Blog, YouTube & Content Monetization

Stellantis, the maker of Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep, Ram, issued a “do not drive” warning for certain late-model vehicles, telling drivers not to use their vehicles until defective air bags are replaced, according to a notice from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). This stop-drive directive was issued for 225,000 U.S. vehicles from 2003 to 2016 that contain the “defective, deadly” Takata airbag inflators, and is part of a larger, ongoing recall. More than 67 million Takata air bags have been recalled in tens of millions of vehicles across U.S. “Over time, the chemical propellant inside certain Takata inflators can degrade, particularly in hot a…

Here’s the sad truth about sports score apps: Most of them aren’t all that interested in actually telling you the score. After all, where’s the money in providing straightforward information like that? The modern sports score app has to do more. It must bombard you with banner ads and betting odds, implore you to create an account and opt into notifications, sell you some tickets, and show some videos to keep engagement up. The scores themselves are an afterthought. Fortunately, there’s an alternative that tells you the outcomes of every major sporting event without distractions. And the same sort of resources are available to bring minimalist magic to your ne…

Elite education has spent decades competing on curriculum, faculty, and brand. Those signals still carry weight. But for founders, executives, and investors, the real question is no longer “Where did you study?” but “Who now takes your call—and why?” When high‑quality content is everywhere, the premium is shifting from information to access. What matters is the environment around the learning: who is in the room, how quickly trust forms, and what happens when people close their laptops and start talking about real decisions. That has become clear in my work advising GIOYA HEI, an institution that deliberately combines higher education with a curated leadership and…

If the 1990 classic movie Ghost is any indication, the dead love a good tune. We all remember when the recently deceased Sam (Patrick Swayze) had his infamous pottery session with his very alive partner Molly (Demi Moore). Now, Liquid Death and Spotify are aiming to use music in a similar way, by giving a few hundred of the recently deceased the opportunity to hear their favorite music for all of eternity. The two brands have collaborated on what they claim to be the first-ever Bluetooth-enabled speaker urn. The tasteful white urn has a top outfitted with a Bluetooth speaker. Spotify is also introducing the “Eternal Playlist Generator” in the U.S., where you can…

Some frustrated passengers are waiting hours in line at airports around the country, due to a stalemate over Department of Homeland Security funding, which has resulted in many TSA officers working without pay to walk off the job. At Austin-Bergstrom International Airport in Texas, lines were out the door earlier this week, according to the airport’s X account that posted this video of passengers waiting in the dark at 4:30 a.m. And it gets worse. According to the Transportation Security Administration, many airports could “literally shut down . . . particularly smaller ones,” if TSA officers continue to call out instead of coming to work, CNN reported. While TSA…

Picture a memory from childhood, one that feels real and nostalgic, but somehow just out of grasp: perhaps a family trip to the beach, or a moment mid-swing on the playset, or an afternoon spent hunting for four-leaf clovers. Now, imagine that you could bottle that golden moment into a fragrance. One scientist at MIT, Cyrus Clarke, is working to do just that. Alongside a team of fellow researchers, Clarke has developed a physical machine called the Anemoia Device, which uses a generative AI model to analyze an archival photograph, describe it in a short sentence, and, following the user’s own inputs, convert that description into a unique fragrance. The word “an…

You may think working hard, showing initiative, boosting your skill set, and being a team player is what it takes to be noticed to get promoted. But even with all these notable wins and strides, the call to a higher position often never comes. The reality of being repeatedly passed over is frustrating—and such a “promotion plateau” can leave you questioning what’s really within your control. To learn more about the concept, Fast Company asked three career experts for advice on how to handle a stagnant job path . . . as well as what you can do to add some momentum to your promotion game plan. What exactly is a promotion plateau? The most significant te…

When Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak built Apple in a garage, the incumbents they were up against were slow-moving hardware companies. When Jeff Bezos started Amazon, Barnes & Noble wasn’t pouring billions into machine learning or cloud infrastructure. This doesn’t mean that it was easy for these entrepreneurs to change the face of whole industries. It was not. But it was at least possible. Back then, giants could be out-innovated because they were bureaucratic, cautious, and often blind to the potential of what the upstart start-ups were building. The situation is very different today. The startup landscape has changed radically. Where once it was populated by boots…

Some consider self-employment a soul-crushing grind—a pit of despair one falls into after being laid off, or after graduating into a job market where entry-level jobs have evaporated. Chasing clients, following up on payment requests, and working into the night, all for little pay . . . it’s a stopgap until you find a full-time job. Who on earth would choose it? But freelancing doesn’t have to feel like gig work. And in fact, plenty of people, especially Gen Zers, do deliberately choose it. If you’re skeptical about freelancing or struggling to earn enough to pay your bills, it might be time for a mindset audit: Instead of thinking like a paycheck-chasing hustler, thi…

California, soaked from days of relentless rain and recovering from mudslides in mountain towns, was hit with another powerful storm Christmas Day that led to evacuation warnings and high surf advisories. The San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department in Southern California issued an evacuation warning for Wrightwood, a mountain town about 80 miles (130 kilometers) northeast of Los Angeles, a day after rescuing people trapped in cars during a mud slide. The National Weather Service said waves near the San Francisco Bay Area could reach up to 25 feet (7.6 meters) Friday. Statewide, more than 70,000 people were without power Thursday afternoon, according to PowerOutage.u…

Over the past few years, business leaders have lived through a masterclass in volatility. A global pandemic, supply chain breakdowns, surging cyberattacks, economic whiplash, and now the rapid acceleration of artificial intelligence have reshaped markets in unpredictable ways. For many executives, resilience once meant little more than business continuity planning: extra servers, backup systems, and insurance policies. But the world we lead in today demands more. Resilience is no longer just about defense—it’s about growth. The organizations that thrive amid disruption are not those with the strongest walls, but those with the most flexible foundations. They are a…

I just launched a wine app, which means I’ve spent the last six months thinking obsessively about one thing: how do you remove friction from decisions that shouldn’t be hard? The answer taught me something bigger about rituals, and why so many of the ones we create at the end and beginning of the year fail us. Here’s my founder story, but from the wine aisle. Last December, I was standing in front of a wall of bottles, paralyzed. Not because I don’t like wine. I do. I was paralyzed because the entire experience was designed to make me feel small. The sommelier energy, the gatekeeping language, the implied message that if I couldn’t name the terroir, I didn’t d…

In a crowded market, building strong, lasting relationships is one of the biggest differentiators a business can create. And while product-market fit is table stakes, true customer loyalty comes from putting people at the center of the product experience. Overlooking that opportunity can leave growth on the table. The companies that stand out are the ones that design not just for functionality, but for connection, trust, and stickiness. These three overlooked pillars help transform software from a useful tool into an essential partner. 1. Engagement that drives daily value The most successful products give customers reasons to return again and again, not just w…

Somewhere between endless meetings and half-finished projects, we all went looking for better ways to get things done this year. These are the 2025 titles that helped people stay organized, focused, and finally finish what they started. Learn something new every day with “Book Bites,” 15-minute audio summaries of the latest and greatest nonfiction. Get started by downloading the Next Big Idea app today! Move. Think. Rest.: Redefining Productivity & Our Relationship With Time By Natalie Nixon A creativity whisperer to the C-Suite keynote speaker teaches how to harness the power of everyday activities to stress less and be more productive. Listen to o…

A few years into the AI boom, it’s clear that designers can rely on AI for some things. It can automate tedious tasks in Photoshop that once took up precious time. It can generate images on command (quality be damned!). It can schedule a meeting, respond to an email, and take notes on a Zoom call. But for all the hype, we know that AI isn’t a silver bullet for the real problems creatives face. Far from it. So we wondered: When it comes to design and creative work, in a blue-sky scenario, what do today’s design leaders wish AI would actually take care of for them? We asked nine great designers that very question, and got back some interesting answers. Their…

Comcast said on Monday it will appoint President Michael Cavanagh as co-CEO, adopting a dual chief executive model as the company prepares to spin off several NBCUniversal cable networks as part of a restructuring. Cavanagh will take up the new role in January and also join the company’s board, serving alongside Brian Roberts, who will continue as chairman and co-CEO. Several high-profile firms such as Oracle and Netflix have adopted a co-CEO model to better manage their operations as they become more complex and globally diversified. Comcast plans to spin off its NBCUniversal cable channels, including USA Network and CNBC, into a new company called Versant la…

If you listen to the CEOs of elite AI companies or take even a passing glance at the U.S. economy, it’s abundantly obvious that AI excitement is everywhere. America’s biggest tech companies have spent over $100 billion on AI so far this year, and Deutsche Bank reports that AI spending is the only thing keeping the United States out of a recession. Yet if you look at the average non-tech company, AI is nowhere to be found. Goldman Sachs reports that only 14% of large companies have deployed AI in a meaningful way. What gives? If AI is really such a big deal, why is there a multi-billion-dollar mismatch between excitement over AI and the tech’s actual boots…

It’s open enrollment season again—that period between October and November when workers must reacquaint themselves with “deductibles,” “copays,” and “premiums.” Many would rather wait at the DMV, sit through a three-hour work meeting, or attempt to explain social media to tech-challeged loved ones than spend their afternoon selecting an insurance plan. That’s why some workers are farming out everything on their health insurance to-do list to AI and social media. New research from HR tech company Justworks and The Harris Poll shows we’re entering the era of “benefit burnout”: Many people are not doing their own research on what plans are best for them, and instead…

Inside Ikea’s movie studio-size marketing and production facility at the company’s headquarters in Älmhult, Sweden, a corner of a vast soundstage is piled with a multicolored array of what look like props from some fantastical children’s show. There’s a bench that rocks from side to side, a bright blue lamp that hides two transformative elbows in its skinny post, a glass vase with jug ears sticking out from its sides, and a clock on the end of a curvaceous red tube that looks like a worm wiggling its way out of the dirt. These whimsical items are all part of Ikea’s new PS collection, a once-in-a-while recurring product drop that the company uses to stretch its exp…

The evidence is mounting. There was a time when a college degree all but guaranteed a job. Not anymore. For decades, entry-level roles served as the primary on-ramp into the workforce for college graduates. They offered young professionals a foothold—an opportunity to build experience, earn income, and grow into long-term careers. But today, that pathway is rapidly eroding. And it’s leaving an entire generation of educated workers without a clear way in. Today’s college graduates are facing one of the most hostile job markets in recent memory, especially when it comes to entry-level roles. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported a 9.3% unemployment rate for …

The steady encroachment of email into all moments of life has been quiet but formidable. A quick glance during a first date. Surreptitiously tapping out a reply during a wedding ceremony. Some even admit to refreshing their inbox at a funeral. Often it’s not the infinite scroll on social media that triggers the nervous phone-glancing. It’s the inbox. More than half of professionals check work email outside regular working hours, according to a recent study published by ZeroBounce, surveying 1,157 professionals in the United States and Europe last month. Nearly 3 in 4 professionals feel pressure to respond to emails off the clock, with that pressure intensify…

If AI can write our emails, analyze data, and generate code, then machines outperform humans on nearly everything we currently measure: speed, productivity, and task completion. Based on these measures, humans lose. Their jobs. Their dignity. Their worth. A recent management study shows that AI can help people do 12% more work, 25% faster—but it gets the answers wrong 19% of the time. That’s a telling number. And helps us to understand what we’re all experiencing. We’re optimizing for throughput while quietly accepting a compounding error rate. If we value motion and not direction, we’re like Wile E. Coyote, sprinting forward ever faster—only to realize, a beat…

For many Americans, 2025 wasn’t a great year financially. The affordability crisis and general economic concerns became defining themes of the year as people dealt with rising costs and a worsening job market. But for billionaires, 2025 was a boon to their already exuberant wealth. The 15 richest billionaires in the United States saw their wealth grow by more than $1 trillion over the course of the year, according to a new analysis from the Institute for Policy Studies, a Washington, D.C., think tank. As of the end of 2025, those 15 billionaires—each with assets over $100 billion—have a combined wealth of $3.2 trillion, up from $2.4 trillion a year ago. …

You sit down at your desk, ready to start the day. Before you can even open your first email, you’ve already typed in three different passwords—each more complex than the last. By lunchtime, you’ve repeated the ritual half a dozen times. It’s frustrating, it’s slow, and it’s happening to millions of employees every single day. This is password fatigue—the silent productivity killer and hidden security risk plaguing modern enterprises. It’s more than an annoyance; it’s a costly vulnerability. Our global survey found that most users still rely on passwords as their primary authentication method. This should concern most organizations, because in an era defined by work-f…