iWorld
Reasons to watch Emmy Award Winner ‘Chernobyl’ Now Streaming on Hotstar Premium
MUMBAI: The recently concluded 71st Emmy Awards recognized excellence in primetime programming and individual achievement for the 2018-2019 television season. And the best performances of year have been spoken for! Out of all the award-winning shows, Chernobyl stood out with a total of 10 awards and bagged 3 most crucial awards this year – Outstanding Limited Series, Outstanding Directing for a Limited Series, Movie or Dramatic Special (Johan Renck) and Outstanding Writing for a Limited Series, Movie, or Dramatic Special (Craig Mazin). If you're wondering where to catch Chernobyl, it is Now Streaming on Hotstar Premium, that is incidentally leading the tally as the destination with maximum award wins this year.
Chernobyl is a gripping mini-series that has gained global popularity for chronicling the events around one of the worst man-made catastrophes, the 1986 nuclear accident in Chernobyl, Ukraine.
For everyone who have not watched the amazing series yet, we have listed down the reasons on why you should binge watch the mini-series.
"Chernobyl" is an excellent example of how one can learn about the real-life events and get compelling entertainment at the same time. It gives out intrinsic details of how this nuclear accident happened and who all were involved in this catastrophe.
Today, politics and power play a huge role in the society. The situation then was still like those now. Mazin, the creator of the show wants to show audience how the public is kept in denial about the truth of global war.
This miniseries is a nod to many blockbuster movies which dealt with similar situations. Though Chernobyl isn’t a movie, every episode is a movie like episode. The amount of genuine emotions you will feel for all victims is unbelievable.
Writer Craig Mazin was obsessed with the idea of creating a realistic atmosphere and wanted to show the real world during that time. Most of the scenes were shot in Lithuania. The Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant, which was closed 10 years ago, is almost 100% equal to the plant, which was in Chernobyl. The crew managed to find an area near Vilnius that resembles the neighbourhood in Pripyat. Some scenes were shot in the Ukraine. The creators worked together with local experts to be extremely accurate. The Kiev city centre was closed during the shooting. It was important to not let any modern details like cars or ordinary people appear in the scenes.
Musical accompaniment is one of the reasons people believe what is happening on the screen. To create unique music, composer Hildur Gudnadottir went to the abandoned Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant. There, she recorded unique noises and sounds that can be heard in different parts of the plant.
iWorld
Meta plans 8,000 layoffs in new AI-led restructuring wave
First phase from May 20 may cut 10 per cent workforce amid AI pivot.
MUMBAI: At Meta, the future may be artificial but the cuts are very real. The social media giant is reportedly preparing a fresh round of layoffs, with an initial wave expected to impact around 8,000 employees as it doubles down on its artificial intelligence ambitions. According to a Reuters report, the first phase of job cuts is slated to begin on May 20, targeting roughly 10 per cent of Meta’s global workforce. With nearly 79,000 employees on its rolls as of December 31, the move marks one of the company’s most significant workforce reductions in recent years.
And this may only be the beginning. Sources indicate that additional layoffs are being planned for the second half of the year, although the scale and timing remain fluid, likely to be shaped by how Meta’s AI capabilities evolve in the coming months. Earlier reports had suggested that total cuts in 2026 could reach 20 per cent or more of its workforce.
The restructuring comes as chief executive Mark Zuckerberg continues to steer the company towards an AI-first operating model, committing hundreds of billions of dollars to the transition. Internally, this shift is already visible: teams within Reality Labs have been reorganised, engineers have been moved into a newly formed Applied AI unit, and a Meta Small Business division has been created to align with broader structural changes.
The trend is hardly isolated. Across the tech sector, companies are trimming headcount while investing aggressively in automation. Amazon, for instance, has reportedly cut around 30,000 corporate roles nearly 10 per cent of its white-collar workforce citing efficiency gains driven by AI. Data from Layoffs.fyi shows over 73,000 tech employees have already lost jobs this year, compared with 153,000 in all of 2024.
For Meta, the move echoes its earlier “year of efficiency” in 2022–23, when about 21,000 roles were eliminated amid slowing growth and market pressures. This time, however, the backdrop is different. The company is financially stronger, generating over $200 billion in revenue and $60 billion in profit last year, with shares up 3.68 per cent year-to-date though still below last summer’s peak.
That contrast underlines the shift underway. These layoffs are less about survival and more about reinvention. As Meta restructures itself around AI from autonomous coding agents to advanced machine learning systems, the question is no longer whether the company will change, but how many roles will be left unchanged when it does.
