We’ll admit it just this once: Hollywood is not the world. What counts as a disaster for us might not have much of an effect beyond it. (In fact, the growing disconnect between Hollywood and the public at large is the source of many of Tinseltown’s struggles.) And in a year with so many actual human tragedies in and around L.A. — from the January wildfires to indiscriminate ICE raids to widespread rolling layoffs — it would be inappropriate to put the following industry-centric developments on the same level. Instead, consider the unordered, random and decidedly subjective grievances below to fall somewhere on the spectrum between catastrophe and minor annoyance. In other words: bummers.

A musician in Canada has had a concert cancelled after he was falsely identified as a sex offender by a Google AI overview.

The Juno Award-winning fiddler, singer and songwriter Ashley MacIsaac had been due to play at the Sipekne’katik First Nation in Nova Scotia, Canada on December 19, but he said he was informed that the show was called off after a Google AI summary wrongly asserted that he had been convicted of a series of offences, including sexual assault.

Vince Zampella, who co-created the popular video game series Call of Duty, has died in a car crash in California, aged 55.

Zampella’s death was confirmed by Electronic Arts, which owns Respawn Entertainment, a game studio he co-founded.

The influential video game developer was travelling in a Ferrari with another person, when it crashed and caught fire on a highway in Los Angeles on Sunday.

”This is an unimaginable loss, and our hearts are with Vince’s family, his loved ones, and all those touched by his work,” a spokesperson for Electronic Arts told the BBC.

Apple has published a fun teaser on the Apple Fitness+ Instagram account, promoting what it promises to be “something big” that will land on the service next year. Watch it below.

’The countdown begins’

In the teaser, published as an Instagram Reel, multiple people are reading a newspaper called Apple Fitness+ Times, with multiple flashy headlines claiming that “something big is coming to Apple Fitness+.

iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max owners are having trouble with the speakers of their devices, and have complained about a static or hissing noise that occurs when the iPhone is charging. There are multiple discussions about the issue on Reddit, the MacRumors forums, and Apple’s Support Community, where affected users say there is a noticeable static noise ”like an old radio”.

2025 was a significant year of advancement for Apple’s software, with a noticeable focus on visual design, productivity, and communication. While Apple introduced and continued to iterate on a wide range of features throughout the year, several additions stood out for their scope and practical impact across multiple devices. As the year comes to an end, these five new features provide a useful lens for weighing up what the company focused on this year and how far its platforms evolved in 2025.