Why didn’t The Social Reckoning enjoy the box office success of 2010’s The Social Network, asks IndieWire/A>:

[T]here wasn’t the same urgency in the story being told. The Social Reckoning focuses less on Zuckerberg, and more on data engineer Frances Haugen’s decision to blow the whistle on how Facebook’s algorithms were promoting political content that radicalized users, as well as the company’s awareness of how its products were contributing to a rise in bullying and teen suicide… [B]ut The Social Reckoning arrives as a much greater threat has emerged from Silicon Valley. Artificial intelligence is dominating the headlines, as fears mount about the economic disruptions it will unleash when millions of jobs are replaced by machines, and, graver still, its potential to trigger a world-ending event… And it’s not like Haugen’s testimony led to lasting change at Facebook… As IndieWire’s Ryan Lattanzio put it, “‘The Social Reckoning’ argues that the aftermath of their whistleblowing is still somehow felt today. In actuality, living as we do in 2026, it pretty much feels like… no one cared, and nothing changed?”

After the first movie’s director bowed out, Sony Pictures shied away from selling it as a sequel — but the problems run deeper, the article adds. “The Social Reckoning isn’t just a financial failure, it’s a critical one, too. The reviews were blistering…” Although on the bright side, “Sony wisely kept The Social Reckoning’s budget at $30 million, meaning it won’t face losses on the scale of a Digger… ”

Variety writes that Digger “cratered in its second weekend with $3.2 million from 3,321 theaters, a 60% decline from its dismal $8 million debut. So far, the Tom Cruise satire has limped to $14 million domestically and $35.3 million globally. Warner Bros. spent above $160 million to produce the film, which is shaping up to be one of the biggest bombs ever…”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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There was some Blade Runner news at New York Comic-Con this weekend — and also some news about Godzilla. Ars Technica reports:

We got our first look at Prime Video’s new sci-fi series Blade Runner 2099 in July at San Diego Comic-Con. With the show’s premiere roughly six weeks away, the streamer unveiled the full trailer this weekend at New York Comic-Con… Prime Video will drop all eight episodes of Blade Runner 2099 on November 25, 2026. [It’s already earned 2.1 million views in the last 17 hours].

We also got a new trailer for Godzilla Minus Zero, the sequel to director Takashi Yamazaki’s gloriously grounded kaiju epic, Godzilla Minus One, which became a major international hit and snagged an Oscar for best visual effects. [1.2 million views in its first five hours]

And StarWars.com brings news from the Star Wars universe:

Kevin Smith has already announced his Star Wars/Marvel: Hope Assembles crossover comic, interweaving the Marvel universe and the Star Wars galaxy like never before. Now, you’re cordially invited to add your own creative ideas to the mix through a LEGO Ideas challenge celebrating the milestone 50th anniversary of Star Wars: A New Hope.

Using physical or virtual LEGO bricks, fans are challenged to build “their own epic mash-ups,” according to Lego’s web site, “in three categories: Character Fusion, Vehicle Fusion, and Scene Fusion.” (“Write an engaging description and upload great images of your creation without using AI tools…”)

Meanwhile, Star Trek fan site TrekMovie.com covered the major Star Trek announcements:

There were an interview with 95-year-old William Shatner by Star Trek super-fan Ben Stiller, which ended “with Stiller surprising Shatner by revealing the original Gorn head from his personal Star Trek memorabilia collection.”Also announced was a new documentary about the disastrous fan-organized convention in 1982 that tried reuniting cast members from the original series. (Its title? The Con of Wrath: The Craziest Convention Ever!)Gates McFadden (who played Dr. Beverly Crusher on Star Trek: The Next Generation) will write a new comic book to “bridge the 20 year in-universe gap in Crusher’s story between the events of the film Star Trek Nemesis and the television series Star Trek: Picard.”Paramount+ offered a panel about their series Star Trek: Starfleet Academy (which returns for a second season in 2027).Nacelle Toys even announced new action figures of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry and Lucile Ball, owner of Desilu Productions.

Reuters also has photos of costumed attendees.

But there was also some excitement when an unruly fan shouted over a panel for the Prime Video animated series Helluva Boss. Entertainment Weekly reports it culminated with series star Brandon Rogers shouting “You need to shut the f— up right now. I’m going to jump over this fence and end you. It’s not cute.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

In an otherwise repairable device, the cooling fan is hard to reach.

We got our first look at Prime Video’s new sci-fi series Blade Runner 2099 in July at San Diego Comic-Con. With the show’s premiere roughly six weeks away, the streamer unveiled the full trailer this weekend at New York Comic-Con. Co-stars Michelle Yeoh and Hunter Schafer (Euphoria) joined showrunner Silka Luisa (Shining Girls) onstage for the big reveal.

As Luisa described the show during the NYCC panel Saturday night:

We are 50 years after [Blade Runner] 2049 and, bad news, the worst has happened. The replicant uprising that has been bubbling up in the films has taken place and the humans have lost. So the creations have surpassed their creators. And the series, the big question it asks is, ‘What happens when our time as a species ends?’ 2099 is taking place at a junction point when one species is ending and a new one is rising. The first film, something I loved about it, was that it was looking at mortality on a micro level. Roy Batty and the other replicants were fighting for more life. This show asks that same question but on a macro level. Mankind—what happens when we realize our time is running out? And are we going to accept that loss? Can we hold on to our humanity during it?

Yeoh stars as Olwen, the dying Replicant, while Schafer plays Cora. The cast also includes Hugo Hamlet as Buster Friendly, as well as Dmitri Abold, Lewis Gribben, Katelyn Rose Downey, Daniel Rigby, Johnny Harris, Amy Lennox, Sheila Atim, Matthew Needham, Tom Burke, and Maurizio Lombardi—all in as-yet-undisclosed roles.

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Your Google Pixel phone has a set lifetime of support based on when it first went on sale. After that, you have few options for using it securely.

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The Chicago Sun-Times reports:

When Elgin Community College hired Flock Safety to install six surveillance cameras in April 2025, President Peggy Heinrich thought they would “enhance the safety and security of students….” They were supposed to help locate stolen cars and missing people. But Heinrich started to wonder if the cameras were actually making students less safe after seeing news reports that data captured by Flock cameras in Illinois had been shared with U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Then in September 2025, Immigration and Customs Enforcement detained an Elgin Community College student in a campus parking lot. More than half of students at the far west suburban Chicago campus identify as Latino. Heinrich said enrollment dipped. Students were afraid to come to class. College officials decided the cameras had to go…

College officials asked Flock to remove the surveillance cameras “out of an abundance of caution for our students,” Heinrich said. But getting the cameras taken down was not as simple as it sounds, especially because Flock retains ownership of the company’s equipment…. Surveillance experts say the company is financially incentivized to have as many cameras gathering data as possible even in places that no longer want them, because potential clients are looking for the surveillance network with the greatest reach…. Elgin Community College staff notified Flock in October 2025 that they wanted to cancel their contract and have the cameras taken down. Within a day, Heinrich said, Flock rejected the request and refused to uninstall the equipment on the basis that the company had not breached their agreement.

College officials reached out again in December 2025 and said they would pay for the remaining five months of the contract — they just wanted the cameras taken down. “We never received a response back from Flock,” Heinrich said.

That’s when things got weird. Heinrich said Elgin Community College staff began to cover the cameras using black trash bags and zip ties so that they would not be able to capture footage. But workers in an unmarked vehicle, which Heinrich assumed belonged to Flock, repeatedly removed the coverings… This strange dance continued, Heinrich said, until Elgin Community College’s contract with Flock expired in April this year and the company uninstalled the cameras for good.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Bloomberg reported that the HomeView device will start shipping in November.