A new six-episode Dune series premiers tonight on HBO and Max — a prequel to the Denis Villeneuve-directed Dune movies set 10,000 years before the birth f Paul Atreides. The Hollywood Reporter writes that it "draws on source material from the 2012 novel Sisterhood of Dune by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson, and Frank Herbert's 1965 novel Dune, the origin of the Dune universe." Cord-cutters can stream Dune: Prophecy online without cable on Max, with subscriptions starting at $9.99 per month through both Prime Video and the Max website directly. Amazon offers a seven-day free trial to the Max channel. Those who want to watch Dune: Prophecy online without a traditional cable service can also get Max as an add-on to existing streaming services, including Hulu and DirecTV Stream. The San Francisco Chronicle describes the series as "">all palace intrigues, agonizing deaths and magical mind games." Taking a further cue from the network's top-rated Game of Thrones, this show indulges more sex and nudity than the Dune movies allow. It could be argued that elements like this introduce a liveliness often missing from the portentous big-screen behemoths, marking an improvement. Another fun touch here: Many characters are constantly baked. Set a millennium before Frank Herbert's novels and the films' events, and a century after humans overthrew their "thinking machine" overlords, the psychoactive "Spice" from the desert planet Arrakis is already the most valued substance in the universe. It's not only vital for spaceship navigation and to expand the mental powers of sorceressy sisterhoods like the Bene Gesserit, it's the club drug of choice for younger members of the galaxy-ruling Great Houses. As ever with "Dune" business, control of the Spice trade fuels much of the conflict and character motivations. Of which there are just enough to keep things interesting without becoming confusing... While the show can't match the outsize visual scope of Denis Villeneuve's films, it does pleasingly approximate those vast alien landscapes, Brutalist edifices and high-ceilinged chambers on a TV budget. For those who find Villeneuve's formal gigantism oppressive, the series' more human scale might be another welcome change of pace... There may not be an original thought in this "Dune" product's Spice-soaked head, but it is one professionally put-together piece of this sort of entertainment. "Tasked with making more material with less money and time, Prophecy cannot hope to equal Villeneuve's aesthetic accomplishments," writes Variety. "But at its best, the show does justice to the intricate politics and ethical debates that form a cornerstone of Frank Herbert's fictional universe... The primary Dune plot finds many echoes throughout Prophecy..." On the other hand, Vulture argues the six-episode series is "stuck in prequel quicksand," even calling it "an act of cowardice and abdication of creativity" (while also noting moments where it "feels like it's stretching itself to be something other than what we expect..."

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During a public joint hearing today titled "Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Exposing the Truth," four experts testified that the U.S. is running secret UAP programs, including crash retrieval and reverse-engineering programs for advanced nonhuman technology. Although the Pentagon maintains there's no evidence of alien spacecraft, witnesses like Luis Elizondo and Michael Gold argue that UAPs represent an intelligence enigma and call for open, stigma-free study to address potential security concerns and unknown scientific possibilities. NPR reports: Tim Gallaudet, retired rear admiral, U.S. Navy; CEO of Ocean STL Consulting, LLC "Confirmation that UAPs are interacting with humanity came for me in January 2015," Gallaudet said in his written testimony (PDF). He describes being part of a pre-deployment naval exercise off the U.S. East Coast that culminated in the famous "Go Fast" video, in which a Navy F/A-18 jet's sensors recorded "an unidentified object exhibiting flight and structural characteristics unlike anything in our arsenal." He was among a group of commanders involved in the exercise who received an email containing the video, which was sent by the operations officer of Fleet Forces Command, Gallaudet said. "The very next day, the email disappeared from my account and those of the other recipients without explanation," he said. Luis Elizondo, author and former Department of Defense official Elizondo's written testimony (PDF) was brief and alleged that a secretive arms race is playing out on the global stage. "Let me be clear: UAP are real," he wrote. "Advanced technologies not made by our Government -- or any other government -- are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries." Elizondo is a former intelligence officer who later "managed a highly sensitive Special Access Program on behalf of the White House and the National Security Council," according to his official bio (PDF). "By 2012, [Elizondo] was the senior ranking person of the DOD's Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, a secretive Pentagon unit that studied unidentified anomalous phenomena," his bio states, adding that he resigned in 2017. Michael Gold, former NASA associate administrator of space policy and partnerships; member of NASA UAP Independent Study Team Gold's written testimony (PDF) stressed the need for government agencies and academics to "overcome the pernicious stigma that continues to impede scientific dialogue and open discussions" about unexplained phenomena. "As the saying goes, the truth is out there," Gold said, "we just need to be bold enough and brave enough to face it." Michael Shellenberger, founder of Public, a news outlet on the Substack platform Shellenberger's testimony (PDF) ran to some 214 pages, including a lengthy timeline of UAP reports from 1947 to 2023. Shellenberger pressed the White House and Congress to act, calling for the adoption of UAP transparency legislation and cutting funds for any related programs that aren't disclosed to lawmakers. "UAP transparency is bi-partisan and critical to our national security," his written testimony stated. You can watch the proceeding here.

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Longtime Slashdot reader thephydes writes: The hearing will go ahead on November 13 at 11:30 ET (16:30 GMT). Apparently, it will "further pull back the curtain on secret UAP research programs conducted by the U.S. government, and undisclosed findings they have yielded," according to a House statement. It's driven by two republicans, Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) and Glenn Grothman (R-Wis.), who say: "Americans deserve to understand what the government has learned about UAP sightings, and the nature of any potential threats these phenomena pose. We can only ensure that understanding by providing consistent, systemic transparency. We look forward to hearing from expert witnesses on ways to shed more light and bring greater accountability to this issue." "Expert witnesses in the hearing will include Luis Elizondo, a decorated former counterintelligence officer who has claimed for years that the U.S. government is hiding knowledge of UAP, including materials recovered from crashed flying saucers," reports Space.com. "The House hearing will also include Tim Gallaudet, a retired U.S. Navy Rear Admiral who observed unidentified submersible objects, arguing that 'these underwater anomalies jeopardize US maritime security.'" "Other speakers at the hearing include journalist Michael Shellenberger, who has also claimed the U.S. government is hiding UFO crash retrieval programs, and former NASA Associate Administrator of Space Policy and Partnerships Michael Gold, who is a member of NASA's independent UAP study team."

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from the European Space Agency: White dots arranged in five clusters against a black background (PNG). This is the simulated extraterrestrial signal transmitted from Mars and deciphered by a father and a daughter on Earth after a year-long decoding effort. On June 7, 2024, media artist Daniela de Paulis received this simple, retro-looking image depicting five amino acids in her inbox. It was the solution to a cosmic puzzle beamed from ESA's ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) in May 2023, when the European spacecraft played alien as part of the multidisciplinary art project 'A Sign in Space.' After three radio astronomy observatories on Earth intercepted the signal, the challenge was first to extract the message from the raw data of the radio signal, and secondly to decode it. In just 10 days, a community of 5000 citizen scientists gathered online and managed to extract the signal. The second task took longer and required some visionary minds. US citizens Ken and Keli Chaffin cracked the code following their intuition and running simulations for hours and days on end. The father and daughter team discovered that the message contained movement, suggesting some sort of cellular formation and life forms. Amino acids and proteins are the building blocks of life. Now that the cryptic signal has been deciphered, the quest for meaning begins. The interpretation of the message, like any art piece, remains open. Daniela crafted the message with a small group of astronomers and computer scientists, with support from ESA, the SETI Institute and the Green Bank Observatory. The artist and collaborators behind the project are now taking a step back and witnessing how citizen scientists are shaping the challenge on their own.

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Hollywood Reporter: A production company for Blade Runner 2049 has sued (PDF) Tesla, which allegedly fed images from the movie into an artificial intelligence image generator to create unlicensed promotional materials. Alcon Entertainment, in a lawsuit filed Monday in California federal court, accuses Elon Musk and his autonomous vehicle company of misappropriating the movie's brand to promote its robotaxi at a glitzy unveiling earlier this month. The producer says it doesn't want Blade Runner 2049 to be affiliated with Musk because of his "extreme political and social views," pointing to ongoing efforts with potential partners for an upcoming TV series. The complaint, which brings claims for copyright infringement and false endorsement, also names Warner Bros. Discovery for allegedly facilitating the partnership. "Any prudent brand considering any Tesla partnership has to take Musk's massively amplified, highly politicized, capricious and arbitrary behavior, which sometimes veers into hate speech, into account," states the complaint. "Alcon did not want BR2049 to be affiliated with Musk." [...] The lawsuit cites an agreement, the details of which are unknown to Alcon, for Warners to lease or license studio lot space, access and other materials to Tesla for the event. Alcon alleges that the deal included promotional elements allowing Tesla to affiliate its products with WBD movies. WBD was Alcon's domestic distributor for the 2017 release of Blade Runner 2049. It has limited clip licensing rights, though not for Tesla's livestream TV event, the lawsuit claims. Alcon says it wasn't informed about the brand deal until the day of the unveiling. According to the complaint, Musk communicated to WBD that he wanted to associate the robotaxi with the film. He asked the company for permission to use a still directly from the movie, which prompted an employee to send an emergency request for clearance to Alcon since international rights would be involved, the lawsuit says. The producer refused, spurring the creation of the AI images. [...] Alcon seeks unspecified damages, as well as a court order barring Tesla from further distributing the disputed promotional materials. Musk referenced Denis Villeneuve's Blade Runner movie during the robotaxi event. "You know, I love Blade Runner, but I don't know if we want that future," he said. "I believe we want that duster he's wearing, but not the, uh, not the bleak apocalypse." I, Robot director Alex Proyas also took to X last week, writing: "Hey Elon, Can I have my designs back please?"

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An anonymous reader shared this report from ComicBook.com: On Saturday, 20th Century Studios announced that the latest entry in the Alien sci-fi horror franchise will get a limited-edition VHS release on December 3 — just in time for the holidays. The VHS release of Alien: Romulus is the first such release from a major studio since 2006... a major win for fans of physical media. In recent months, there has been a great bit of conversation surrounding the so-called death of physical media with the rise of digital and streaming with some retailers even having previously announced that they have or will be stopping sales of physical media. But with streaming platforms removing content for various reasons, there's been a rise in appreciation for physical media which has, in turn, resulted in increased sales, particularly when it comes to limited edition items such as Steelbooks [collectible steel-case disc releases]... Given that the Alien: Romulus VHS release is part of an overall celebration of the franchise for its 45th anniversary year, leaning into that nostalgia for feels pretty spot on. The release will present the movie "in a 4:3 aspect ratio," writes the Verge, "hopefully with well-done pan-and-scan..." (Their post includes a promotional picture showing the "slick, vintage-style" box-cover art.) "The tape has only the film," notes Gizmodo, "and no special featurette attached at the end, like some used to back in the day." Gizmodo also reminds readers of Hulu's 2025 series Alien: Earth and an upcoming videogame sequel to 2014's Alien: Isolation.

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Neal Stephenson is a sci-fi writer "of exuberant prose who revels in embracing big ideas," according to the New York Times. "With Polostan he enters the realm of the spy novel..." Or, as the Washington Post puts it, Stephenson "drops readers into a bloody, inspiring, conflict-ridden and pivotal period of the early 20th century." With its flair for characterization, precision of language, witty apercus and fecundity of events, the novel delivers what we've come to cherish from the author of such fantastical classics as "The Diamond Age," "Snow Crash" and "Cryptonomicon." But the book is also utterly unlike the majority of Stephenson's work. For one thing, it's short — a far cry from the maximalist "systems novels" that cram in entire worlds with complex interacting power structures, both explicit and hidden. "Polostan" is also devoid of fantastical elements and farcical "hysterical realism," which comes as a bit of a shock given that this is the writer who invented Mafia pizza-delivery guys and cybernetic children's primers. The structure of the book is, likewise, unusually straightforward: a mainly linear narrative dispersed along two timelines... These observations aren't quibbles so much as alerts to the reader that this is new territory for Stephenson — and good for him! Though, because Polostan is the first novel in a planned historical series titled Bomb Light, which aims to capture the excitement and intrigue of the nuclear arms race, we cannot rule out any Stephenson freakiness down the line... Assuming the subsequent books are as good as this one, Stephenson might end up with a series that rivals Michael Moorcock's Pyat Quartet and Edward Whittemore's Jerusalem Quartet as a vivid and canny dissection of a century unlike any other. "Much of the next volume is already written," Stephenson says on Substack, calling it "a project that has been in the works for over ten years". (He also notes that among his novels, "even the stuff that's branded as science fiction tends to contain a lot of history.") Meanwhile in August, Stephenson's blockchain-tech startup Lamina1 announced a collaboration with special effects company Weta Workshop (from "The Lord of the Rings" film franchise) on a "participatory worldbuilding" experience. Variety reports: The experience is expected to offer "a new blueprint for IP expansion through immersive experiences that incorporate fan action and input." Per Lamina1's description for the project, "Stephenson and the Weta team will begin engaging a global community of creators and fans on the Lamina1 platform this fall, inviting them to unravel the lore behind a mysterious set of 'Artefacts' that will build upon the themes and lore from Stephenson's critically-acclaimed catalog of work. Next, the superfan will take on the new role of creator, utilizing their discoveries to contribute directly to the expansion of the universe." "Artefact" will serve as the flagship project in the Lamina1-Weta partnership and first major multimedia property launching on Lamina1's blockchain infrastructure and tooling. Neal Stephenson answered questions from Slashdot's readers in 2004. Now to promote his new novel Polostan, Stephenson will be making several personal appearances this week: At the Wisconsin Book Festival in Madison (Sunday at noon)Chicago's Book Stall (Monday at 7 p.m.)A Cary, North Carolina Barnes & Noble (Tuesday at 6 p.m.)New York City's Strand (Wednesday at 7 p.m.)At the Midtown Scholar Bookstore in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania (Thursday at 7 p.m.)Ames, Iowa at Dog Eared Books (Sunday at 6 p.m.)

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