Huang is considering the use of this node for its future multi-die architectures for its GPUs. Nvidia has managed to become TSMC’s main customer, but this manufacturer cannot satisfy Nvidia’s demand, so this company is looking for plans B, and Intel is serving it one on a plate. The signature by the way, already bought 4% of Intel in September 2025, so it is the first interested in Intel doing well. The PowerVia revolution. There are two big technical arguments that are apparently convincing Google and Nvidia. The first, the transistors RibbonFET. The second, even more important, PowerVia technology. This system is a qualitative leap because it physically separates the power and signal lines from the transistors, which avoids bottlenecks and improves both performance and efficiency of the CPUs that use this technology. Chip sovereignty. This decision by Google and Nvidia’s plan respond in part to the pressures that the US government is doing—and boosting with its CHIPS Act— to recover technological sovereignty and avoid dependence on foreign countries. Both companies know that 90% of the planet’s advanced chips depend on that island called Taiwan, and taking advantage of Intel’s renewed capacity is a great opportunity for kill two birds with one stone. They reduce their dependence on TSMC, and comply with the demands of the US government. War makes strange allies. The current situation is unique, because it is causing companies that competed fiercely in the field of hardware (Intel and Nvidia) to now be forced to collaborate out of pure necessity. Intel needs clients of this type to demonstrate to investors that its division foundry can operate independently of its consumer processor or server division. And Google and Nvidia in turn need Intel to break manufacturing monopoly of semiconductors that TSMC had. Intel finally resurrects. The big winner of these agreements is Intel, which has gone through a really compromising stage but has for a year has not stopped growing. We can see it in its valuation on the stock market. A year ago its shares were trading at $20.68, and now they are trading at $107.04 and with these agreements that value may continue to improve. Good for Intel. Image | Intel In Xataka | Bill Gates has X-rayed Intel. And his diagnosis is overwhelmingly accurate.

Russia thought kyiv would fall within days. Four years later, the war in Ukraine has just “passed” the First World War

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In 1914, millions of Europeans they were convinced that the war would end before Christmas. In fact, the expression “home by Christmas” became popular between soldiers and civilians who believed that the conflict would be rather brief. It ended up lasting more than four years and transforming Europe forever. More than a century later, the Ukrainian war has already grown longer. From days to historical milestone. When Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022, the Kremlin expected a swift campaign that would culminate in the fall of kyiv within days. More than four years later, the reality is exactly the opposite: the war has reached the 1,569 days duration and has already officially surpassed to the First World War. What began as an operation designed to quickly overthrow the Ukrainian government has transformed into one of the longest and most consequential conflicts in recent European history, to the point that many Ukrainians they contemplate with concern another historical threshold even more distant: the duration of the Second World War. The inevitable comparison with 1914. The historians warn that comparisons with world wars have obvious limits due to the differences in scale, number of countries involved and volume of casualties. However, they consider that the war in Ukraine shares enough features with the First World War to become its closest parallel in more than a century. Both began lightning offensives aimed at achieving a decisive victory within a few weeks. Both the German advance to Paris in 1914 like the Russian push towards kyiv in 2022 came close to achieving their initial objectives before being stopped and forced to retreat. The return of trench warfare. After the failure of the initial offensives, both conflicts drifted towards long static fronts where artillery dominated the battlefield. The images from the trenches of eastern Ukraine quickly evoked scenes from France and Belgium during the Great War. Soldiers barely separated a few hundred meterscontinuous bombardments and small infantry assaults became the daily routine. The firepower forced combatants to bury themselves underground to survive, reproducing a pattern that seemed to belong definitively to the past. Drones change the rules. The main difference between both wars came from the air. The drones profoundly transformed the battlefield and ended up making even traditional trenches vulnerable. Permanent surveillance from the sky and the ability to attack with precision forced the replacement of long defensive lines by small scattered sheltersdifficult to detect and more resistant to attacks. In many areas, any open-air movement can be located and attacked in a matter of minutes, turning large areas of the front into veritable death zones controlled by unmanned systems. Tanks, bunkers and dispersal. Technological evolution has also reduced the prominence of some weapons that for decades symbolized modern warfare. Tanks, feared during the early stages of the invasion, have become on easy targets for drones and they appear less and less near the line of contact. Meanwhile, soldiers invest enormous efforts in building shelters each time more sophisticated and profound. Some bunkers incorporate specific designs to absorb explosions and increase the chances of survival, reflecting the extent to which physical protection is once again a vital issue in an attritional conflict. Destruction reminiscent of the last century. Although the casualty figures They are very inferior Like those of the First World War, the visual devastation is eerily familiar. Destroyed forests, towns reduced to ruins and fields covered in craters constantly appear in images captured by reconnaissance drones. Various military analysts hold that the lethality of the Ukrainian front is close to that of the great battles of a century ago, not because of the absolute number of deaths but because of the constant danger faced by those fighting on the front lines. Stagnation and the search for a way out. The slow pace of progress illustrates the nature of the conflict. In some recent operations, Russian forces have progressed at a pace even slower than that recorded in some of the most stagnant battles of the First World War. With negotiations practically paralyzed, neither side has yet found a formula to break the balance. Ukraine tries to weaken Russian economic capacity through attacks against energy infrastructures and oil companies while flooding the front with thousands of attack drones, seeking to impose unsustainable costs on the adversary. The final paradox is that a war that began with the promise of quick victory increasingly looks like to the Great War: a prolonged struggle of attrition, marked by technology and with no clear end in sight. Image | Ministry of Defense of Ukraine In Xataka | The drone war has left a clear lesson for Ukraine: you can’t leave home without a 100-year-old machine gun In Xataka | In case there was not enough “gasoline” in 2026, the attack by a Russian drone has crossed a red line: that of Chernobyl

The world is running out of data to continue training AI. China has an ace up its sleeve

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The models of artificial intelligence (AI) have a problem that more powerful chips cannot solve: they are running out of data. Epoch AI, a nonprofit research organization specializing in scaling AI models, warns with 80% certainty that the high-quality text available on the Internet will be exhausted sometime between 2026 and 2032. The reason is very simple: AI laboratories have been extracting everything the web has to offer for many years, and current models already train on data sets that approach the theoretical limit of the information available. When that gold mine empties, data volume scaling will stop working. And if this scenario occurs, AI development will most likely slow down. We still do not know what strategy US companies are developing to solve this problem, but we already know what is China preparing. His biggest rival. In fact, Xi Jinping’s government has decided that this shortage is an opportunity. This week the China National Data Administration published a draft outlining its action plan with a clear objective: to build an ecosystem of validated data by 2028 that will fuel the next generation of AI models. China’s bet is already on the table The document prepared by the National Data Administration identifies which specific sectors are priority objectives for information generation and certification. Some of them are scientific research, manufacturing, agriculture, energy, transportation, finance, healthcare, education and e-commerce. However, his plan does not stop at traditional sectors. China has a structural advantage that no Western laboratory can easily replicate And it also plans to cover cutting-edge fields with quality data, such as AI applied to robots, autonomous driving, low-altitude aviation or biomanufacturing. These are, precisely, domains whose data is not on the internet because they come from sensors, actuators and physical environments. Achieving them requires having industrial infrastructure, and in this scenario China has a structural advantage that no Western laboratory can easily replicate. However, this is not all. The document prepared by the National Data Administration explicitly encourages the expansion of the supply of text, code, images, audio and video necessary to train systems capable of complex reasoning, agentic behavior and control of intelligent robots. In fact, it’s an almost exact description of what the industry calls next-generation models. They are not just systems capable of answering questions; They will also be able to plan, act and operate in the physical world. The availability of high-quality multimodal data, especially that coming from real industrial environments, is today one of the least discussed and most determining bottlenecks in the AI ​​career. In a scenario where access to cutting-edge chips is restricted by US export controlsdata becomes a competitive advantage. If China can’t win the hardware race, it can try to win the fuel race that that hardware needs to be truly useful. Image | Daoducquan More information | SCMP In Xataka | The condemnation that afflicts China: after decades of manufacturing a competitive desktop processor, it is six years behind

FIFA has turned the 2026 World Cup into the most expensive cultural event in history because it has become a new Ticketmaster

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For almost a century, FIFA has not cared about selling cheap tickets: the money in football was in television. But as has happened with the musiccinema and other cultural events, spectacularization is the order of the day, and for the 2026 World Cup the business model is closer to Ticketmaster. Direct consequence: two US attorneys general have already asked him for explanations through judicial means. Pocho record. The World Cup in the United States, Mexico and Canada starts this Thursday, becoming the most expensive cultural event in history. The cheapest ticket to the group stage cost an average of $200 and the most affordable ticket to the final started at $2,030. Adjusted for inflation, the price is double that of Qatar 2022 and quadruple that of the United States 1994. Because. The reason is more than obvious: for the first time, FIFA controls ticket sales directly, without delegating it to local organizers, and has launched dynamic prices. Between October and April made at least one category more expensive in 95 of the 104 gameswith an average increase of 35%. The Category 1 ticket for the final went from $6,730 to $10,990. Other niceties. Another novelty this year that is not going down well with fans is that the buyer does not choose a seat either. You pay for a category that corresponds to an area of ​​the stadium and FIFA assigns you a row and seat months later. For example, in April many fans who had paid for Category 1 discovered that their seats were in areas previously marked as Category 2, because FIFA had modified the maps and reserved the best seats for a new “Front Category 1”. More expensive, of course. The law. The attorneys general of New York and New Jersey have judicially summoned to FIFA to investigate your sales practices; The one in New Jersey accuses the agency of turning the purchase into a labyrinth of “false scarcity.” California had previously sent its own letter of request. Justice accuses FIFA of setting up its own secondary market without price caps in the United States and Canada: as explained your own support pagecharges a commission of 15% to the seller and another 15% to the buyer. Only in Mexico does it limit resale to the original price, and by legal requirement. On that platform there have been tickets for the final listed by more than two million dollars. The opacity does the rest. FIFA has almost never reported how many tickets were left per match or per phase, and before publishing any price it sold tens of thousands of “Right to Buy” tokens through its crypto collectibles platform: hundreds of dollars for the right to buy a ticket whose final cost was not known until much later. More opacity: in February, FIFA president Gianni Infantino stated that all matches were sold out. His own organization had to correct himand in April acknowledged that about five of the planned 6.7 million tickets had been sold and that the rest were being held for “continued sales.” Different ticketing experts identify this retention as a classic tactic to create a sensation of demand. Although it is not clear if the play has given the expected results: the United States’ debut against Paraguay accumulated 10,000 entries listed on resale platformsa, many below the original price. The accounts come out. Wow, they come out: in Qatar 2022 the box office contributed about 950 million dollars; for 2026 FIFA budget up to 3,000 million for tickets and VIP packages (premium entry plus experience). The organization foresees earn 8.9 billion with the tournament within a four-year cycle of 13,000 (which is how FIFA organizes its accounts) in the most optimistic calculations. There are those who consider that this calculation even falls short: an academic analysis It projects that the box office and VIP experiences alone will exceed 7.4 billion, and to that would be added TV rights, sponsorships and other income. One but. The Economist It points, however, to a very specific problem this year: the public in the fields is part of the television product that FIFA sells around the world for more than 4 billion dollars. It must be remembered that in the Club World Cup, spectators had to be relocated in front of the cameras in half-empty matches to keep up appearances. All of this underlines the idea that FIFA is torn between a couple of businesses in which it wants to be the leader: squeezing in-person spectators and protecting the image of the spectacle that the rest of the planet sees. For now the eyes with the dollar sign are watching intently at the first one. In Xataka | How to configure your Smart TV to watch the 2026 World Cup in the best possible way

For the first time, Curaçao will play in a soccer World Cup. And only one of their players was born in Curaçao

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Curaçao has an area of ​​444 km2, fewer inhabitants than Almería and barely 16 years behind it. 16 years, of course, as an autonomous country after October 10, 2010 the Dutch Antilles were definitively dissolved and, with them, the vestige of centuries of colonization. More or less. Because they remain autonomous countries within the Kingdom of the Netherlands. That is to say, Curaçao, like Aruba and San Martinhave their own parliaments but depend on the Dutch force to defend their borders. They are also tied to their foreign policy. Peculiarities of a world that seems to have been left behind but that continues to remind him of the Netherlands and multitude of territories scattered around the world There was a day when the Dutch managed, administered and, of course, exploited their lands in favor of a metropolis that was thousands of kilometers away. Today those vestiges of the past are still more or less present. Between 2021 and 2023, Amsterdam Mayor Femke Halsema, Prime Minister Mark Rutte and King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands They took over to apologize for the exploitation and slavery of people for centuries wherever the Dutch were present. Today, the Netherlands cannot be understood without the immigrants from those territories. Nor does his team, which in the last Eurocup He participated with 16 soccer players who were children or grandchildren of immigrants African or Caribbean. But the Suriname or Aruba teams are not understood either. Of course, not to Curaçao either, the smallest country to compete in the final phase of a World Cup. globalist colonialism According to data from last year provided by the Netherlands Central Statistics OfficeOf the 18 million people who live in the country, there are more than five million people who are immigrants or children of immigrants. Of them, 2.1 million citizens are children of immigrants. Those five million people, according to FIFA regulationswould be eligible for the Netherlands if they have been residing in the country for more than five years. But of them, those more than two million people (to which the grandchildren of immigrants should be added) could also be selectable with the federation of their ancestors. They know it well in Curaçao. Of the 25 players called up for the 2026 World Cup, only one of them was born in Caribbean lands. Is Tahith ChongSheffield United player in England, born in Willemstadthe capital of the country that brings together half of the population of the entire territory. It is the result of a policy that began to be planted years ago and that has now germinated with the most attended World Cup in history. Opening participation to 48 teams was the perfect opportunity for Curaçao. With three nations such as Mexico, the United States and Canada already classified as hosts, Concacaf went from 3.5 World Cup berths to 6.5 (the “seventh” was played in the play-off with an African team). It was now or never. They explain in elDiario.es that the project was born from the hand of Gilbert Martina, president of the federation, who attracted Patrick Kluivert, a former FC Barcelona soccer player whose mother was from Curacao, to contact Dutch soccer players of Caribbean descent. And the project succeeds. He succeeds so much that today We only have one player born in Curaçao representing Curaçao. With three additional spots open for the North American and Caribbean Confederation, the opportunity to play in a World Cup was very attractive for those who decided to take a plane to play against Jamaica in a life or death final in Kingston and defend a tie that gave them a ticket to the most attractive competition in the world of football. The attraction of the project is evident in the statistics books. Of the 10 players who have played the most games for Curaçao since their emancipation as an independent team in 2011, nine are Dutch. The company has also raised interest among coaches. Since the arrival of Patrick Kluivert as coach in 2015, eight of the nine coaches have also arrived from the Netherlands, with a single exception from Curacao. Wearing the Curaçao shirt was the express (and only) ticket to reach a World Cup for these players, most of whom were unknown to the general public and undoubtedly without sufficient level to be part of Ronald Koeman’s plans where they were born. In fact, only five of them play in the Dutch first division. The rest of the players are divided between the second division of major leagues such as the English one or mid-table teams of lesser-known leagues such as the Turkish, Greek or Israeli ones. Use a “wild card selection” to guarantee a ticket to a final phase of a World Cup or a major national team tournament has been a common practice for years but such a “migratory movement” has never occurred. At the 2014 World Cup It was the only match where two brothers have participated wearing different shirts despite sharing the country of birth: Jerome Boateng defending Germany and Kevin Prince Boateng doing the same for Ghana. Iñaki Williams, a player from Athletic Club de Bilbao, also participated with Ghana in the 2022 World Cup in which Nico Williams wore the Spanish shirt. This time the paths did not cross. The debate about whether or not to call the best available is a tricky one. Alberto Edjogo-Owono, a well-known Dazn commentator born in Sabadell, defended the Equatorial Guinea shirt and recognizes that there is a debate within the footballer and another within the fan. This is how it was expressed in Africa Worldto David Soler’s questions: “A moral dilemma opens up for me: ok, on the one hand it’s fine, but of course. Be careful, I don’t want to be hypocritical. I was born in Sabadell and if I had had the level to play for the Spanish team, then I would have tried to play for the Spanish team, because it is the country where I was born, where I … Read more

The World Cup starts at PcComponentes with OLED or QLED TVs with up to 60% discount

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In a couple of days it starts (finally) the world. There will be 104 games in total and, although many will be at dawn, we want to see as many as possible. We still have time to get a new TV for this.whether for the living room or the bedroom, precisely for those late games. If you are looking for one, then be careful to the offers that PcComponentes has right now. LG OLED TV OLED55C5 55″ 4K UltraHD 120Hz Smart TV WebOS HDR10 Dolby Vision Atmos The price could vary. We earn commission from these links This Spanish store has a ton of discounts on televisions right now. Besides, with free shipping from 50 euros and with exchange or replacement within 24 hours under warranty. There is a lot to choose from, but we have made a selection of five that we find very interesting: LG OLED55C5 by 899 eurosone of the best quality-price OLED televisions there is. Samsung Q7F by 489 eurosQLED television from the Korean firm with 65 inches diagonal. Hisense QLED 65E7S by 399 eurosa very interesting option now that it is at an all-time low. Philips QLED 43PUS8450 by 269 ​​euroscompact television with Ambilight. Nilait Prisma 40FD7004SVIOS by 169 eurosVery economical 40-inch Smart TV. LG OLED55C5 The first of these televisions is the LG OLED C5one of the OLED TVs with the best quality-price ratio there is. Its image quality is outstanding, since this panel technology achieves pure black and very good contrast. In addition, it has native 120 Hz and Dolby Vision compatibility. It’s coming out right now 899 euros in its 55-inch version. LG OLED TV OLED55C5 55″ 4K UltraHD 120Hz Smart TV WebOS HDR10 Dolby Vision Atmos The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Samsung Q7F Another very popular option is this 65-inch Samsung Q7F television, which is on sale at PcComponentes right now until 489 euros. QLED technology offers better colors than normal LED televisions and this particular one is also compatible with HDR10+ and has a Tizen OS operating system. Samsung AI QLED TV 65″ TQ65Q7FAAUXXC UltraHD 4K Quantum HDR Tizen The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Hisense QLED 65E7S Another QLED option, although in this case cheaper and from Hisense: it costs 399 eurosits historical minimum price until today. It is an ideal option if you want a 65-inch television and want to spend as little as possible. In addition, it has VIDAA U9.5 operating system, VRR and 60 Hz, as well as compatibility with HDR 10+. TV Hisense QLED 65E7S 65″ 4K UltraHD 60Hz VRR Smart TV VIDAA HDR10+ Dolby Atmos The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Philips QLED 43PUS8450 Now let’s go with two more recommended options if you are looking for something more compact and economical than the ones above. This Philips QLED is a very good option, especially now that it costs 269 ​​euros. These televisions have Ambilight, a back lighting technology that is great for watching football or playing games. In addition, it has a Titan OS operating system. TV Philips QLED 43PUS8450 43″ 4K Ambilight Smart TV Dolby Atmos The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Nilait Prisma 40FD7004SVIOS Finally, let’s go with a TV designed for small rooms. It is from the Nilait brand, which is PcComponentes’ own. It has 40 inches, Full HD resolution (more than enough for this screen size) and costs only 169 euros. It is an option that could be great for a bedroom or even for a second residence. Nilait Prisma 40FD7004SVIOS 40″ LED FHD Smart TV VIDAA The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Other televisions that may also interest you These above are just some examples of TVs that are available right now at a very good price at PcComponentes. Below, we leave you some more as a summary: Nilait Prisma 43UD7004SWOS by 219 euros (instead of 359 euros). Philips LED Ambilight 50PUS8010 by 299 euros (instead of 599 euros). Nilait Prisma 55UD7004ST by 299 euros (instead of 499 euros). Philips QLED 55PUS7810 by 319 euros (instead 699 euros). Philips LED Ambilight 55PUS8010 by 333 euros (instead of 599 euros). Samsung UE55U8072FUXXH by 339 euros (instead of 599 euros). Some of the links in this article are affiliated and may provide a benefit to Xataka. In case of non-availability, offers may vary. Images | Xataka, LG, Samsung, Philips, Hisense, PcComponentes In Xataka | Best televisions in quality price. Which one to buy and seven recommended 4K smart TVs In Xataka | The best TVs to play and get the most out of your PS5 or Xbox Series

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