Blog, YouTube & Content Monetization

AI is bringing voice to the forefront of brand interactions. Smarter AI means we can talk to our technology—LLMs, software, phones, cars, fridges, and even banking apps. The novel part is this: Our technology is now talking back, and convincingly so. Brands are catching on, and the smart ones know that voice isn’t just functional, it will form a core part of the brand identity itself. Voice will be the next frontier of branding. And not metaphorically. A brand’s literal voice—the voice(s) used for advertising, on their website, and now, in interactive AI-based conversations with customers—is becoming just as ownable as elements of a visual identity. But standing out …

Christine Renauld, CEO and Co-founder of Braindate, discusses how her app is revolutionizing networking by turning it into purposeful, meaningful conversations. View the full article

For its 50th anniversary, Zara has partnered with 50 designers and creators for a collection you might not expect from a fast-fashion mall brand. The Spanish fashion retailer unveiled its 50th anniversary collection at Paris Fashion Week with collaborators that include photographer Annie Leibovitz, supermodel Cindy Crawford, stage designer Es Devlin, and musician Robbie Williams. Available worldwide beginning Oct. 6, the collection does include plenty to wear (Leibovitz contributed a photo for a t-shirt), but what stands out most are the non-apparel items. This is about a whole lot more than clothes. Devlin, whose build stages for artists like Adele, Beyoncé, …

On December 1, podcaster and venture capitalist Harry Stebbings posted on LinkedIn that candidates were 200 times more likely to get into Harvard University than they were to get a job at the $6.6 billion valuation AI startup ElevenLabs. According to his statistic, out of 180,000 applicants in the first half of the year, only 0.018% were hired by the AI voice agent platform. That figure—extrapolated from a July spike in applications—may have been hyperbole. But it still went viral. And out of tens of thousands of applications, just 132 candidates eventually got the job at ElevenLabs—indeed, much lower than Harvard’s 3% to 4% admission rates. “On average, we’re se…

A group of college students braved the frigid New England weather on Dec. 13, 2025, to attend a late afternoon review session at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. Eleven of those students were struck by gunfire when a shooter entered the lecture hall. Two didn’t survive. Shortly after, a petition circulated calling for better security for Brown students, including ID-card entry to campus buildings and improved surveillance cameras. As often happens in the aftermath of tragedy, the conversation turned to lessons for the future, especially in terms of school security. There has been rapid growth of the nation’s now US$4 billion school security industry. …

Spot the robin’s egg blue of a Tiffany box, and you know there’s luxury inside. Or the sturdy brown of the UPS truck, and you expect reliable service. Yellow Minions make you smile, and Valentino’s vivid Pink PP Collection makes you want to step out and step up. Color is more than decoration. Color is a powerful tool that drives business and creates cultural relevance. The right hues build trust, drive sales, and make brands unforgettable, while the wrong ones can cost you customers and credibility. The launch of Coke Life in a green rather than familiar red can probably contributed to the product’s uphill battle with consumers. Even tinkering with a color combina…

You might not know it from the headlines, but there is some good news about the global fight against climate change. A decade ago, the cheapest way to meet growing demand for electricity was to build more coal or natural gas power plants. Not anymore. Solar and wind power aren’t just better for the climate; they’re also less expensive today than fossil fuels at utility scale, and they’re less harmful to people’s health. Yet renewable energy projects face headwinds, including in the world’s fast-growing developing countries. I study energy and climate solutions and their impact on society, and I see ways to overcome those challenges and expand renewable energy—but …

Uber is on Wednesday launching its own version of a bus system along busy routes, calling it its most affordable ride option yet. The rideshare company has introduced Route Share, a new service offering pickups every 20 minutes along busy corridors during weekday commute hours. Available from 6 a.m. to 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. local time, the service will launch in New York City, San Francisco, Chicago, Philadelphia, Dallas, Boston, and Baltimore Riders can select the Route Share option to see nearby routes and book a seat anywhere from seven days to 10 minutes before their intended pickup. They’ll then be prompted to walk to the set pickup area where the drive…

This article is republished with permission from Wonder Tools, a newsletter that helps you discover the most useful sites and apps. Subscribe here. Not everything creative needs a prompt. The Web is increasingly flooded with AI-generated images and videos, much of it aimed at kids. Sometimes it’s nice to break free of that synthetic media. As a dad of 10 and 12-year-old daughters, I appreciate resources for kids and families that celebrate human imagination, curiosity, and hands-on exploration. I had a fruitful recent conversation about resources for kids with a fellow dad, Kevin Maguire, who writes the great newsletter The New Fatherhood. If you’re a dad looking…

Here’s a guide to the most notable features of the top AI chat apps. ChatGPT: Your Conversationalist 🗣️ iOS & Android Advanced Voice Mode is the ChatGPT app’s most distinctive feature. Ask it to play a tough interviewer or a skeptical client as you prepare for a difficult conversation. Or have it ask questions to help you make a decision. Most of what you can do on your laptop you can do in the ChatGPT mobile app. Create an image. Ask for an infographic, a cartoon, or a photo illustration. See examples of seven ways I use these images. Ask for deep research. Get a detailed analysis with dozens of sources. See examples of nine ways I use this researc…

Our financial system still treats teens like little kids who need to wait their turn. Meanwhile, by the time most Americans turn 13, they have a smartphone in their pocket and are actively participating in the economy. Teens are transacting regularly, and many are earning through digital channels, running online businesses, or pursuing a passion project. There’s a better way. SUPERVISION AND A CONTROLLED ENVIRONMENT We need to give teens supervised access to financial tools earlier in their lives. Let them learn financial responsibility through real experience. Help them build smart money habits in a controlled environment. By the time they hit 18, every te…

Artificial intelligence is reshaping the global workforce and rapidly expanding the expectations placed on today’s learners. The World Economic Forum predicts that technological advancements like AI, alongside economic and demographic factors, will lead to a net increase of 78 million global jobs this decade. Educational institutions now face a pivotal moment. They must evolve how students learn, how instructors teach, and how technology supports each step of that journey. For decades, the education sector adopted new technologies cautiously. However, the profound impact of AI on the workforce has accelerated interest and experimentation. Our latest research at Cengag…

Picture a data center on the edge of a desert plateau. Inside, row after row of servers glow and buzz, moving air through vast cooling towers, consuming more electricity than the surrounding towns combined. This is not science fiction. It is the reality of the vast AI compute clusters, often described as “AI supercomputers” for their sheer scale, that train today’s most advanced models. Strictly speaking, these are not supercomputers in the classical sense. Traditional supercomputers are highly specialized machines designed for scientific simulations such as climate modeling, nuclear physics, or astrophysics, tuned for parallelized code across millions of cores. What …

I’ve been writing professionally since 2002, and in that time, I’ve experimented with lots of different strategies to keep myself on track. (I’ve been a columnist at Fortune and Fast Company, and am now a contributing writer for The New York Times Opinion Section, in addition to cohosting Slate’s Money podcast, and I’ve been an editor, reporter, and opinion writer for a number of other places.) I also have, shall we say, a fragmented attention span, and my therapist likes to routinely bring up how many women my age have undiagnosed ADHD, which I now take as a not-so-subtle hint. So I need systems and routines maybe a bit more than the average person, and it has taken …

Synchrony’s CEO, Brian Doubles, shares with Stephanie Mehta how a mindset of “productive paranoia” fosters a workplace where curiosity, collaboration, and creativity drives real change. View the full article

As a woman in the United States, turning 21 means beginning a lifelong journey of getting a pap spear every three years. It’s not a pleasant experience. You’ll lie down with your legs in stirrups, while your doctor inserts a speculum inside your vagina. Then, she or he will take a sample from your cervix with a hard plastic device to figure out if you have any trace of HPV (the human papillomavirus), a sexually transmitted infection that can cause cervical cancer, or cancerous and precancerous cells. Starting today, however, there’s an easier solution. Teal Health, a woman’s health company founded in 2020, has developed a new product that allows you to take a sam…