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View More NewsAndy Serkis has played some of contemporary film’s most memorable characters: Gollum in the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit trilogies, Kong in King Kong, Caesar in the Planet of the Apes reboot, proto-punk icon Ian Dury in the biopic Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll, and arms dealer Ulysses Klaue in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Serkis has also moved behind the camera: He directed an animated adaptation of George Orwell’s Animal Farm, which was released in theaters on May 1. Later that month, Serkis spoke with Reason’s Nick Gillespie about his new film, authoritarianism, and what unites his signature roles. Q: Let’s talk about Animal…
In brief Nano Banana 2 Lite (gemini-3.1-flash-lite-image) generates images in four seconds at roughly $0.034 per image. This means it produces results at about half the cost of Nano Banana 2 at the same resolution and 2.7× faster. In head-to-head testing, the Lite model matched or beat Nano Banana 2 on many fields, but when details are important, the more expensive version may be the better option. Google last week launched Nano Banana 2 Lite—officially gemini-3.1-flash-lite-image—as the entry point in its image generation stack, sitting below Nano Banana 2 and well below Nano Banana Pro. It delivers text-to-image outputs in…
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A review of Love and Terror: The Helter-Skelter History of the Manson Murders by Claudia Verhoeven; 384 pages; Verso (May 2026)Although the True Crime genre of publishing and documentary television is replete with accounts of murderous spouses, serial killers, Mafia wars, and financial scams, rarely do the subjects transcend the headline immediacy of police procedurals to deliver the long-term import of critical analysis. The Victorian predator Jack the Ripper and the Depression-era exploits of Bonnie and Clyde are two such exceptions; a third is the countercultural carnage wrought by the Manson family. As such, Claudia Verhoeven’s new book Love and Terror: The Helter-Skelter History…
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from the truth-and-fiction-and-ai dept This story was originally published by ProPublica. Republished under a CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 license. Last month, my colleagues and I published an investigation into a Texas…
The crypto industry has spent years convincing Washington that it deserves a seat at the table. Now, as Congress inches toward passing the CLARITY…
A recent records request revealed that a Canadian government department is working up a potential new federal strategy on misinformation. But the section explaining what…
Mexico City, July 9, 2026—Mexican authorities must immediately and credibly investigate the killing of environmental journalist and content creator Manuel Alejandro Mora Serna and…
I WANT FREE MINDS AND FREE MARKETS! Help Reason push back with more of the fact-based reporting we do best. Your support means more…
The privacy-focused Zcash network completely stopped creating new blocks for more than four hours on Wednesday, a rare and worrying pause for the system.Think…
Movement, the Move-based blockchain network that has expanded into stablecoin payments and financial infrastructure, said it has gained access to licensed payment rails across…
The President’s Echo System: How Foreign Policy Is Sold to Americans, by Chad Levinson, Harvard University Press, 288 pages, $39.95 The modern presidency frequently…
The long-term value of decentralized finance (DeFi) depends on its ability to transform the back-office operations of global banking institutions rather than providing alternative…
The US Treasury has sanctioned four Iranian crypto exchanges, including the country’s largest, Nobitex, marking the latest effort in its campaign called “Economic Fury”…
Officials in Macon–Bibb County, Georgia, have dropped their case against 95-year-old Paula East after realizing they had approved her vinyl windows more than 20…
The legacy financial and digital frameworks propping up the current internet architecture face an imminent, existential crisis.Evin McMullen, co-founder and CEO of Billions Network,…