Blog, YouTube & Content Monetization

The worst part of any medical is waiting for results. That can be especially true of sexual health tests. Those conducted in person can take 24–48 hours, but if they’re submitted via at-home collection kit and mailed to a lab, it can take even longer. A new test from diagnostics company Visby Medical, launching nationwide today is changing that. Now that it’s successfully completed a pilot period, the company is bringing a 30-minute, lab-accurate PCR test for three common sexually transmitted infections to women at home. From a self-collected vaginal swab, the $149.99 test can diagnose chlamydia, gonorrhea, and trichomoniasis—three common infections that can all easi…

British entrepreneur Emma Grede, who founded the women’s bodywear company Skims along with her husband Jens Grede and Kim Kardashian, is getting a lot of attention after dismissing work-life balance as a priority for employers. “Work-life balance is your problem, not the employer’s responsibility,” Grede said on “The Diary of a CEO” podcast on Monday, hosted by British entrepreneur Steven Bartlett, which features interviews with CEOs and other successful leaders. “Look, I have four kids and I had to figure out how I would think about my own ambition balanced with my parenting, that’s the truth,” she continued. While they say that all PR is good PR, Grede’s claim i…

Ann Hummond knew the office software like the back of her hand. Based in Yorkshire, England, she could untangle any spreadsheet snafu in her sleep. Over the past 23 years, she had worked her way up from a data entry clerk to her finance company’s administrative director, quietly becoming the person everyone relied on when things went sideways. She was, in short, indispensable. And then, one Tuesday morning last year, during a quarterly team meeting attended by directors, colleagues, and a team leader, her boss—who is nearly 10 years her senior—told her publicly, in a roomful of people: “You’re too old to do this job.” “I must have looked like a goldfish…

“If this is your first time being poor, I’m Kiki, and I’m trying to make it affordable to eat by using depression, recession and wartime recipes,” says TikTok creator Kiki Rough in a video posted last month. While most people wouldn’t turn to the 1940s for dinner inspiration, Rough’s video has since racked up over four million views. “‘We are so back’ as says my 104-year-old grandparents,” one comment reads. “The economy must be cooked if this is trending,” added another. Rough’s video dropped just days after President The President’s global tariff announcements in April, which sent the stock market tumbling and triggered headlines warning of a looming rec…

What is “happiness”—and who gets to be happy? Since 2012, the World Happiness Report has measured and compared data from 167 countries. The United States currently ranks 24th, between the U.K. and Belize—its lowest position since the report was first issued. But the 2025 edition, released on March 20, the U.N.’s annual “International Day of Happiness,” starts off not with numbers, but with Shakespeare. “In this year’s issue, we focus on the impact of caring and sharing on people’s happiness,” the authors explain. “Like ‘mercy’ in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, caring is ‘twice-blessed’—it blesses those who give and those who receive.” Shakespeare’s plays of…

The 4chan website is down, and continues not to load for many users, according to Downdetector. (Downdetector is a platform that monitors online services and internet-related issues, and is essentially a crowd-sourced outage reporting tool.) This outage comes amid unconfirmed reports on social media, including on Reddit, that the internet message board was hacked. Fast Company has reached out to 4chan for comment and did not hear back immediately. The outage was first reported on Downdetector at around 9:57 p.m. ET on Monday night, and peaked soon after around 10:12 p.m. ET, when 1,265 users reported the problem. Since then, users have taken to monitoring the pla…

Ernest Hemingway had an influential theory about fiction that might explain a lot about a particular weakness of artificial intelligence, or AI. In Hemingway’s opinion, the best stories are like icebergs—with what characters actually say and do located above the surface, but making up only a fraction of the unfolding action. The rest of the story—the characters’ motivations, feelings, and their understanding of the world—ideally resides instead beneath the surface, like the bulk of an iceberg, serving as unarticulated subtext for all that transpires. Perhaps the reason Hemingway’s theory struck a chord is because human beings are like icebergs. Whatever people say or …

On days of heavy pollution in Sulphur, a southwest Louisiana town surrounded by more than 16 industrial plants, Cynthia “Cindy” Robertson once flew a red flag outside her home so her community knew they faced health hazards from high levels of soot and other pollutants. But she stopped flying the flag after Louisiana passed a law last May that threatened fines of up to $1 million for sharing information about air quality that did not meet strict standards. On Thursday, Robertson’s group Micah 6:8 Mission and other Louisiana environmental organizations sued the state in federal court over the law they say restricts their free speech and undermines their ability to promot…

From the outside, it looks like a generational standoff. Baby boomers are retiring earlier than expected, frustrated by workplace change, technology shifts, and growing tension with younger colleagues. At the same time, Gen Z talks openly about quitting jobs that feel misaligned or draining. Many leaders interpret this as a clash of values. Older workers cannot adapt. Younger workers lack commitment. The data tells a more complicated story. New research from Clari and Salesloft, conducted in partnership with Workplace Intelligence, surveyed 2,000 U.S. sellers and sales leaders across industries. The study found that 19% of baby boomers are planning to retire early…

If you’re in need of some good and satisfying news, Chipotle has got you covered. The beloved burrito brand is bringing back its free burrito promotion for April 3rd’s National Burrito Day. According to the chain’s March 31 announcement, Chipotle Rewards members will once again be able to play the popular Burrito Vault game at UnlockBurritoDay.com. The game, which involves customers trying to guess exact burrito order combinations, is easy to play but comes with delicious prizes. Players will get four attempts to win BOGO (buy-one-get-one) codes. Each hour, the first 2,500 members to choose burrito orders with the correct ingredients will win free food. “Las…

Many brands take advantage of Mother’s Day to sell more products, like flowers and cupcakes. But 50 companies, including workwear label M.M. LaFleur, framing startup Framebridge, and stroller brand Bugaboo, are joining forces to draw attention to America’s lack of federal paid leave. Across the country on Saturday, May 10, the nonprofit MomsRising, the Paid Leave for All campaign, and 50 brands are hosting pop-ups in New York City; Washington, D.C.; Philadelphia; Nashville; Hoboken, New Jersey; and Cleveland, offering more than $100,000 in donated goods and services. The idea is to help new moms by giving them things like formula, breast pumps, clothing, and strollers…

The room is silent. All eyes are on you. Your heart races, but as you take a deep breath, confidence replaces the nerves. You begin to speak, not just to inform, but to captivate. Public speaking isn’t an innate talent; it’s a skill that can be mastered. With the right techniques, anyone can transform into a compelling speaker. Research shows that 77% of people experience anxiety around public speaking, yet confidence and clarity can be learned. I frequently speak publicly, addressing teams of executives, industry leaders, and students. As a seasoned financial services executive with two decades of leadership experience and the two-time author of Wisdom on the Way to…

Walking around the factory floor of Twincraft Skincare, outside Burlington, Vermont, there is the unmistakable scent of soap. The general manager points out the luxury lines and designer labels for whom they manufacture soaps and lotions, as well as the basic, inexpensive bars and bottles left on hotel room sinks. The factory runs two 10-hour shifts per day, four days a week, with an overtime option as needed. At over 400 employees, Twincraft is one of the top employers in the state. In the last few years, there’s been a boom in skincare products and, to meet demand, Michele Asch, Twincraft’s chief people officer, says they’ve had to hire over 180 people over the pas…

Few apps are as inextricably linked to the iPhone as Apple’s Messages. Introduced with the original iPhone almost 18 years ago, the app (then called “Text”) has become the primary messenger for most iPhone users worldwide. It allows users to receive Apple’s proprietary iMessages, as well as RCS messages and old-school SMS messages. In recent years, Apple has introduced several new features to the Messages app and its iMessage protocol. Most recently, in iOS 18, the company allowed users to stylize text by bolding or underlining words, incorporated animated effects that make words shake or appear to explode, and enabled users to react to a message with any emoji. But …

There’s an ear-piercing war brewing at the mall. Claire’s, the biggest player in the market, has hit hard times, leaving room for upstarts to impinge on its territory. For 60 years, Claire’s has billed itself as a place for kids and teens to get their first piercings. The company says it has pierced more than 100 million ears since 1978. But after declaring bankruptcy in August (its second bankruptcy in seven years), Claire’s was acquired by the holding company Ames Watson for $140 million. These new owners have plans to turn the business around, including drastically shrinking its retail footprint which had ballooned to more than 1,000 stores. It recently annou…

Back in the 1930s, Robert W. Woodruff, president of the Coca-Cola Co., would carry a red swatch in his wallet. Of course, it wasn’t just any red. It was Coca-Cola red. And so anywhere he went and encountered his brand—painted on a wall, wrapping a refrigerator—he would pull out the little swatch to check that it matched. Woodruff understood the importance of Coca-Cola’s brand equity as it expanded globally—a challenge that has only grown since, now that Coca-Cola sells 2.2 billion servings a day across 200 countries, 150 languages, and 30 million points of sale. But where Woodruff used a swatch, Coca-Cola’s design team has spent the past four years dreaming up a modern op…

You couldn’t have missed the news: Jony Ive and Sam Altman have teamed up, after OpenAI acquired Ive’s company io for $6.5 billion. The plan? For Ive, and a sizable team of ex-employees from Apple, it’s to create a series of hardware products for OpenAI. The news alone dropped shares of Apple by 1.8% as two of the most celebrated software and hardware development teams in the modern era have combined to realize the potential of artificial intelligence and change the way we live. Hopefully for the better. The first io product, according to The Wall Street Journal, arrives in 2026. It will be a small object “capable of being fully aware of a user’s surroundings and…

Have you heard of “Maycember”? According to social media, it’s a term that describes the hectic nature and mounting expenses families face around May, particularly parents with children, due to the increased cost of everything from graduation gifts to summer camps and family vacations, which combined with inflation (and tariffs), have made May feel extra expensive, just like the winter holiday season. That’s as total spending for college and graduation gifts is expected to reach a record $6.8 billion in 2025, up from $6.1 billion in 2024, according to the National Retail Federation. And U.S. consumer spending was up in May 2024, even as prices remained stable; the per…

Ugly might be the new cute: Just look at Labubu, a “kind of ugly” plush toy that has sparked a buying frenzy across the world, especially in Asia, reported CNN. People from Bangkok to Kuala Lumpur flocked to shopping malls on Friday to get the latest edition of the oh-so-collectible furry, while they quickly sold out online. Inspired by Nordic folklore, the toothy stuffed animal has high, pointy, rabbit-like ears, big round eyes, and a mischievous grin with serrated teeth. Made by Chinese toymaker Pop Mart, Labubus come in so-called “blind boxes” the size of a hand, which keep the contents a mystery until the box is opened. Pop Mart, which sells collectibles, has …

As always, many of this year’s best apps are ones you’ve probably never heard of. Sure, there are some big names on this list, particularly in the buzzy field of artificial intelligence, but the real standouts of 2025 innovated on a smaller scale. They give you better ways to take notes or remember things, write with just your voice, have fun snapping photos, or even indulge in some gaming classics. For this list, “apps” include desktop and mobile software, along with browser extensions and web tools. Some apps are entirely new, while others received transformative updates that make them worthy of a fresh look. Hopefully, you’ll discover something that quickly bec…

Layoffs might make headlines, but the real measure is how leaders support the remaining employees. Layoffs are undeniably challenging for good reason. However, it’s what leaders do in the aftermath that determines whether a culture fractures or recovers. I’ve led workforce complex reductions at Amazon, Microsoft, startups, and PE-backed firms. While every situation was unique, the same pattern appeared each time. It wasn’t necessarily the layoff that broke the culture. It was the leadership response. Layoffs disrupt the culture and impact more than just headcount. I’ve watched talented, engaged employees turn quiet and withdrawn after layoffs. Not because they sto…

As the 2025 Major League Baseball season gets into full swing, you’d expect the league to use its marketing muscle to hype the heroics of its biggest stars. But its anime-style ad campaign takes that idea to a new level. “Heroes of the Game” mixes the on-field superpowers of players like Shohei Ohtani, Paul Skenes, Julio Rodríguez, Juan Soto, and Aaron Judge with the pop cultural artistry of anime hits like One Piece and Fullmetal Alchemist. Created with ad agency Wieden+Kennedy, the league also partnered with Passion Pictures and Echelle Studios in Japan, as well as acclaimed animation director Hiroshi Shimizu, to make the work. The first ad features a whol…

When India banned TikTok in 2020, YouTube responded by launching a short-form video feature with a similar user experience in the country. Less than a year later, that feature rolled out globally as YouTube Shorts, which allows creators to post 180-second-long swipeable vertical content. Today, YouTube Shorts has roughly 1.5 billion users and receives an average of 70 billion daily views. With TikTok’s future in limbo in the U.S.—a much-delayed ban is set to take effect on June 19—Shorts is hoping that TikTok’s audience of almost 2 billion people will see it as a compelling alternative. YouTube is already the second-most visited site in the world, and the platform ha…

Fans of Big Lots who were devastated when the embattled retailer filed for bankruptcy last year will be happy to learn that more than 200 locations are expected to reopen by summer. The discount chain, which had initially been expected to close every store, struck a deal in December with Variety Wholesalers, parent company of Roses and other bargain shopping chains, which agreed to take over hundreds of leases and operate the stores under the Big Lots brand. Here’s what you need to know: When are the Big Lots store reopening? The stores are having their soft openings in four “waves,” with the first wave of nine stores having already opened earlier this month, a…