When Netflix said that David Fincher and Tim Miller's Love, Death and Robots was an animated series for mature audiences, it wasn't kidding around. The streaming giant has posted the trailer for the 18-story anthology, and you definitely won't be watching this with younger viewers. The title is not only apt, but can sometimes describe one scene -- there are multiple displays of robot sexuality, for starters. The trailer doesn't show enough to indicate whether these will be thought-provoking tales or simply a bit risqué, but it's certainly enough to raise eyebrows (and ears, given the thumping industrial soundtrack). And even if you don't care for it, look at it this way: it might open the door for more adult-oriented animation on Netflix.

A video software firm has come up with a way to prevent people from sharing their account details for Netflix and other streaming services with friends and family members. UK-based Synamedia unveiled the artificial intelligence software at the CES 2019 technology trade show in Las Vegas, claiming it could save the streaming industry billions of dollars over the next few years. Casual password sharing is practised by more than a quarter of millennials, according to figures from market research company Magid. Separate figures from research firm Parks Associates predicts that by $9.9 billion (£7.7bn) of pay-TV revenues and $1.2 billion of revenue from subscription-based streaming services will be lost to credential sharing each year. The AI system developed by Synamedia uses machine learning to analyse account activity and recognise unusual patterns, such as account details being used in two locations within similar time periods. Netflix's recommendation algorithm is pretty sophisticated these days, to the point where it can probably determine not only what you want to watch next, but what you'll eat for breakfast 13 years on Wednesday and the thread count of your sheets. And yet, it still has a tendency to spit out some peculiar recommendations.

David Fincher's next project for Netflix is taking a sharp left turn. The famed director is working with Deadpool's Tim Miller on Love, Death, and Robots, a mature-themed animated anthology series. The show will revolve around 18 short stories of varying length (from 5 to 15 minutes each), each with their own film crews using distinctive art styles ranging from classic 2D to realistic CG. The producers aren't saying much about the content, but have noted the episodes will cover genres like comedy, horror and tragedy. You can expect subjects as strange as "alien spiders" and "sentient dairy," in case you thought the producers might play it safe.

As a masters student exploring artificial intelligence at Stanford University almost 30 years ago, Reed Hastings no doubt had an eye on where the future might take him. But of all the scenarios he imagined for his career, it's highly unlikely that any of them included the one that unfolded this past week: strolling the red carpet in the south of France, rubbing shoulders with some of the country's most glamorous actors and actresses, and fielding questions about his role as a global media kingpin. It's a future the CEO of Netflix says he couldn't even have predicted five years ago, when the company was still primarily shipping DVDs to customers in the U.S. while grappling with its emerging video streaming service. Even now, the Internet continues to scramble the game so fast that Hastings said his company is racing to keep up with all the changes. When asked, he didn't even want to hazard a guess as to where Netflix might be five years from now. "We don't really know," Hastings said.