• Dropbox co-CEO Ashraf Alkarmi announced layoffs of roughly 200 workers.
• Alkarmi said the cloud-based storage company is profitable but needs to make "hard choices."
• You can read his full email to employees below.

Dropbox is dropping the layoffs hammer.

Dropbox co-CEO Ashraf Alkarmi announced on Wednesday that the cloud-based storage company is laying off roughly 9% of its global workforce.

"Today, we're making difficult choices about where we invest and how we organize Dropbox to achieve the product and growth priorities that will matter most for our long-term strategy," Alkarmi wrote in an email to workers that the company posted publicly.

Alkarmi said Dropbox is eliminating roughly 200 roles across its across Engineering, Product, Design, and G&A team. The company, Alkarmi wrote, is profitable but needs to make "hard choices" about where it spends its money.

"Delivering on that strategy requires concentrating our resources on the priorities that will have the greatest potential for customer impact and growth," he wrote.

As part of the changes, Alkarmi also announced that chief technology officer Ali Dasdan will be stepping down.

Read the full email

Hi everyone,

Today, we're making difficult choices about where we invest and how we organize Dropbox to achieve the product and growth priorities that will matter most for our long-term strategy. As part of these changes, we've made the decision to eliminate about 200 roles across Engineering, Product, Design, and G&A teams (approximately 9% of our global workforce). For most impacted Dropboxers, today will be their last day.

S-team and I take full ownership of this decision and recognize that these colleagues have made meaningful contributions to Dropbox, our products, our customers, and our teams. Our first priority today is to treat every person affected with the care and respect they deserve.

Changes to Senior Leadership

I also want to share that Ali Dasdan has decided to move on from Dropbox. During his time here, Ali led and strengthened many of the technical capabilities we'll rely on as we move into the next phase of our transformation. I'm grateful for his leadership, his partnership, and the foundation he and the team have put in place. Ali's last day is November 18th, and he'll be focused on ensuring a smooth transition through next month. We wish him all the best in what comes next.

Why we're making these changes

Our business is profitable, and we've built real momentum this year. Our two-year strategy sets a clear direction for growth: solving more of our customers' critical workflows; reaching more of our chosen customers, including larger companies; and bringing our technology to new markets.

Delivering on that strategy requires concentrating our resources on the priorities that will have the greatest potential for customer impact and growth.

That means making hard choices about where we invest, how we're organized, and what work we simplify, scale back, or stop. Those choices include the difficult decision to reduce the size of our team.

How we'll prioritize going forward

In order to be successful, we can't take the same work and spread it across fewer people. We'll streamline teams and concentrate support and resources against product areas that have the highest impact on our customers and Dropbox as a business.

Taking care of impacted employees

To those leaving Dropbox, we're committed to supporting you through this transition. Departing Dropboxers are eligible for a severance package in line with the following:

Severance, equity, and transition support:

Sixteen weeks of pay beginning today, plus one additional week for each completed year at Dropbox. International packages will reflect local practices and legal requirements

Q4 equity vesting

For employees on the Corporate Bonus plan, a prorated lump-sum payment based on their 2026 bonus target

Immigration support for impacted visa holders

Healthcare and well-being:

U.S. employees will receive six months of COBRA subsidy, if elected and eligible

Modern Health access will continue through the end of the separation month to support mental well-being, with extension options detailed in severance packages

Payment for eligible current and approved upcoming paid leaves, including medical and family leave

Additional support:

Devices: Impacted employees will be eligible to keep (1) Dropbox laptop, (1) mobile device if assigned, and all existing desktop peripherals

Job placement: Job placement services and career coaching will be available at no cost

What comes next

Right now, our focus is on the colleagues who are leaving Dropbox. Please give them the space and support they need.

And to everyone leaving Dropbox: thank you. Your work to build our capabilities, serve our customers, and contribute to our culture has been deeply meaningful. I'm grateful for everything you've contributed.

Ashraf

December is when streaming companies bring out the really big guns, but November is no wimp when it comes to major releases.

Today we are taking a look at what’s coming to streaming next month, so grab your comfy blanket, put the kettle on and let’s dive right in!

The Greatest – Prime Video (November 4)

The life of legendary boxer Muhammad Ali has been immortalised on screen before, but The Greatest casts a wider net and covers his whole life in detail over an eight-episode series.

Starring Jaalen Best as the legendary boxer, The Greatest follows the transformation of a young Cassius Clay into Muhammad Ali, exploring his struggles both inside and outside the ring.

A major plus for the series is the involvement of Michael B Jordan, who serves as executive producer.

Stick (Season 2) – Apple TV (November 4)

Guys, at this point I would watch anything released by Apple TV. A-ny-thing. I don’t know what’s happening over there, but their creative team is firing on all cylinders and it’s a wonder to behold.

Owen Wilson returns as Pryce ‘Stick’ Cahill, the washed-up golfer who, during season one, rediscovers his love for the sport by mentoring a young prodigy.

Wilson, who I strongly believe was born to play this part, now eyes his own comeback in season two, as he decides to return to professional golf and take a shot at winning the US Open.

Timothy Olyphant and the always welcome Marc Maron return, and to make the whole thing even better, Rhea Seehorn joins the cast as Pryce’s new coach. What more do you want?

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (Season 3) – Prime Video (November 11)

One does not simply walk into Mordor. Because it is currently under construction.

Amazon’s ambitious Tolkien adaptation returns for its third season, taking place five years after the fall of Eregion.

Sauron’s armies are spreading across Middle Earth, the Elves are fighting desperately to resist him and the Dark Lord is preparing to forge the One Ring.

Morfydd Clark returns as Galadriel, alongside Charlie Vickers as Sauron and Robert Aramayo as Elrond.

The season also introduces Jamie Campbell Bower, of Stranger Things fame, as Galadriel’s partner Celeborn, and Simon Pegg as the voice of the Balrog.

Guarding Stars – Netflix (November 18)

“Supernatural” star Jared Padalecki stars as Jack Stapleton, a famous action movie star who is in need of a new bodyguard. Leighton Meester is the reluctant professional who begrudgingly takes on the assignment and follows her client to his family ranch in Montana.

It is cheesy and predictable, so everything you want from a Christmas movie. Just what the doctor ordered for those cold winter nights to warm your heart!

The Altruists – Netflix (November 19)

Sam Bankman-Fried and Caroline Ellison were among the biggest names in cryptocurrency, and they were making billions before most people had caught up with this new thing.

By 2022, their empire had collapsed. Both eventually ended up in prison, with Bankman-Fried ordered to forfeit $11 billion.

The Altruists dramatises this extraordinary story of love and fraud over eight episodes. Honestly, given how crazy the whole story was, I doubt that the writers had to do any writing at all. Sometimes real life is far more bizarre and outrageous than anything a writers’ room can come up with.

Steps – Netflix (November 20)

There are always two sides to every story. For years we have been listening only to Cinderella’s side of the story, one that painted her stepsisters as evil.

Are they, though?

Ali Wong stars as Lilith, one of Cinderella’s misunderstood stepsisters, who embarks on an adventure to save the kingdom after she accidentally plunges everything into chaos.

Blade Runner 2099 – Prime Video (November 25)

One of science fiction’s most celebrated franchises makes the jump to television.

Set 50 years after the events of “Blade Runner 2049”, this eight-part limited series returns viewers to a futuristic Los Angeles where the distinction between humans and artificial beings remains dangerously blurred.

Hunter Schafer stars as Cora, a fugitive who assumes the identity of a Blade Runner, while Michelle Yeoh plays Olwen, a replicant approaching the end of her life.

Original Blade Runner director Ridley Scott serves as executive producer.

The Hunchback, Soul of Paris – Netflix (November 27)

Having read Victor Hugo’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame, I was always amazed by Hollywood’s lighthearted approach to the source material. The actual book is dark and heart-wrenching. There are no happy endings for anyone and definitely no singing gargoyles.

This film apparently decides to stick closer to the spirit of the novel, taking a far darker approach to Victor Hugo’s legendary character. I say “spirit” because the plot looks like a total deviation.

Set in Paris in 1830, against the backdrop of political unrest and a devastating cholera epidemic, the film follows a disfigured man hunted by authorities who want to use him for medical experiments.

Vincent Cassel the titular character.

Why is Motherwitch – opening this Thursday in local cinemas – quite a special kind of film? Let us count the ways.

“It’s special because it’s Cyprus’ first folk-horror feature film,” says Minos Papas, who directed it and also co-wrote the script (with Nikolas Kouroumtzis and Euripides Dikaios).

It’s also special because “it’s based on Cypriot folklore that has not been seen onscreen before” – the fabled kalikantzari, mischievous goblins (sometimes said to be the spirits of lost kids coming back to haunt their parents) who appear during the 12 days of Christmas, and were previously immortalised in the silkscreen prints of Hambis Tsangaris.

It’s also special, says Minos, because “it’s shot in real locations of Cyprus – the abandoned 15th-century village of Parsata” (which the production spent a month restoring), and “the ruined monastery of the Holy Cross, ‘Timios Stavros’, in Anogyra.”

What’s more, “it’s a wintry Cyprus that we don’t usually see, the colour palette is grey and green and brown”. In fact, with its green fields and layered purplish hills stretching into the horizon, the landscape often seems more Balkan than Mediterranean, adding to the doom-laden atmosphere.

It’s also special because “it’s a movie where people will hear the actual Cypriot dialect of the late 19th century – or at least what we assume it was,” adds the director. Note that the film is being released not just with English, but also Greek subtitles – though he actually went back and forth on that, says Minos, the effect of the archaic dialect on modern Cypriot viewers (allowing them to catch the dramatic flow without understanding every word) adding a strangeness, “an arcaneness” that’s actually interesting.

Is that all? Not entirely.

Motherwitch is also special for genre buffs and special-effects geeks because its effects are almost entirely ‘practical’ (i.e. not computer-generated), a huge point of pride in the horror-fantasy world.

The filmmakers used “the ‘Schüfftan effect’ from the original Blade Runner” to create glowing eyes, says the director – an intricate effect, involving literal mirrors placed next to the camera – and also, for instance, used a “cloud tank to create these dreamy skies”, shot in his apartment in LA “then composited onto the skies here”.

Then again, lest we get too geeky, the film also provokes some emotional reactions.

“In Malta, I had somebody [from the audience] coming up to me sobbing – because she was going through a loss,” he reports. “She’d recently lost her mother, and she said –” Minos laughs out loud – “she told me to go fuck myself” for having hit a nerve so precisely. “Which was really touching…”

Motherwitch is the story of Eleni (Margarita Zachariou), a wandering painter in rural Cyprus in 1882, soon after it became a British colony. (The British play a small but significant part in the narrative.) Having lost her children in a tragic accident, she initially withdraws from life – but then, teaming up with an abused village boy, she embarks on a blood ritual that she hopes will bring back her kids. But “something ancient is unleashed” instead.

The film took seven years to make, much of that devoted to writing the script and finding the budget of €1.7 million – which sounds like a lot to the layman, but “the layman needs to get educated then,” jokes Minos grimly, “because 1.7 doesn’t go very far, especially in the European funding system [where] you have to pay for a lot of accounting and auditing”.

About half the funding came from the Cyprus government and Invest Cyprus, the rest includes equity (i.e. private investors) from both here and the US – the country that’s been Minos’ base for the past 27 years, since he went to study in New York at the School of Visual Arts. (Motherwitch is his third feature film.)

The idea was brewing in his head for a lot more than seven years, however, sparked by Tsangaris’ prints of the kalikantzari – but in fact they later meshed with something else, an artist friend in the US who lost her son when he was two days old and, grief-stricken, painted his portrait and wrote a book of poems (Poems for Wyatt) about her loss.

That unlikely mix lies at the heart of Motherwitch – and is also part (yet another part) of what makes it special.

The film’s done well on the festival circuit, having played Fantasia in Montreal and Sitges in Spain, two of the world’s biggest fests for genre films (a catch-all term for horror, sci-fi, fantasy, action, and cult cinema) – but the most common reaction he gets, says Minos, is perhaps that “it’s unique, it’s its own thing”.

Wikipedia describes Motherwitch as a “gothic folk horror fantasy film”. The trailer calls it simply ‘A Cyprus Gothic’. It’s coming out for Halloween, and the shoe obviously fits – yet “I think ‘horror’ is my least favourite word for the movie,” admits Minos. “It’s the word we adopted because we had to classify it, y’know?

“In the beginning we were saying to people ‘It’s a fairytale’ – and we’d describe it, and they’d be like ‘Oh, so it’s a horror film’.” He laughs. “No, no, no! There’s no blood, there’s no violence…” There are creatures – kind of – but “you don’t really see anything”.

Minos’ own preferred term is ‘Gothic’ – “19th-century ghosts, more or less. A very sort of wintry, stone look”.

There’s a certain texture (“It’s a very handmade movie”), a certain melancholy, a certain atmosphere that sticks to your bones. It’s there in the visuals, the antiquated words, the emotional pull of the grief-stricken mother.

An unusual film? You could say that. An unusual Cypriot film? And how.

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The sudden death of Greece’s popular singer Giorgos Mazonakis opened the Pandora’s Box about illegal medical practices and pseudo-scientific “alternative” methods aiming first of all at the healing of the pockets of scam doctors with warm euros. His sudden death shocked the Greek society and mobilized health and police authorities in a speed we could […]

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