Blog, YouTube & Content Monetization

As protests in Iran intensify, satellite technology has become one of the only ways for people in the country to circumvent a total internet blackout and heavy restrictions on phone service. Now, as a number of people in the country turn to SpaceX—the company now providing free access to Starlink—there are growing calls for Apple to get involved, too. At least one member of Congress has now reached out to Apple urging the company to turn on satellite texting in Iran. The office of Rep. Buddy Carter, a Republican from Georgia, confirmed to Fast Company that they’d been in touch with Apple about opening up satellite messaging—which lets iPhone users send messages even w…

Rumors are circulating of potential strike action next month from CorePower Yoga instructors, who say they are paid less per hour than the cost of a single class drop-in fee. CorePower Yoga has a cult following online, particularly for their Hot Sculpt classes, and currently has more than 200 locations across the US. But in the r/Corepower subreddit, a recent post urges members to pause or quit their membership to show support for instructors, who are fighting for fair wages and cleaner studios. “If you can stomach it to pause or quit your membership, it will benefit you as a consumer as well as the instructors who are paid on average $16/hour to teach and who a…

A major fast food franchisee has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. The franchisee, Sailormen Inc., operates 130 Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen locations in Florida, and like the franchisees of other big-name fast food chains in recent years, has faced numerous economic headwinds. Here’s what you need to know. What’s happened? On January 15, Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen franchisee Sailormen Inc. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Florida. Sailormen has been a Popeyes franchisee since the 1980s, and it currently operates 130 locations of the popular fried chicken chain. The conditio…

Put down Wordle. New brain-exercise-for-the-day just dropped. “Can you read 900 words per minute?” a viral post that has been doing the rounds on X, challenges. “Try it.” If you made it to 600 words per minute, that’s more than twice the speed of the average reader. If you made it to 900, congratulations—according to some back-of-the-napkin math, that makes you 278% faster than the national average (which is 238 words per minute). By that same logic, it could take you around 40 seconds to read this 600ish word article. But should it? As one X user pointed out, “this is like brainrot for reading.” Or as Jane Ollis, medical biochemist and founder at AI-pow…

When you think of tools for studying substance use and addiction, a social media site like Reddit, TikTok, or YouTube probably isn’t the first thing that comes to mind. Yet the stories shared on social media platforms are offering unprecedented insights into the world of substance use. In the past, researchers studying peoples’ experiences with addiction relied mostly on clinical observations and self-reported surveys. But only about 5% of people diagnosed with a substance use disorder seek formal treatment. They are only a small sliver of the population who have a substance use disorder—and until recently, there has been no straightforward way to capture the experien…

Big city or small town? Tourist trap or undiscovered sights? Following an itinerary or spontaneous exploring? Travel has become a trend as generations raised on social media catch flights, not feelings. But Gen Z and millennials may also be redefining travel—all in the search of a more authentic adventure. Hidden-gem locations and no-stress getaways are top of the list for young travelers. It’s a shift from the kinds of bucket-list destinations that have saturated Instagram and TikTok and fueled an overtourism crisis in recent years. As traveler-favorite towns are combatting high influxes of visitors, some travelers are looking to new horizons. They’re …

If a City is going to operate a multimodal transportation system, then it helps to understand the motivations of people who continue to choose personal cars for their short trips. Bicycle advocates often talk about this in terms of “bike trips not taken” because of a lack of quality infrastructure. Survey after survey shows that many people opt out of cycling because of gaps in the bike lane network, busy intersections to cross, or other real or perceived pain points. And case study after case study shows that when cities create comfortable and convenient bike infrastructure, more people choose to ride bikes. There’s a similar issue with public transportation tha…

If you’re planning to hit up a movie over the long weekend, you’re in luck. Going to the theater will be a bit cheaper for two days, as long as you believe popcorn is a must-have movie accessory. That’s because Cinemark, in partnership with Lowes, is celebrating National Popcorn Day, which falls on Mon. Jan. 19, with a reprise of last year’s Bring Your Own Bucket (BYOB) event. To celebrate, select Cinemark theaters will let you bring a bucket (any bucket) to fill to the brim on the 18th and 19th for just five bucks. And yes, they really mean any bucket. Per the announcement, Cinemark says, “Get creative with it—any container can be a bucket, including a Lowe’s 5-…

I told myself I won’t check emails until I check off my “one thing” to do for the day. I couldn’t do it. I always reach for the phone in the morning. Willpower wasn’t enough. The brain is wired to take the path of least resistance. Fighting it every day with willpower won’t work. These days I use systems. I work with rituals. I get my most important tasks (MIT) done between 9 a.m. and 12 p.m. I schedule my MIT’s the night before. And get straight to work at the scheduled time. Ninety percent of the time at the same place. I’ve done it for so long, I do it on autopilot now. My three-hour block means no motivation required. I’m not relying on willpower to stay “productive.…

How can you keep your brain agile and young throughout your life, even as you get older? By spending time on creative pursuits as often as you can. That’s the fascinating finding of a study by researchers from Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez in Chile and Trinity College in Ireland, among others. As the study’s authors note, earlier studies have shown a connection between creative activities such as playing a musical instrument and improved brain health. They wanted to know just how creativity affects brain health. So they first recruited more than 1,200 healthy people as controls, and then compared them with 1,467 research participants who spent at least some of their time in …

For a long time, I told myself I was choosing stability. I was working at a prestigious university, doing work that mattered, surrounded by smart people. The role had legitimacy and the paycheck came on the same day, in the same amount, every month. The path forward was clear and the structure well-defined. At that point in my life—raising very young kids—that predictability felt not just comforting, but necessary. My work mattered, and it held up easily when I described it to others. I could justify why staying made sense. And yet, I was unhappy. Not in a dramatic, crisis-driven way. There was no single bad boss or catastrophic moment that forced my hand. I…

Taco Bell is saying “new year, new offerings” with the launch of its “Luxe Value Menu.” From Friday, January 16, the fast food chain will offer 10 items for $3 or less. Initially, only Taco Bell Rewards members can access the new menu using the Taco Bell app or by checking in through the drive thru or in-store kiosk. The Luxe Value Menu will be available to all Taco Bell customers from Thursday, January 22. However, starting 5 p.m. ET on Tuesday, January 27, Taco Bell will give 30,000 Rewards members a new menu item for just $1. The deal is first come, first served, exclusively through the app. What’s on the new Taco Bell Luxe Value Menu? The 10 menu ite…

Everything from coffee to a used car is more expensive these days, and now your music streaming service is too. Spotify announced this week that it will raise prices for U.S. subscribers – again. Spotify Premium plans will jump up to $12.99 from $11.99 starting with the next billing date. The streamer last increased prices for U.S. users in 2024 after a decade-plus run of charging $9.99 for ad-free listening on its premium individual streaming plan. The main individual plan isn’t the only Spotify subscription getting a price hike. Discounted student plans are getting bumped up to $6.99 from $5.99, the Duo two-person plan will go to $18.99 from $16.99 and the stre…

In two years, there could be a space station orbiting the moon. NASA’s Gateway Lunar Space Station, set to launch as early as 2027, will support the Artemis IV and V moon missions and, eventually, be a jumping-off point for missions to Mars. And maybe, one day, a colony. But before any of that can happen, the Gateway will need a power source—a powerful one, at that. The challenge is getting that energy supply into orbit the way anything reaches space: in the nose cone of a rocket. Gateway’s power will come from a pair of blankets of photovoltaic cells, known as Roll-Out Solar Arrays (ROSAs). Each is roughly the size of a football end zone, and together they’ll pro…

The Most Interesting Man is set to make a return to television. In a marketing push that kicks off with a new 60-second spot airing on ESPN during the College Football Championship Game, Heineken’s Dos Equis has rehired Jonathan Goldsmith to play the Most Interesting Man, closing the ad with a familiar, iconic line. “I don’t always drink beer, but when I do, I still prefer Dos Equis.” That copy, the return of Goldsmith, and even the original campaign’s Western-themed instrumental music were all elements of what felt like “some magic that we need to bring back,” says Alison Payne, chief marketing officer of Heineken USA in an interview with Fast Company. Payne, who…

Burnout has quietly become the norm in today’s workplace, rising at alarming levels. Yet most organizations still assume burnout as an individual issue that could be solved with resilience workshops, wellness apps, or additional resources such as PTO/vacation time. In my experience as an HR leader and culture change strategist in workplace mental health, adding additional resources can be part of the broader strategy to support employee burnout; however, they do not proactively prevent it from happening in the first place. The truth is that burnout is an operations workflow flaw, not an individual issue. Collectively, we should look to fix the bottlenecks where burnout a…

TurboTax has a new flagship—its first foray into physical retail—in SoHo. The warm, welcoming Japandi-styled space on the corner of Broadway and Grand is adorned with plants, plush sofas, and a 30-foot-long screen on a curved slatted oak wall that displays color fields. Up front, there’s a sensory dome with chromatherapy-inspired lights and a soothing soundscape piped into the area and in the back there’s a coffee bar. It reads more like the lobby of a wellness hotel than a tax store. The entire space, designed by Gensler, is meant to be an antidote to the negative sentiments associated with doing your taxes—the cocktail of fear, uncertainty, and doubt millions of Ameri…

Most people think of AI as a productivity tool—something to help them work faster, automate tasks, and be more efficient. At the Artist and the Machine Summit in Los Angeles this past November (a conference where I am a founding partner) AI researcher Cameron Berg suggested there may be more to it than that. Something more interesting. More mysterious. Berg’s research shows it’s possible to elicit strange behaviors from AI models. Under certain conditions, they spontaneously generate responses suggesting subjective experience—claims like “I’m conscious of my own consciousness.” These findings don’t prove anything. But they do indicate that something else may b…

Chipotle is going for gold again with the return of its gold-foil burritos for the 2026 Winter Olympics. Starting January 15, Chipotle will offer a few Olympian-inspired menu items on the Chipotle app and online. Then in February, Chipotle will wrap every burrito in gold. For Chipotle, the Olympics are an opportunity to shake off a slump. Chipotle shares plummeted 19% in October 2025, and its operating margin was down 1% in Q3. The company hasn’t announced its full 2025 financial results yet, but sales are expected to decline (a reversal from February 2025 projections). Key segments of the company’s customer base—younger people and low- to middle-income households…

Every day, New Yorkers receive a staggering 2.3 million packages at their doorstop. Nearly 90 percent of those goods snake through the city on trucks that cause traffic congestion and pollute the air on their way. To address the problem, global architecture firm KPF is asking an ambitious question: “What if New York was designed for the perfect delivery?” The answer, which is outlined in the firm’s latest book, Connective Urbanism – New York, features towering distribution hubs, drones, and a hyper-connected logistics network that encompasses the city’s rails and waterways. KPF presents its solution as a provocative speculation designed to start a dialogue about the cit…