Blog, YouTube & Content Monetization

When Rare Beauty, Bogg, and Goodles arrived in stores, they had to vie for shelf space with well-established brands making beauty products or beach bags or boxes of macaroni and cheese. But these brands quickly amassed cult-like followings by being very intentional with their missions to foster a sense of loyalty with customers. Although her legions of fans might have lined up to try the beauty products in Selena Gomez’s line, Rare Beauty, the company was founded with a bigger mission baked in: To support youth mental health by donating 1% sales to the Rare Impact Fund. While the company has found that customers will come for the products, they stay for the mission, E…

If you tuned into the red carpet for the Academy Awards, you may have seen actress Julia Fox being interviewed by social media influencers Quen Blackwell and Jake Shane, who were at the awards show reporting for Vanity Fair. In a bit that completely misses the mark, Shane quipped several times about the “annoying” child character in If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, which earned Rose Byrne a nomination for best actress. After being asked by Shane repeatedly about the “annoying” kid in the movie, Fox politely and appropriately steers the conversation to the more important tenor of the movie: that it’s meant to depict the unforgiving pressures of motherhood. In fact, the identit…

Is all hope lost for the future of the news media in the U.S.? There’s reason to be optimistic, two experts say, though new models for disseminating factual information are sorely needed and it’s worth paying attention to how younger Americans consume news. “We have to do something radically different,” said Chris Licht, founding partner and CEO of CLC Partners and a former executive at CNN and other TV networks, speaking at the Fast Company Grill at SXSW. “Millions of people get their news and information from people that are actually giving opinion.” “[We’ve] got to focus on, in this modern media world, separating those two things again,” he added. Whi…

When actress Maddie Ziegler first read the script for the film Pretty Lethal, which premiered at SXSW over the weekend, she was immediately drawn to it because of its authenticity—even if, sure, the ballerinas are also seen scrappily fighting like a bunch of feral cats. “There’s been so many dance films that have not accurately depicted what it’s like to be a real-life ballerina,” Ziegler said during a panel discussion at the Fast Company Grill at SXSW. After first gaining fame as a young dancer on the reality show, Dance Moms, Ziegler had strayed from dance to instead pursue acting, and this project proved both emotional and cathartic for her. “It just completel…

Investor and Shark Tank personality Kevin O’Leary said CEOs who blindly pursue AI are “dead in the water”. But the winning formula, he said, is pairing AI with storytelling and critical thinking. On Wednesday, in a post on X, O’Leary wrote: “In business, it’s about critical thinking and communication, period.” He shared the comment alongside a clip from a recent Fox News appearance, where he discussed the renewed relevance of liberal arts degrees in the age of artificial intelligence. Technical fields like computer science—once considered the safest bet for a stable, high-paying job—are increasingly on shaky ground. Rather than a specific set of technical ski…

Pop star Zara Larsson is the internet’s newest it girl. After a wave of viral hits, including her latest album’s title track “Midnight Sun” and her feature on PinkPantheress’ “Stateside” remix, the Swedish singer cemented herself as the next big thing in pop music. But fame doesn’t come without controversy, as Larsson learned when she revealed to her fanbase that she uses generative AI. The discourse began when Larsson posted about watching AI-generated content on TikTok. Larsson first reposted an image from the account Ai Fruit Stories, a page posting AI animations of—you guessed it—drama between anthropomorphic foods. Larsson then posted a selfie with the c…

Pakistan gets almost all its oil and gas from the Middle East, where U.S. and Israeli bombing of Iran have caused crude prices to blow past $150 a barrel and tankers can’t get through the Strait of Hormuz. But it has one edge in the crisis: a rapid, recent shift to solar power. The country’s solar boom started in the wake of the Ukraine war, when Pakistan couldn’t afford to buy liquefied natural gas and that led to power outages. “It also led to soaring electricity bills,” says Rabia Babar, an energy market analyst at the Pakistan-based nonprofit Renewables First. Some power bills were as much as 30-40% of people’s income, sometimes more than they were spending on rent.…

The CEO of Crypto.com, Kris Marszalek, announced on Thursday that he was laying off 12% of the company’s staff. Marszalek cited AI as the driving factor behind the layoffs. Here’s what you need to know. What’s happened? On Thursday, Crypto.com CEO Kris Marszalek took to X to announce that the company was cutting 12% of its staff. Marszalek cited AI as the reason for the layoffs. In the X post, Marszalek said that Crypto.com was “joining the list of companies integrating enterprise-wide AI” and suggested that those who do not embrace artificial intelligence won’t be around for long. “Companies that do not make this pivot immediately will fail,” Marszalek wr…

On the one hand, the fact that Walmart passed $1 trillion in market cap is notable, but not especially surprising. The company has long been the largest company in the world, measured by revenue. Almost everyone is familiar with the small five-and-dime store that started in one of the most rural towns in America and grew up to become the biggest retailer in the world. On paper, this looks like just another milestone in a 64-year-old success story. But a closer look at how Walmart just hit a market cap reserved almost exclusively for tech giants reveals how the company has changed, even in just the past three years. For the past six decades, Walmart was the king of…

Nearly 90,000 bottles of children’s ibuprofen have been recalled across the United States, according to an enforcement report this week from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Strides Pharma Inc. has recalled 89,952 bottles of Children’s Ibuprofen Oral Suspension following customer complaints of a “gel-like mass and black particles” in the medicine. The India-based company had manufactured the ibuprofen for Taro Pharmaceuticals U.S.A., Inc. based in Hawthorne, New York. The recall comes from Strides Pharma’s Bridgewater, New Jersey, subsidiary. Strides Pharma initiated the recall on March 2, with the FDA labeling it a Class II recall on Monday, March 16…

The dangerous heat wave shattering March records all over the U.S. Southwest is more than just another extreme weather blip. It’s the latest next-level weather wildness that is occurring ever more frequently as Earth’s warming builds. Experts said unprecedented and deadly weather extremes that sometimes strike at abnormal times and in unusual places are putting more people in danger. For example, the Southwest is used to coping with deadly heat, but not months ahead of schedule, including a 110-degree Fahrenheit (43.3 Celsius) reading in the Arizona desert on Thursday that smashed the highest March temperature recorded in the U.S. On Thursday, sites in Arizona and south…

Fans of the Bachelor franchise are accustomed to hearing that the upcoming season will be the most “shocking” one ever. But this time, it’s the events leading up to the season that have been hard to believe. In fact, the life of season 22’s Bachelorette became so controversial, the latest season won’t even make it on air. On Thursday, just days before the newest season of The Bachelorette, starring Taylor Frankie Paul, star of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, was scheduled to premiere, ABC pulled the plug. The shocking news came shortly after TMZ published a video from 2023 which showed Paul kicking, hitting, and throwing chairs at her ex-boyfriend, Dakota Mortensen. …

Three teenagers in Tennessee sued Elon Musk’s xAI this week, claiming the company’s image-generation tools were used to morph real photos of them into explicitly sexual images. The high school students, who are seeking to proceed under pseudonyms, filed the lawsuit in California, where xAI — Musk’s artificial intelligence company — has its headquarters. They are seeking class-action status in order to represent what the lawsuit says are thousands of victims like themselves who either are minors or were minors when sexually explicit images of them were created. According to the lawsuit, Jane Doe 1 was alerted anonymously in December that someone was distributing sexually…

Shares in Super Micro Computer (Nasdaq: SMCI) are falling off a cliff this morning after news that the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has charged the company’s cofounder and two other associates with conspiring to deliver restricted AI technology to China. Here’s what you need to know. What’s happened? On Thursday, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York announced that it was charging three men with ties to Super Micro Computer (aka Supermicro) for export-control violations related to AI technology. The three individuals, the DOJ alleges, conspired “to divert high-performance computer servers assembled in the United States and […

The tech industry has spent the past few years focused on AI as a productivity engine, rewriting code, optimizing search, and automating customer service at scale. Now a more delicate transformation is underway., with agentic AI is moving into human resources. A new wave of startups and enterprise platforms claims algorithms can screen candidates, predict attrition, and recommend career paths faster than managers. The pitch is simple. AI promises less administrative work and more consistent decision-making. As these systems take on more responsibility, they are beginning to redefine what the “human” in human resources means. “Concerns are valid, because unlike other ent…

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…

Once upon a time, there were two guarantees when getting a new job: a 401(k) and a work wife/hubby or bestie. No one assigns you. There’s no official moment. One day, they are just there. The person who can help you translate your boss’s cryptic email, exchange eyerolls after annoying comments at the staff meeting, or share your emergency stash of M&M’s at 3 p.m. But then 2026 happened and many of us work with colleagues we’ve only seen from the shoulders up on Zoom. So, I must ask, are work besties even a thing anymore? Or are they an outdated artifact of the pre-video conference culture? Why You Need a Work BFF Science backs up the value of office b…

Happiness has been a bit thin on the ground these days. The headlines are grim, loneliness and disconnection are rising, and work pressures seem to multiply by the day as new technologies, global unrest, and social upheaval collide. In the midst of all that, searching for joy may feel a bit . . . selfish. Even absurd. But none of these forces seem likely to resolve themselves anytime soon. Work will remain demanding. The news cycle will keep churning. Which raises a practical question: if the world isn’t getting lighter anytime soon, how do we find a little more lightness inside it? That doesn’t mean ignoring the difficulties around us. But you will be better able to …

Spring is a glorious, warm season after the harsh cold of winter—filled with light and more sun-induced vitamin D. Friday, March 20, 2026 (at exactly 10:46 a.m. ET), marks both its triumphant return in the Northern Hemisphere and the spring equinox. So, get ready for longer days, warmer weather, and flower blooms that may cause sneezing. Let’s take a deeper look at the science behind seasons and what exactly an equinox is. What causes the seasons? The tilt of the Earth’s axis as it orbits around the sun is what causes seasons. Depending on that angle, different parts of the world receive different amounts of sunlight. In the Northern Hemisphere, we experie…

People who live and work in Washington state don’t currently pay any income tax. But in a few years, a small group of residents will be subject to one: Washington lawmakers recently passed a bill that would impose a 9.9% tax on income earned above $1 million, which goes into effect on January 1, 2028. The so-called millionaires tax could raise up to $4 billion annually for the state, revenue that Governor Bob Ferguson has said could go toward free breakfast and lunch for students, and to working families through a tax credit. (Ferguson has yet to sign the bill, which landed on his desk March 13, but has pledged to.) The tax is part of a wave of bills that lawmaker…

With AI capabilities doubling in a matter of months, agility is no longer a competitive advantage for business leaders—it’s now become a survival skill. “The entire order of companies and the way in which they deliver value and the entire business models that they have been built on for the last few decades or longer are being rewritten in front of us,” Peter Smart, chief experience officer and managing partner of product design firm Fantasy, said during a discussion at the Fast Company Grill at SXSW. “The new agility is coherence: Can you create the conditions by which it’s very clear what we do, what the value is that we produce, and how we’re going to get there?” …

Federal regulators on Thursday approved a new higher-dose version of the blockbuster obesity drug Wegovy that may help users lose more weight and keep it off. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved a 7.2-milligram dose of Danish drugmaker Novo Nordisk’s semaglutide. Previously, the highest approved dose of the drug, taken as a weekly shot, was 2.4 milligrams. The new dose received accelerated review through the FDA’s ultra-fast drug review program. The approval was granted 54 days after the request for review was approved, the agency said in a statement. The new dosage will be available in April at pharmacies in the U.S., with a price to be announced t…

This week, Google announced new features for its AI-powered interface tool Stitch—in the process, it signaled that it’s going all-in on “vibe design.” “We are evolving Stitch into an AI-native software design canvas,” Rustin Banks, product manager at Google Labs, wrote on company’s blog, Keynote. “With it, anyone can create, iterate and collaborate to turn natural language into high-fidelity UI designs.” Launched last March during the Google I/O annual developer conference, Stitch sets out to give people an accessible tool for creating front end UI designs for projects like websites or mobile apps. While late to a market already occupied by competitors like Figma …

If you’ve ever cracked open an ice-cold Sprite on a hot summer day, or taken a sip of the soda fresh from a McDonald’s machine, you’ve probably experienced that eye-widening first moment that the extra-fizzy, citrusy beverage hits your tongue. That exact second is what Sprite is trying to capture with its new brand refresh, which includes the return of a beloved brand symbol, an updated logo, new visuals, and the brand’s first-ever signature sound. These updates are part of a broader campaign called “It’s That Fresh,” which Sprite says is designed to appeal to younger consumers by strengthening the brand’s presence in music, food, and sports spheres (Sprite also reveal…