Bar Crobar

AI in chess, the plug of discord

Chess player Hans Niemann has been accused of cheating following his victory over world champion Magnus Carlsen. The 19-year-old is alleged to have received instructions to move via vibrations emitted by an anal plug. This scandal reveals the tumultuous relationship between humans and computers in the world of chess, which stems from a 25-year rivalry.

On 4 September 2022, during the Sinquefield Cup chess tournament in the United States, the young Hans Niemann won his match against the world champion Magnus Carlsen. Carlsen suffered his first defeat for 53 games. Two weeks later, the two men met again. The match got under way when, suddenly, it was all over: Carlsen gave up. He turned off the camera that was broadcasting his moves, leaving the incredulous spectators with no explanation.

Accusations flew in the following days. Niemann was suspected of cheating: some professional players said they were astonished by his level, which seemed abnormally high given his record. "From the age of 17 to 19, you don't progress as quickly as that," said Eloi Relange, international grandmaster and president of the French Chess Federation. The young American earned his master's title at the age of 17, whereas the 12 other players under the age of 25 who are among the 50 best in the world attained this rank between the ages of 12 and 16.

In the absence of any material evidence, the Internet is full of theories as to the cause of the subterfuge. Rumours start with earpieces, then vibrating soles. Another hypothesis, which at first seemed incongruous, eventually emerged as a perfectly plausible explanation. Niemann is said to have inserted an anal plug before his game, in order to receive instructions via pulsations.

The player defends himself and proclaims his innocence in a way that borders on insolence. "I think Magnus Carlsen is disgusted to have lost to an idiot like me. It's embarrassing for a world champion. I feel bad for him," he declared without batting an eyelid in front of the Saint Louis Chess Club cameras. It's a real scandal.

The chess world was in an uproar. Reactions were swift, particularly from a certain Garry Kasparov, who was highly critical of Carlsen's attitude. In an interview, he said that it was "unacceptable" to leave a tournament in progress, even if there was evidence of cheating.

This speech is all the more resonant when put into perspective with the history of chess. Kasparov is indeed a monument of the discipline: he dominated it for fifteen years. However, if history remembers his name, it is also as the first world champion to have been beaten by a computer. That was 25 years ago.

A day to remember

In May 1997, chess champion Garry Kasparov played his second match against Deep Blue, a supercomputer designed by IBM. In the first encounter, fifteen months earlier, the Russian player had emerged victorious. This new face-off was to take a completely different turn.

During the first set, Kasparov was disturbed by an unusual computer move, the logic of which he did not understand. In the end, however, he won. The second round followed, and Deep Blue proved as unpredictable as ever. The Russian player lost his nerve and conceded the game. At the end of the sixth, he was forced to concede. It was a real thunderclap: for the first time, a world champion was defeated by an artificial intelligence.

Kasparov's reaction to Carlsen's attitude reveals the impact of this defeat on chess. The players were traumatised, and the artificial intelligence appeared invincible. In concrete terms, Deep Blue's victory had repercussions for the sport's economy: during the champion's tournaments following his defeat, sponsors were more reluctant than before to finance him. On the other hand, the indirect publicity from which IBM benefited is estimated at 500 million dollars. In the collective imagination, the computer is the real number one.

I think, therefore I am?

In 2006, world chess champion Vladimir Kramnik lost to a standard desktop computer. From then on, humans had to come to terms with the intellectual superiority of chess machines, and training with the help of algorithms became widespread among professionals. Garry Kasparov himself is considered to be the first person to have studied chess openings in depth using programmes.

Eloi Relange, who was just a promising young player in 1997, explains that the professionals only used computers to check their tactical errors. Today, the best players use artificial intelligence to "come up with ideas that will surprise their opponent", says the now President of the French Chess Federation at La Croix.

The main risk of such practices is that they smooth out the game. Players abandon their creativity to concentrate on more pragmatic assets, such as studying the moves listed. More than talent, it is now the hours invested in learning the different combinations that seem to lead to victory. The paradigms on which the discipline is based are undergoing a radical transformation.

While professionals used to prepare rigorously before their performances, grandmaster Matthew Sadler says that "the amount of stuff there was to remember just exploded" with the advent of the programmes. "The thrill came from using your mind creatively, and working on strategic problem solutions. Not testing each other to see who has the best memory," laments international player Wesley So in the media. The Atlantic.

As professionals rely more and more on rote learning dictated by machines, their autonomy as athletes is diminishing. The outcome of this development seemed logical, and the discipline was soon plagued by a major scourge: cheating. Hans Niemann hasn't invented anything.

To be or not to be

The situation is dauntingly simple. No matter how hard a human being tries, he will always be soundly beaten by a computer programme. Ironically, the same Vladimir Kramnik who was defeated by a computer was accused of cheating with algorithms during the tournament that crowned him world champion a few months before his defeat.

Fraud is on the increase among unscrupulous sportsmen and women. In 2015, Georgian grandmaster Gaioz Nigalidze was caught running programmes on his phone in the toilet during a tournament in Dubai. The International Chess Federation investigated, and the offender was finally banned from competition for three years. This event marked a turning point, as it was the first case in which the Anti-Cheating Committee applied a sanction.

Players are now required to leave their phones in the cloakroom, and competitions begin with searches. Now Hans Niemann has admitted to cheating in online tournaments. According to the website chess.com, which recently published a 72-page report, he "probably" played in more than 100 games on the Internet, some of them with prizes.

Cheating in chess is all the more petty because it is very difficult to identify, especially since the democratisation of online play. It is only exposed during major events, such as the confrontation between Niemann and Carlsen. Top player Kenneth W. Regan explained in an interview this month with LA TimesIt's a fact, however, that youngsters with incredible talent and situations comparable to Hans Niemann's often appear out of nowhere. In most of these cases, their sporting integrity is called into question.

Live and let live

Despite all these upheavals, chess has survived. Fraud does a lot of damage, but it is not the only innovation brought about by computers. First and foremost, they have made learning the game much more accessible, and therefore more democratic.

Artificial intelligence has also opened up new avenues for chess enthusiasts, enabling them to make moves that were once considered too risky. As a result, the possibilities of the game have been broadened and the discipline has evolved. In an interview for Le Time released in 2019, Garry Kasparov says that while his defeat by Deep Blue shocked him at the time, in retrospect he sees it as "a victory for humanity". According to the former champion, the future of mankind lies not behind the machines, but alongside them.

Finally, instinct and talent will always be important in chess. This is borne out by the rapid games, particularly those used to decide between opponents in the event of a tie, during which it is impossible not to make mistakes in view of the imposed timing. Although the programmes indicate the best openings to play, it is still up to the human mind to work out the best strategy based on this move.

According to the website chess.com, only 0.2 per cent of players cheat in online tournaments: a figure much lower than popular belief. The chess community seems particularly keen to revive what used to be the charm of the discipline: the thrill of a duel of the mind, the vertigo of the infinite possibilities allowed by 64 squares, and the creativity expressed on the board as a game that was born so many centuries ago is renewed.

Text by views.fr

In Italy, the far right wins a historic victory

Giorgia Meloni's Fratelli d'Italia won nearly a quarter of the vote in Sunday's general election. The coalition formed by the post-fascist party with Matteo Salvini's League and Silvio Berlusconi's Forza Italia is expected to win an absolute majority in parliament.

The coalition formed by Fratelli d'Italia, Matteo Salvini's other far-right formation, the League, and Silvio Berlusconi's conservative party, Forza Italia, would win up to 47 % of the vote. With the complex interplay of the electoral system, it should secure an absolute majority of seats in both the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate. If these results were confirmed, FdI and the League would together win "the highest percentage of votes ever recorded by far-right parties in the history of Western Europe from 1945 to the present day".According to the Italian Centre for Electoral Studies (CISE).

This earthquake comes two weeks after the victory in Sweden of a conservative bloc including the Sweden Democrats (SD), a party with its roots in the neo-Nazi movement, which made a strong breakthrough, becoming the leading right-wing party in the Nordic country. SD and FdI are part of the same group in the European Parliament. In what was (badly) perceived in Rome as a warning without cost, the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen recalled that the European Union (EU) has "instruments to sanction Member States that undermine the rule of law and its common values.

Pitfalls

Giorgia Meloni has warned Brussels that she will demand a review of the terms of Italy's relationship with the EU: "The party's over, Italy will start defending its national interests".she warned. In particular, she is calling for a reform of the Stability Pact and the renegotiation, to take account of inflation, of the colossal aid package of 190 billion euros granted by her European partners to the eurozone's third-largest economy to help it recover from the pandemic.

Europeans are also alarmed by the positions on social issues of "la Meloni", as she is known in Italy, whose motto is "God, family, country", and who is close to the ultraconservative Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban. Fratelli d'Italia owes its success as much to the unfulfilled promises of its opponents and the wind of "disengagement" blowing across the Peninsula as to the charisma of its leader. This 45-year-old woman from Rome, who as a young activist said she admired Mussolini, has succeeded in de-demonising her image and rallying around her name the fears and anger of millions of Italians faced with soaring prices, unemployment, the threat of recession and poor public services.

Whichever Italian government emerges from the elections, which will not take office until the end of October at the earliest, its path already appears to be strewn with pitfalls and with little room for manoeuvre. In particular, it will have to manage the crisis caused by galloping inflation, while Italy is already crumbling under a debt representing 150 % of GDP, the highest ratio in the eurozone after Greece. On the issue of Ukraine, Europe and Italy's allies, as a member of NATO, will also be scrutinising the distribution of portfolios between the three parties. While Giorgia Meloni is an Atlanticist and supports sanctions against Moscow, Matteo Salvini is opposed to them.

More than 1,200 people arrested since protests began

The protest movement continues unabated and has already claimed the lives of 41 people. It began on 16 September, after the death of a young woman for "wearing inappropriate clothing".

The authorities have arrested 450 new demonstrators in northern Iran, where more than 700 people have already been arrested for taking part in protests against the death of a young woman detained by the morality police, official media reported on Monday.

Protest movement

"During the unrest of recent days, 450 rioters have been arrested in Mazandaran," said the province's attorney general, Mohammad Karimi, quoted by the official Irna agency. On Saturday, the authorities reported that 739 demonstrators had been arrested, including 60 women in Guilan, Mazandaran's neighbouring province in the north of the country.

The demonstrations began on 16 September, the date of the death of Mahsa Amini, who had been arrested three days earlier in Tehran for "wearing inappropriate clothing" in the Islamic Republic, where the dress code for women is strict, in particular the wearing of the Islamic veil.

The protest movement spread to several cities in the country, where demonstrators shouted anti-government slogans, according to local media. "Over the past few days, rioters have attacked government buildings and damaged public property in some parts of Mazandaran under the direction of foreign agents", he said.

No leniency

On Sunday, the head of the judiciary, Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejeï, threatened to show "no leniency" towards the demonstrators and called on the security forces to act "firmly" against "those who undermine security".

According to a non-detailed official report, including demonstrators and police, 41 people have been killed in ten days of protests. But the toll could be higher, with the Oslo-based NGO Iran Human Rights (IHR) reporting that at least 57 demonstrators have been killed.

On Monday, the Tasnim news agency published around 20 photos of demonstrators, including women, in various streets of Qom, an important Shiite holy city around 150 km south of the capital. The military and security institutions published these images of the "riot leaders" and called on residents to "identify them and inform the authorities", the agency added.

Alcaraz disgusted after Federer's retirement announcement

While just a few hours ago, following his triumph at the US Open, he said that he would really like to play Roger Federer at least once before the end of his career, Carlos Alcaraz was dealt a blow when the Swiss announced on Wednesday that he would be playing him.

The youngest world number one in history posted a heartbreaking message on his Twitter account, which says a lot about his state of mind following the Swiss player's decision to retire from professional tennis due in part to a creaking knee.

Text by we love tennis.fr

The new British sovereign takes the name of Charles III

The new British monarch, previously known as Prince Charles, is now known as Charles III. The 73-year-old prince automatically became king on the death of his mother Queen Elizabeth II under the rule that "the king never dies".

His accession to the throne after 70 years of patience, a record in the history of the British monarchy, was immediate on the death of the Queen, in accordance with the ancient Latin maxim "Rex nunquam moritur" (the King never dies).

Charles said in a statement posted on Twitter that his mother's death was "a time of great sorrow". "The death of my much-loved mother, Her Majesty The Queen, is a time of great sorrow for me and my family," the statement read.

Coronation in a few weeks

Her coronation should take place in a few weeks' time at the earliest. Elizabeth II was crowned in June 1953, sixteen months after being proclaimed Queen.

His wife Camilla became Queen Consort, a wish expressed by the Queen last February. The subject remained sensitive among the British. After her marriage to Prince Charles in 2005, Camilla chose not to take the title of Princess of Wales, which was too closely associated with Princess Diana.

Born on 14 November 1948, the eldest son Charles became heir to the crown at the age of three years and three months, in February 1952, when Princess Elizabeth, aged 25, became Queen on the death of her father George VI.

Since his first official engagements in the 1970s, the Prince of Wales's role has been to "support Her Majesty the Queen as a focal point of national pride".

He has welcomed dignitaries to the UK on his behalf, attended state dinners, travelled to a hundred countries, presented thousands of decorations, attended inaugurations, honoured heroes and written or recorded countless messages of encouragement and congratulations.

He was increasingly replacing his mother, who was in declining health. In May, Charles delivered the Speech from the Throne in Parliament for the first time, one of his most important constitutional duties.

Green dandy

The British know him best for the wreckage of his marriage to Princess Diana, which did him considerable harm in the 1990s, and his remarriage to Camilla.

A man of passions, Charles has made the most of this very long wait, an early advocate of the environment, a lover of alternative medicine, a passionate advocate of sustainable urban planning and an inspired gardener who talks to his trees. Since 2007, he has published his "ecological footprint" (total 3133 tonnes of CO2 in 2020 compared with 5070 in 2019).

In total, he is chairman or benefactor of more than 420 charities, the largest of which, the Prince's Trust, has helped more than a million young people in difficulty since it was founded in 1976.

But this dandyish old aristocrat who loves double-breasted suits is far less popular than his mother, who has been totally devoted to her role for 70 years, and is absolutely neutral.

Text by rts.ch afp/cab

Flood in Pakistan: global warming has triggered a chain reaction

With a third of Pakistan under water, many scientists claim that the floods have been devastating for a number of reasons, starting as early as April.

They are the worst floods that Pakistan has ever known. Tens of millions of people have already been evacuated, without any resources, and more than 1,200 people have died, while a third of the country is under water. The death toll is set to rise in the coming days, as for the moment the entire country is under water and the extent of the damage is still difficult to assess. But what caused such flooding ? According to researchers, it's a combination of climatic events that have set off a chain reaction, starting with global warming.

An extraordinary drought from April and May onwards

From April onwards, the temperature in Pakistan was well above the seasonal norm of around 30-35°C, and for several days exceeded 40°C in many places. Worse still, in the city of Jacobabad, the mercury a rose to 51°Cthe first of its kind in theNorthern hemisphere until this year! "These were not waves of heat normal, it was the worst in the world. We had the hottest place on Earth in Pakistan.explains Malik Amin Aslam in a press release from Natureformer Minister for Climate Change, based in Islamabad.

And these extreme heat waves do not bode well. L'air warmer, less dense air than cold air, can therefore retain more moisture. This stored water can then be released into the air.atmosphere once the rainy season had begun. As a result, above-normal rainfall levels were already forecast. What's more, the dryness of the air will naturally lead to a soil drought. These then become more compact, absorbing much less water than when they are inactive. weather soil. As a result, the water that reaches these soils tends to run off instead of infiltrating deep into the earth.

But the drought has also had other consequences. Visit high mountain glaciers in the north of the country melted, much more than usual due to the heat waves. Water was already flowing from the mountains into the Indus, the country's largest river, which crosses it from north to south, when the floods came. This river supplies towns and agricultural installations throughout Pakistan. And according to Zia Hashmi, a water resources engineer at Global Change Impact Studies Centreand flow rates high levels of muddy water in the Hunza river, which feeds the Indus, were observed in July. An observation that suggests a cast iron rapid and more intense than usual, and the possibility that some glacial lakes may have broken their dams.

Flooding so bad that a new lake has been created!

But that's not all! These floods also coincide with the arrival of an area of intense low-pressure in the Arabian Sea to the south of the country, causing heavy rainfall. heavy rains in Pakistan from June. "We rarely have large-scale depression systems happening out there".explains Athar Hussain, climatologist at the University of Islamabad. All these events, combined with a monsoon which started at the end of June helped to produce twice as much rainfall than average during the rainy season. Five times, in the southern provinces. So much so that a new lake has been created, even though the rains are now over!

This lake will recede once the weather dries up, but could well remain for a few days to a few weeks. Just like the water flowing across the country, which has already destroyed 240 bridges, 5,000 kilometres of roads and millions of homes. For this country, the worst is not yet over. Particularly representative of the effects of the global warmingIn a few years' time, such events could become the norm in Pakistan.

Text by futura-sciences.com

Benjamin Mendy, "a predator" according to the prosecutor

The trial of Benjamin Mendy resumed late on Monday morning at Chester Crown Court, with the prosecutor giving his opening speech, describing the 2018 World Cup winner as a "predator".

Before taking a break for lunch, nearly two hours later, he unfolded half of his argument in this highly publicised case; some thirty journalists were present on the spartan wooden benches of the Crown Court on Monday morning. "The charges are simple and have little to do with football.said the preliminary prosecutor. It's just another chapter in a very old story: men raping and sexually assaulting women because they think they're powerful and can get away with it.

As the two defendants, who were seated in the dock and to whom the indictment file had also been distributed, looked on, Prosecutor Cray continued his speech, getting to the heart of the matter. First, he mentioned Louis Saha Matturie. The co-accused (no relation to former striker Louis Saha) is charged with twelve counts of sexual offences, including eight rapes. On Monday, he was presented as a "fixer by the prosecution, a "assistant and a "friend Mendy, who would have been responsible for "to find young women and create situations where they could be raped and sexually assaulted".said the prosecutor.

A 'mansion' where you could feel 'vulnerable

Accused of eight rapes, one attempted rape and one sexual assault, Benjamin Mendy, like his alleged accomplice, was presented as a "man of conscience". "predator by Prosecutor Cray. The acts of which the Manchester City defender - who has been suspended for almost a year by his club - is suspected took place at his vast home in Prestbury, Cheshire, between 25 October 2018 and 23 August 2021, three days before his arrest. The native of Longjumeau (Essonne), who spent 134 days in pre-trial detention, has been on parole since 7 January.

Mendy's country home is a "manor housecontinued the prosecutor, in which one could feel "vulnerable, frightened, isolated. A "vulnerability accentuated by other important facts that you will hear about".he told the jury. Such as driving "Complainants in rooms they think are locked, "the fact that some of the women were drunk and that the defendants wanted them to be". and "differences in age and wealth between the defendants and the plaintiffs"..

"Nowadays, no one can doubt that : "No means no "

Prosecutor Timothy Cray

The apparent serenity shown by Benjamin Mendy since the start of the trial on 10 August was no longer in evidence. Face closed, mouth stiff, the 2018 world champion listened as the prosecutor continued his address to the jury: "Here are two important questions for you to consider. What happened in Mendy's house on the days in question? What was there in that house that made these women vulnerable?" A video of the various rooms in the full-back's "mansion" was also shown on two screens during the hearing. The player and his 'assistant' Matturie, who have pleaded not guilty to each of the charges against them, maintain that the complainants were consenting, the prosecutor pointed out.

"Nowadays, no one can doubt that : "No means no "he also said, echoing the societal upheaval generated by the #MeToo movement. This fundamental right to say "no sex should benefit everyone. And we don't lose that right because we went to a bar, got dressed up to go clubbing or went to a footballer's house." It is obviously on this central issue - the consent, or otherwise, of the presumed victims - that the jurors will have to decide and reach a verdict at the end of this trial, which is due to last fifteen weeks.

Amazon buys the legendary James Bond studio, MGM, to compete with Netflix

James Bond, Rocky, The Silence of the Lambs... More than 4,000 films, including many classics, will come under the Amazon banner after the $8.45 billion acquisition of the almost century-old Hollywood studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, arming the American online giant to face the streaming emperor Netflix.

This acquisition "is very exciting and offers many opportunities for great stories to be told", said Mike Hopkins, Senior Vice President of Prime Video and Amazon Studios, in a statement.

This is the second most expensive acquisition in Amazon's history after the $13.7 billion takeover of US supermarkets Whole Foods in 2017.

In addition to more than 4,000 films, including the Agent 007 saga, Robocop, Basic Instinct, Raging Bull and Thelma & Louise, Amazon will be acquiring a vast catalogue of series, including The Handmaid's Tale, Fargo and Vikings.

"The real financial value of this deal is the treasure trove of intellectual property from the entire catalogue that we plan to reinvent and develop with the talented team at MGM," adds Mike Hopkins.

Through this acquisition, the American giant founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos is strengthening its position in content for its Amazon Prime Video streaming service, the mother of all battles in the entertainment world, which is subject to merciless competition between services.

To win subscribers and market share, streaming platforms are forced to invest massively in content, like Netflix, which could spend $17 billion this year, or try to grow through acquisitions.

With the decline in the number of Covid-19 infections and the gradual recovery in activity, Netflix's growth has slowed. It still dominates the sector, with 208 million paying subscribers worldwide at the end of April. Disney's platforms (Disney+, ESPN+, Hulu) had 159 million at the beginning of April.

Although its growth has slowed as economies gradually reopen thanks to a drop in Covid-19 contamination, Netflix dominates the sector, claiming 208 million paying subscribers worldwide at the end of April.

Amazon, whose shares were up 0.75% on the stock market at around 15:30 GMT, said at the end of April that its streaming service had been used by 175 million Prime subscribers over one year.

This agreement "clearly helps Amazon because customers are looking for more content", Dan Rayburn, media analyst for Frost & Sullivan, told AFP.

In addition to content, Amazon is acquiring a legendary Hollywood name with a proven track record in the film industry, he added.

Sport too

The American giant, which is worth over 1.6 trillion dollars on the stock market, has already made some costly acquisitions in recent years, including the television rights to "The Lord of the Rings", the cult fantasy saga by J.R.R. Tolkien, for 250 million dollars. Amazon intends to turn it into a multi-season series.

It has also stepped into the sporting breach, with the purchase of exclusive rights to the NFL in the United States, as well as Wimbledon and the US Open in the United Kingdom. In France, the giant has acquired part of the rights to Roland Garros for this year and the next two years.

The announcement of the purchase of MGM comes against a backdrop of brutal consolidation moves in recent days. In mid-May, telecoms giant AT&T announced the merger of its WarnerMedia subsidiary with Discovery, which offers the HBO MAX and Discovery+ streaming services respectively.

The value of mergers and acquisitions in the media and entertainment sector this year is the highest since 2000, at $232 billion according to data provider Refinitiv, almost seven times the level at this time last year.

This is the latest in a long series of takeovers by Hollywood studios, including Warner Bros by AT&T, Universal by Comcast and Paramount by ViacomCBS.

Like many American film studios, MGM suffered greatly from the Covid-19 pandemic and the prolonged closure of cinemas around the world.

Initially due to hit cinemas in March 2020, James Bond's latest opus, "No Time To Die", has seen its release postponed several times and is finally due to be shown in cinemas from 30 September.

BY bilan.ch AWP/AFP

McFly and Carlito: Emmanuel Macron is already campaigning on YouTube

By issuing a challenge to the famous duo of youtubers, the President hopes to benefit from their cool image among young people. An electoral propaganda strategy that should be more closely supervised.

McFly and Carlito have over 6 million subscribers on YouTube, undeniable comedic talent and perhaps the best intentions in the world. But when they say that making a video with Emmanuel Macron isn't the same as helping him get re-elected, they're wrong.

It's 19 February 2021, and McFly and Carlito are posting a video on their YouTube channel: "The PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC has issued us with a challenge. Crazy? Yes." The codes of the "Youtube Game" are respected, with the two youtubers commenting and going back over the phone call they received earlier from the President, and the challenge he gave them: to make a video on barrier gestures that exceeds 10 million views. If they succeed, they will be invited to the Elysée Palace to shoot a new video, giving them the opportunity to create new content and the promise of several million more views. The challenge was met in three days: by midday on Wednesday, the video already had 11 million views. A look back at an election propaganda campaign aimed at 15-25 year-olds, disguised behind a harmless video on barrier gestures.

Macron in search of the Halo effect

To understand Emmanuel Macron's objective behind this challenge to two young youtuber stars, icons of a generation, we first need to understand how a cognitive bias works: the Halo effect. The Halo effect causes you to make unconscious associations of ideas, and to transfer the qualities of a person or object to the person or object associated with it.

For decades, this bias has been the basis of a plethora of advertising campaigns in which brands associate the image of a sportsperson or celebrity with their products, hoping that, through a halo effect, their image will 'rub off' on their product. Among the 15-25 age group, McFly and Carlito are icons of cool. Their videos, viewed millions of times, promise their subscribers a funny time, something to smile about and clear their heads. In short, a cool moment. In other words, by this simple halo effect, if McFly and Carlito make a video with Emmanuel Macron, it automatically makes Emmanuel Macron cool.

No matter what is said, and no matter what the subject, our brains will make the unconscious association between their personalities and the image of Emmanuel Macron.

Image and personality, decisive factors for 2022?

In a democracy, we like to believe that when people go to the polls, they are voting in good conscience for a programme, for ideas, for a vision of the future. In reality, we know that this is not true. All the more so with someone like Emmanuel Macron. According to an Ipsos-Sopra Steria poll, in 2017, 8 % of votes for Emmanuel Macron in the second round were for "his personality. 8 %, compared with his score in the first round, represents around 700,000 votes. And yet an unsuccessful candidate has been saying for three and a half years that in 2017 he would have been in the second round. "à 600 000 votes". That candidate is Jean-Luc Mélenchon.

Since 2017, young people (born between around 1998 and 2005) have been the target of numerous reforms that have made their living conditions more difficult and their future more uncertain. With Parcoursup and the reform of the lycée, their chances of accessing a good education have been reduced, and have widened the inequalities between young people from favoured city centres, and the others (suburbs and "provinces"). Emmanuel Macron has also failed to live up to the expectations of this generation when it comes to the climate, as evidenced by his failure to respect the Paris agreements and his backtracking/amendments on neonicotinoids, glyphosate and the ban on disposable plastic.

The issue of police violence is also at the heart of the concerns of part of this generation, as demonstrated by the huge success of the demonstration on 2 June outside the Paris Magistrates' Court in memory of Adama Traoré and George Floyd. It is also a marker of the break with a President who makes no secret of his support for the methods of the Paris Police Prefect, Didier Lallement. Above all, these young people are starving and desperate. Between the exponential increase in prostitution, whether physical or digital, and the daily lengthening of queues outside food aid centres, we can see that an entire generation has been abandoned in the midst of a health crisis.

Faced with this situation, it is perfectly reasonable to think that the executive has commissioned surveys to gauge how this generation feels about its actions. And it is just as reasonable to think that the results of these polls are not good, hence the need to use influencers to limit the damage done by politics through communication.

Using influence to get round the rules

What is happening between McFly and Carlito and Emmanuel Macron is not a first under the LREM presidency, as this executive has already used it on several occasions to deliver messages to a population far removed from traditional media. Whether it's fitness youtuber Tibo InShape to promote the SNU, influencer EnjoyPhoenix who was invited to spend a day with Brune Poirson, then Secretary of State for Ecology, to green the government's image, or Nino Arial as part of an anti-harassment campaign, the use of influencers has become common practice under Emmanuel Macron's five-year presidency.

And this practice raises many questions.

With an audience of several million followers and the halo effect they confer on the politicians with whom they collaborate, influencers are a powerful means of political propaganda among the under-30s. But they are also a way for politicians to get round the French ban on advertising on social networks. In France, the legislation governing advertising for political propaganda purposes is particularly strict: it is prohibited in the six months preceding an election.

No banners, no keyword purchases, no sponsored posts on Facebook or Instagram, nothing. But as it stands, legislation does not prohibit commissioning a video from an influencer. However, given the young age of their audience (often underage) and the fact that an influencer is not bound by any duty of neutrality, unlike a journalist, we need to think about how, at the very least, to regulate and legislate these practices, which represent a real risk to the integrity of future elections.

by Antoine Kalawski, Liberation.fr

BLUES - KARIM BENZEMA, A STORY TO BE MENDED AND A DESTINY TO BE WRITTEN IN THE FRANCE TEAM

EURO 2020 - Karim Benzema's history with the French national team is a troubled one. From his successful debut to his five-and-a-half-year eclipse, the Madrid striker has never had the influence on Les Bleus' fortunes that his talent merited. Now, at the age of 33, he has been given an unexpected second chance. A chance to finally make his mark on the national team.

It all started so well. At half-time of France-Austria on 28 March 2007, Karim Benzema replaced Djibril Cissé for his first cap. Eight minutes later, he scored the only goal of the match from a pass by Samir Nasri, another newcomer. A successful launch for the new star of the France team, who already embodies the new generation. The one that is set to succeed Zinedine Zidane's Bleus, runners-up in the World Cup a few months earlier. But nothing in Benzema's career with the French national team has been a straight line. Fourteen years on, Benzema's mark on the French national team pales in comparison to his talent and club career.

Mbappé, Benzema, Griezmann? The greatest promise of the Euros, the greatest danger for Les Bleus".

The twentieth most capped player in history with 81 caps, despite a five-season gap, Benzema has enjoyed two great moments with the French national team. His goal against Ukraine in the play-offs for the 2014 World Cup was the most important moment in his international career. Then there was the successful first round (three goals) in Brazil, at the end of which he was voted best player of the group stages. The rest of his career has been a mixture of good, average and mediocre. With the exception of the 2014 World Cup, his major international tournaments have been fiascoes. In 2008, when he was the new sensation of Les Bleus, his starts against Romania and Italy came to nothing.

How can Benzema be integrated into Les Bleus' line-up?

HE HAS RARELY BEEN THE SAVIOUR FRANCE WAS WAITING FOR

In 2012, when he was still the man who had to pull Les Bleus out of the post-Knysna precipice, he missed his competition. Despite two assists and a starting berth, he failed to score a single goal. The tournament was both a collective and personal failure. But Didier Deschamps, like Laurent Blanc before him, did not give in to media and popular pressure and kept Benzema up front despite a terrible personal drought of 1,222 minutes without scoring. While Olivier Giroud is beginning to look like a credible alternative, Benzema remains a stalwart, an essential member of the backbone of Didier Deschamps' first half of his mandate.

Missing out on the last 8 (Nigeria) and quarter-finals (Germany) at the 2014 World Cup did nothing to change that. Deschamps even entrusted him with the captain's armband for the first and only time in his career in March 2015. The coach's confidence in him was unshakeable until his last, not to say final, outing against Armenia in October. The sextape affair and his statements in Marca will keep Deschamps at bay until Tuesday.

BENZEMA HAS NEVER SEEN A FRANCE TEAM IN A POSITION TO WIN

The story picks up just when it seems to have been sealed, offering Benzema a second chance, not to say a second life, in the French national team. Everything had changed, and now he was surrounded by world champions. He has never experienced such a dynamic, such a calm environment and a France team capable of winning a tournament. Throughout his career with the national team, he has oscillated between Les Bleus in the process of building, rebuilding or drifting apart.

Now that he is no longer the saviour or the man who has to change his team's dimension, the expectations will be less heavy on his shoulders than during his first mandate, even if his return raises a lot of excitement. He is no longer the leader or the central figure, but a member - and an important one at that - of a team that has already proved, without him, that it can rule the world. And that's probably the best thing that could have happened to him.

THE EURO BEFORE QATAR?

At the age of 33, he can now look forward to playing in both the UEFA EURO and the World Cup in Qatar. How will the story end? That's what this unexpected comeback is all about. At the age of 20, his adventure looked set to be a straightforward one, and his destiny with the French national team a foregone conclusion, but he had to wait until he was 33 to turn his fortunes around with Les Bleus. His itinerary has been bumpy, tortuous, unpredictable and unique. We thought we knew the end of it, but now it's open to all possibilities.

Why did Deschamps take so long to recall Benzema?