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\n\tThe techie titans who grabbed our attention and our Oscars\u00a0in The Social Network almost 16 years ago are ready to capture our screens again.\u00a0Their forays are omniscient as well as ominous.<\/p>\n
\n\tIn upcoming movies like The Social Reckoning<\/a> and Artificial<\/a> or in myriad books and TV shows, the Odysseus-like wanderers have re-emerged as nerdy narcissists feuding\u00a0over the anarchy of AI.<\/p>\n \n\tAaron Sorkin made us laugh at the youthful coders searching for a foothold, but bilious billionaires like the Musks, Altmans, Zuckerbergs and Bezoses are now increasingly intruding upon the way we live and think. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tAnd some forecasts are dark:\u00a0\u201cTechdom once ate the world but is now eating itself,\u201c declared The Economist, in a review titled \u201cBoom and Gloom.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tOpenAI itself is slated to spend $600 billion on AI Infrastructure by 2030, yet will generate only $2 billion a month in revenue while \u201ccrying for further government funding,\u201d says an editorial in the Wall Street Journal. This week the Journal reports that \u201cAI anger has some tech executives stepping up security and fearing for their lives.\u201d \u00a0<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cOur industry has drastically underestimated how much we\u2019re going to keep people at the center of everything,\u201d says Sam Altman<\/a>, OpenAI\u2019s chief executive.\u00a0\u201cWe\u2019ve been right on our technological predictions but wrong on their social and economic implications.\u201d\u00a0Apple filed suit on OpenAI last week for stealing trade secrets.<\/p>\n \n\tArtificial, a movie about Altman and his company, was financed\u00a0last year by Amazon MGM, but that studio dropped distribution plans the moment director Luca Guadagnigo yelled \u201cwrap.\u201d\u00a0After some nervous screenings, the film was picked up by Neon<\/a> for release next month. Its star, Andrew Garfield, ironically played the winning, then losing, player\u00a0in The Social Network.<\/p>\n \n\tRELATED: 45 Of The Most Anticipated Movies Of 2026<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tAlso headed for\u00a0production are movies based on the two embattled prediction sites, Kalshi and Polymarket.\u00a0Will they generate a box office betting fever?<\/p>\n \n\tReflecting all this, recent press conferences called by tech leaders offered conflicting forecasts of AI\u2019s future.\u00a0Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg theorized that \u201cthere should be more jobs in the future thanks to AI, not fewer.\u201d Two months after his speech, he laid off\u00a08,000 workers.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tAnthropic CEO Dario Amodei warned that 50% of entry-level jobs would imminently be eliminated, only to make even deeper cuts within a month.<\/p>\n \n\tSimilar contradictions are emerging about the future of the work week, with Zoom CEO Eric Yuan predicting a three day week, Steve Cohen forecasting four, and Bill Gates predicting two.\u00a0Elon Musk<\/a> went further, predicting that work in general will become optional \u2013 \u201cit will be akin to sport or a\u00a0video game.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tTV\u00a0documentaries and magazines that attempt to pigeonhole tech leaders usually surrender to similar ambiguities.\u00a0The June 2026 New Yorker ran an exhaustive profile of Ken Griffin, whose worth approaches $50 billion and \u201cwhose property portfolio resembles that of a Saudi prince.\u201d With it all, we\u2019re told that Griffin still \u201cpresents the vibe of a suburban dad who wears a polo shirt and jeans to meetings and drinks Coke for breakfast along with H\u00e4agen-Dazs ice cream.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tGriffin two years ago paid $238 million for a four-story Manhattan penthouse but now ponders shifting his base to Miami for tax and lifestyle reasons.<\/p>\n