Blog, YouTube & Content Monetization

For global companies, Africa’s promise has long been tempered by a persistent operational myth: that the continent is not ready for complex business. The reality is different, however. The barrier isn’t a lack of demand, but the inability of traditional global systems to handle Africa’s unique financial landscape. Nearly 400 million African adults remain on the fringes of the formal financial system, yet digital adoption is exploding. The conversation has decisively shifted from basic financial access to a more critical question: How can multinationals efficiently manage their core operations like paying suppliers, collecting revenue, and moving money across borders, …

It looks and feels like any other luxurious cashmere sweater. But a new oversized crew from Reformation is made entirely from recycled fiber, a milestone three years in the making. The brand now makes a cardigan, crew, V-neck, and five other styles from a carefully developed blend of 95% recycled cashmere and 5% recycled wool—the unexpected material that made 100% recycled fiber feasible. Some other pieces in its lineup still use a small amount of virgin cashmere, but Reformation is aiming to eliminate it completely. “It really does have an outsized and shockingly large footprint compared to other fiber,” says Kathleen Talbot, Reformation’s chief sustainability of…

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…

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…

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…

Lots of work situations require some creativity. A client needs a nonstandard solution to a problem. A colleague is stuck in a dispute with their supervisor. You’re writing an article and you need to find a third good example of the concept you’re describing (see what I did there?). You may have the occasional brilliant insight, but then look on in dismay at all of the mediocre ideas you come up with in times of need. Is there something you can do to come up with better ideas? The answer is, “sort of.” Quantity over quality First off, don’t fret if you feel like most of the ideas you generate when trying to solve a new problem are bad. Research on creativit…

As 2026 begins, the workplace is rapidly changing due to technological advances, shifting labor dynamics, and evolving employee expectations. Organizations that anticipate and adjust to these changes are more likely to attract top talent, boost productivity, and stay competitive. From embracing artificial intelligence in the workplace to a continued focus on skill-based hiring, the future of work is being shaped by trends that could redefine how we collaborate, learn, and thrive. Here are three top workforce trends to watch in 2026. 1. THE AI-AUGMENTED WORKFORCE The adoption of AI is quickly becoming a critical factor in modernizing the workplace. Companies and emp…

Most climate reports are bleak. Temperatures are soaring. Sea levels are rising. Companies are missing—or abandoning—their emissions targets. But a new report from the nonprofit Energy & Climate Intelligence Unit looks at the surprising amount of progress that’s happened since the Paris climate agreement 10 years ago. Renewable energy has grown faster than every major forecast predicted in 2015. There’s now four times as much solar power as the International Energy Agency expected 10 years ago. Last year alone, the world installed 553 gigawatts of solar power—roughly as much as 100 million U.S. homes use—which is 1,500% more than the IEA had projected. Investo…

You don’t need a perfect jump shot or the exhaustive knowledge (or opinions) of Stephen A. Smith to land a career in sports. You can get far on passion and a desire to spread that love of the game throughout an increasingly fan-driven world. Sports marketing—which encompasses everything from managing multimillion-dollar sponsorship deals and crafting social media campaigns for local teams to coordinating fan activation at the Super Bowl—is one of the most robust components of the sports industry, which is worth at least $500 billion globally. To understand the state of play in this arena, Fast Company analyzed nearly 2,800 job listings on Google for Jobs between April…

Long John Silver’s is known for its seafood, but it’d like to be better known for its poultry. So much so, that it just swapped the fish in its logo for a chicken. In time for national seafood month, Kentucky-based chain announced that it’s dropping the golden yellow fish illustration for a similarly styled chicken illustration. It’s also adding the words “Chicken” and “Seafood” to its lock-up. “Guests have been telling us for years that our chicken is a best-kept secret,” Long John Silver’s senior vice president of marketing and innovation Christopher Caudill said in a statement. “It’s time we let that secret out.” For now, the new logo shows up on the Long J…

Think about how many emails you receive each day. Then how many of those include the phrase “please find attached” in the body. One X user has made a plea to retire the phrase, a relic leftover from a time when business communication relied on typewritten letters posted in envelopes, which actually included attached documents to be found. The post quickly went viral, gaining nearly 15 million views since it was posted earlier this week. While the user doesn’t elaborate why exactly they personally take issue with the phrase, or what to say instead, the post had the desired effect, with many weighing in with their own takes on modern email etiquette. Some agr…

The results are in. McDonald’s latest earnings report sheds light on the growing divide among U.S. consumers—as the wealthiest Americans continue to spend and eat out—while lower income families are making less trips to the Golden Arches as they battle the rising cost of living, skyrocketing food prices, grocery inflation, and stagnate wages. A look at McDonald’s third quarter earnings, released Tuesday after the closing bell, shows the fast food giant’s U.S. same-store sales increasing 2.5%, over the same period last year, (up 3.6% globally,)—but missing analyst expectations with adjusted earnings per share (EPS) coming in at $3.22, ten cents under expectations of $3…

In the run-up to the annual U.N. climate conference, set to take place in Brazil’s Amazon in November, the construction of a road is drawing attention, with critics arguing it will lead to environmental degradation. Before the talks, called COP30, the state government of Para is building a 13-kilometer (8-mile) avenue designed to ease traffic on a major highway that runs parallel. The road was planned long before Belem, a metropolitan area of 2.5 million people that sits on the edge of the Amazon, was chosen as conference host. That hasn’t spared it sharp criticism, however, because the road is expected to cut across the last remnants of rainforest in Belem. R…

Six years ago, when Michael Buckley returned to True Religion‘s offices as CEO, the denim brand looked nothing like the one he had built a decade earlier. Buckley was the brand’s president between 2006 and 2010, when True Religion was a luxury brand that sold jeans priced between $300 and $500 at Neiman Marcus and Barneys. Buckley helped grow revenues to more than $300 million a year, but after he left, the brand hit hard times, as it struggled to adapt to e-commerce. It filed for bankruptcy in 2017 and again in 2020. In 2019, after serving as CEO of Differential Brands Group (which owns Hudson Jeans), Buckley came back to True Religion to clean up the mess. He’s …

In this final chapter of How YouTube Ate TV, Fast Company’s oral history of YouTube, the platform migrates from computers and phones to the biggest screen in the house: the living-room TV. It also takes on TikTok with brief videos called Shorts and becomes a major destination for podcasts. And it begins to tackle one of its greatest opportunities—albeit a fraught one—by incorporating AI into the creation process. To succeed, it will have to do this without losing the human element that made YouTube a phenomenon in the first place. Comments have been edited for length and clarity. Read more ‘How YouTube Ate TV’ Part one: YouTube failed as a dating site. This…

A federal judge on Thursday approved a $1.5 billion settlement between artificial intelligence company Anthropic and authors who allege nearly half a million books had been illegally pirated to train chatbots. U.S. District Judge William Alsup issued the preliminary approval in San Francisco federal court Thursday after the two sides worked to address his concerns about the settlement, which will pay authors and publishers about $3,000 for each of the books covered by the agreement. It does not apply to future works. “This is a fair settlement,” Alsup said, though he added that distributing it to all parties will be “complicated.” About 465,000 books are on the list of …

Beleaguered pharmacy chain Rite Aid has officially filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection after weeks of media reports suggesting that it was on the cusp of doing so. The bankruptcy is Rite Aid’s second in two years, and it leaves a lot of questions for both customers and employees, including whether stores will be closing, if there will be layoffs, and what happens to customers’ prescriptions. Here’s what you need to know about Rite Aid’s second bankruptcy. Why did Rite Aid file bankruptcy the first time? Rite Aid originally filed for bankruptcy in 2023. It emerged from the process less than a year ago, in 2024, with the hopes of being in a better fi…

Rite Aid is moving quickly to close additional store locations after selling a substantial chunk of its pharmacy business to other companies last week. The drugstore chain, which is winding down operations after seeking Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection for a second time earlier this month, has listed 95 store locations that it wants to close as it continues to seek buyers for its retail operations. The locations span six states, with Rite Aid’s home state of Pennsylvania being hit hardest. The list includes more than 70 Pennsylvania stores. Competitors scoop up Rite Aid’s pharmacy assets The move to close additional locations was disclosed in a court filing one…

Shares of Krispy Kreme Inc. (NASDAQ: DNUT) plunged over 28% on Thursday after the donut-and-coffee chain said it will no longer pay out its quarterly dividend and that it was “reassessing” the deployment of its planned McDonald’s rollout, and fell short of earnings expectations, according to Bloomberg. Krispy Kreme’s earnings missed expectations for the first quarter of 2025, with the company posting an EPS (earnings per share) of negative $0.05, coming in below the EPS forecast of negative $0.04. It posted revenue of $375.2 million, within previous guidance but below a forecast of $385.11 million. Following the announcement, Krispy Kreme’s stock fell by 28.18% in…

Each business has its unique challenges, but one commonality today is that AI is poised to disrupt almost every business everywhere. Organizations aren’t the only ones rapidly shifting to adopt AI—attackers are too, and they’re doing it faster. The implications of this AI arms race are alarming for legitimate businesses around the world. Security teams must rapidly evolve their cyber strategy to meet these new threats, moving away from a reactive posture that detects and then responds after an incident happens. To outpace attackers, organizations will need to be preemptive instead—deterring, neutralizing, and preventing threats before they happen. HOW AI IS CHANG…

Amazon will once again beef up its workforce in the fourth quarter to handle the expected shopping surge that comes with the holidays. This year, though, it could be responsible for nearly half of all seasonal hiring in the retail sector. The retail giant says it plans to create 250,000 jobs in the U.S. That’s on par with the number of people it hired last year—and in 2023. That not only underscores Amazon’s standing among shoppers, but it also puts a spotlight on expected slower sales at some competitors. Seasonal hiring is nothing new. Every year as temperatures get brisker, retailers put the call out for workers looking to make some extra cash and help handle t…