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Today, April 3, 2026, is Good Friday. It is an important day to Christians in the United States and around the world. But unlike in many other countries, Good Friday, in many U.S. states, isn’t an official holiday. When it comes to institutions and businesses, some observe the holiday, while others don’t. That can make it confusing for people to know exactly what is open and what is closed on Good Friday. Here’s what you need to know. Is Good Friday a national holiday? No, the federal government does not recognize Good Friday as a national holiday. This means that many federal institutions that are typically closed on public holidays remain open on Good Fr…

Hello again, and welcome back to Fast Company’s Plugged In. More than 15 months ago, I wrote about Surf, a discovery engine for the social web from Flipboard—itself an earlier twist on the same concept dating to the early days of the iPad. At the time, it was still a rough draft, and in private beta. Rather than rushing it out to a broader audience, Flipboard took its time. The app went through a series of revisions that were both numerous and substantial, ending up significantly different than the intriguing prototype I tried in December 2024. This week, the company finally deemed Surf ready for prime time. It’s now live in web form at Surf.social; a beta Android versi…

Baltimore, known for being a leader in medicine and technology as well as for its fiercely community-driven residents, is one of many cities trying to determine how to grapple with some of AI’s most pressing issues. And recently, the city has been sounding the alarm. Artificial intelligence is changing the way we live and work. In many ways, the tools are wildly helpful—solving business problems, advancing medicine, and even helping solopreneurs thrive without a team. However, the technology comes with some worrisome drawbacks and, given the lack of federal oversight, the risks are beginning to reshape local politics. That seems especially true in Baltimo…

This week, the labor movement in architecture scored a win. Sage & Coombe Architects, a women-led firm based in New York City, unanimously approved a collective bargaining agreement. It’s the second American practice to ratify a contract, after Bernheimer Architecture in 2024. “This contract, the second in the industry, sets a standard for workers at Sage and Coombe and beyond,” Architectural Workers United (AWU), a group that has been helping firms organize, announced on April 1 via Instagram. The agreement’s details have yet to be made public. The milestone marks a significant move in the design industry’s unionizing efforts, especially after high-profile se…

Most organizations think they have a productivity problem. They don’t. They have a work design problem. I’ve spent decades studying how people solve problems and take action, and the same pattern keeps showing up. Productivity dips, so leadership responds the way they always do: new tools, redesigned workflows, and an engagement initiative with a catchy name. And it works, but only for a while. Teams rally around the new process. Leaders feel good about the momentum. Then, a few months later, the same questions come back. Why does the work still feel harder than it should? Why are capable, committed people running on fumes? And typically, motivation is…

A few days ago, the electric grid in California hit a new milestone: At 7pm on March 29, batteries provided 12.3 gigawatts of power—roughly as much as six Hoover Dams, or around 43% of the total demand on the grid. Nearly all of that battery storage was built in the last five years. “Until 2020 or 2021, battery storage was still quite expensive, but we’ve seen huge price drops over the last few years,” says Nicolas Fulghum, senior energy and climate data analyst at Ember, a global energy think tank. When it’s paired with solar power, it can “bring some of that excess generation in the middle of the day to where it’s really needed, which is during the peak demand in the e…

While companies cram artificial intelligence features you never asked for into their apps, Domino’s seems to have found a valid use case for the technology: more accurate tracking of when your pizza will be ready. When Domino’s launched its pizza tracker in 2008, it was a marvel of UX. The tracker gave customers a lens into when their pizza would be ready through a simple interface that lit up as the pizza progressed from ordered to baked to delivered. The tool turned Domino’s into a tech company, and inspired industries (and governments) to adopt the same UX for their own needs. Now, Domino’s made the biggest update to its pizza tracker in years. The new tracke…

At last, Seedance 2.0 is now available in the U.S. This extraordinary generative video AI model made by TikTok’s Chinese parent company ByteDance is capable of creating high-definition video so realistic that it’s shattering our visual truth into a billion pieces. But hey, who cares? If we are going down in flames as a species, let’s have fun putting dumb videos together. I’ll tell you how to do it in this short guide on how to make Seedance 2.0 videos. Time to roll up for a Magical Mystery Tour. Step up right this way! Signing up for Higgsfield To use Seedance 2.0, you first need to sign up for Higgsfield. This platform is essentially a unified digital wor…

The Artemis II mission now underway aims to send three Americans and one Canadian back to and around the moon, a journey that will mark humans’ farthest trek into space in decades. The program is one of a series of endeavors, including next-generation space stations, a lunar habitat, and even a manned Mars mission, that will vastly expand human presence in outer space. Critically, these missions are all certain to involve spacey versions of consumer technologies, which have now become a fixture of life in space. (Astronauts aboard the International Space Station use laptops and smartphones.) Yet such modern conveniences also create a host of IT issues. On the latest Art…

When the server walked past our table, my hand shot upward like a high schooler eager to answer the teacher’s question. “Can we get two more of the same, please?” I asked upon getting his attention. “Another round of espresso martinis? I got you, boss.” Leona grinned and nodded in approval, as expected. We go back like four flats on a Cadillac. From study buddies back at the G.O.A.T. HBCU to marketing professionals putting in work for thriving companies, we’ve remained a two-person support system. It’s a celebration every time we link up. So it’s only right that we throw back a few cocktails while getting our yap on. Sipping a boozy, caffeinated concoction at 2 p.m. …

Amid the usual barrage of new launches around this time of year from the likes of Samsung and Xiaomi, I’ve been checking out the highest-end device yet from a manufacturer many readers won’t have heard of—but it’s one that marks an unusual collaboration with another brand that might be more familiar. Infinix is a sub-brand of Chinese company Transsion, which also owns the smartphone maker Tecno. The manufacturer is particularly successful in developing smartphone markets like Africa and the Middle East; across all of its brands, Transsion accounts for about half of Africa’s smartphone market share, according to figures from Canalys last year. Infinix largely targ…

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) issued a public health alert on Wednesday for frozen, dinosaur-shaped, ready-to-eat chicken nuggets that may contain unsafe levels of lead. The “Dino shaped chicken nuggets” were sold at Walmart locations nationwide. The FSIS did not request a recall, because the nuggets are no longer available for purchase. However, the agency is concerned some bags may still be in consumers’ freezers. The problem was discovered during routine surveillance sampling conducted by a state partner. In the meantime, the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service continues to investigate this issue. Wha…

U.S. egg prices have fallen 60% from last year’s record highs, making it easier for consumers to fill their Easter baskets and Passover Seder plates. Bird flu was to blame for elevated retail prices during the first five months of 2025, and the course of the highly contagious disease is a big reason why prices are much lower now. An outbreak forced farmers and commercial producers to slaughter entire broods of egg-laying hens, but ebbing cases in the second half of last year helped restore egg supplies, said Mark Jordan, the executive director of agricultural research firm LEAP Market Analytics. The stubborn outbreak is still affecting U.S. poultry flocks, with the numb…

AI isn’t just transforming industries. It’s transforming the way energy is stored and distributed. Scaling at unprecedented speeds across the country, data centers today require a reliable, uninterrupted power supply, often consuming as much electricity as small cities. This puts immense pressure on power grids. Nationwide electric demand is forecast to increase by nearly 16% by 2029. The main drivers of that increase are investments in data centers, manufacturing, and geopolitical and national strategic industries. Two years ago, the amount of global electricity generated to supply data centers was 460 TWh. This is projected to more than double to 1,000 TWh in 2030, and…

Your upper chest could be the key to your long-term health. A new study found a correlation between the health of a human’s thymus and the likelihood of cardiovascular disease or cancer. Published on Wednesday in the science journal Nature, researchers detailed the “crucial” effect of the thymus on long-term health and lifespan, reshaping prior assumptions about the organ. “These findings reposition the thymus as a central regulator of immune‑ mediated aging and disease susceptibility in adulthood,” the report states. Thymus health a key indicator Using AI tools, scientists analyzed more than 27,000 patient scans and medical records to evaluate thymus he…

Welcome to AI Decoded, Fast Company’s weekly newsletter that breaks down the most important news in the world of AI. I’m Mark Sullivan, a senior writer at Fast Company, covering emerging tech, AI, and tech policy. This week, I’m focusing on OpenAI’s gigantic new funding round and valuation. I also look at a recent leak around Anthropic’s models, and at backlash to ads placed in GitHub Copilot. Sign up to receive this newsletter every week via email here. And if you have comments on this issue and/or ideas for future ones, drop me a line at sullivan@fastcompany.com, and follow me on X (formerly Twitter) @thesullivan. OpenAI closes $122 billion funding round at $852 bil…

Amazon once seemed poised to wipe out the American bookstore. As online shopping exploded in the late 1990s and early 2000s, independent shops struggled to compete with endless inventory and lower prices. By 2009, many believed indie bookstores were on the brink of extinction. But instead of disappearing, they adapted. The future of books, it turns out, isn’t just online. It’s local. View the full article

A strong PR plan should balance day-to-day visibility with long-term brand building. At most plans’ core will be some sort of press office, one that fields reactive inquiries, chases proactive opportunities, and strives to create a consistent drumbeat of attention. That ongoing media presence is further punctuated by product launches, releases, or announcements that help create heightened awareness around a singular piece of news or event. That describes the basic tenets of a traditional PR plan for earned media (acknowledging that the PR function is much broader). But the playbook that agencies and in-house teams are using to deliver that is evolving; it looks vastly di…

Chinese spirituality just adopted a new icon: American “momager” Kris Jenner. Jenner, best known for launching the mega-successful careers of her daughters Kourtney, Kim, and Khloé Kardashian, is suddenly the go-to profile pic for Gen Zers on Chinese social media, including apps like RedNote, Weibo, and Douyin. The reverence for Jenner doesn’t stop there. Her photo is also being used for wallpapers on computers, tablets, smart watches, and more, all as part of Chinese Gen Z’s manifestation for good luck. How did Jenner of all people become a Chinese symbol for good fortune? Chinese influencer Marcelo Wang broke down the trend in his own viral TikTok. He explai…

A new GLP-1 pill is about to hit the market. On Wednesday, Eli Lilly announced its new GLP-1 pill, Foundayo, was approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for use in adults with obesity or weight-related health problems. The company says that drug trials saw patients taking Foundayo losing an average of 27.3 pounds (12.4%) compared to 2.2 pounds (0.9%) with a placebo. It said the drug will be available via LillyDirect, noting that it will begin accepting prescriptions immediately. It expects shipping to begin on April 6, and said the drug will be made broadly available “through U.S. retail pharmacies and telehealth providers” soon after. The medication will of…

If you listen to the brightest minds in tech right now, you might think human disease is just a software bug waiting for a patch. ​At the 2025 World Economic Forum in Davos, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei—drawing on his background in biophysics—predicted that AI could condense a century of biological progress into a single decade, potentially doubling human lifespans. Demis Hassabis, the Nobel laureate behind Google DeepMind, recently floated a similarly audacious timeline, suggesting that AI could help eliminate all diseases within 10 years. Hassabis aims to shrink the decade-long drug design process down to mere months. ​I’ve spent my career straddling the mathemati…

Below, co-authors Joshua Steiner and Michael Lynton share five key insights from their new book, From Mistakes to Meaning: Owning Your Past So It Doesn’t Own You. Joshua has worked in government, finance, and the nonprofit sector. After serving as chief of staff at the U.S. Department of the Treasury, he became a banker at Lazard before co-founding two investment firms and serving as an executive at Bloomberg LP. Michael has spent his career in the media and entertainment business. He is the former CEO of Sony Entertainment and now serves on the boards of the Rand Corporation and the Smithsonian. What’s the big idea? The only thing worse than making a mista…