Blog, YouTube & Content Monetization

If the holiday hustle and bustle is stressing you out, the night sky is providing a perfect moment to pause and wonder at some majesty this weekend, as the Geminid meteor shower (Geminids) is set to peak. The Geminids are technically active annually—this year, from around December 1 through 21, and the action peaks on the evenings of the 12th and 13th. Let’s take a look at the science and history behind this cosmic phenomenon, before we dive into how best to view it. When was the Geminid meteor shower first discovered? These days, the Geminid meteor shower is considered by NASA to be “one of the best and most reliable annual meteor showers.” The event s…

Your smartphone is only as good as the charge it holds. It doesn’t matter if you have the newest flagship iPhone or Android—when the device’s battery dies, all the bells and whistles don’t mean diddly. And manufacturers know it. For years, Apple and Google have managed to pack increasingly larger-capacity batteries into the phones they make. The larger the battery, the longer your phone can stay charged. But in recent years, both companies have also been turning to software features on their phones’ operating systems to help maximize battery life. Apple added several software-based battery maximization enhancements in iOS 26. Google has done the same with its popu…

Platforms from Amazon to YouTube—and, of course, the headline-dominating Spotify Wrapped—have spent much of December rolling out year-end recaps that show users how they engaged with the platforms’ services throughout 2025. Today, one of the last anticipated recaps of the year makes its debut: Snapchat Recap 2025. Here’s what you need to know. What is Snapchat Recap 2025? Snapchat Recap is Snapchat’s annual year-in-review feature for users of the Snapchat app. Users are able to see a special year-end Story that showcases how they spent their time Snapchating throughout 2025. Snapchat owner Snap Inc. says the 2025 recap features insights and highlights on …

A lot has been written about how AI is coming for your job, but EY’s latest AI survey found some surprising results. Out of 500 top executives at major U.S. companies who said artificial intelligence was boosting productivity at their companies, only 17% of those polled actually turned around and laid off workers or cut their jobs. Instead, the new survey found they are reinvesting those gains back into the company. “Executives are plowing productivity gains right back into more AI tools and more talented people,” EY America’s consulting leader Colm Sparks Austin said. “The real breakthrough isn’t automation—it’s amplification. Leading companies are using AI …

Welcome to exhausted America 2025: Most adults are more than a little fine with doling out cash as gifts, and many plan to be asleep before midnight on New Year’s Eve, according to a new AP-NORC poll. About 6 in 10 Americans say cash or gift cards are “very” acceptable as holiday presents, but they’re much less likely to say that about a gift that was purchased secondhand or re-gifted, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. “Cash is OK for the grandkids I guess,” said Nancy Wyant, 73, in rural central Iowa. “But I’m a gift giver.” Come New Year’s Eve, she’ll be fast asleep before 2026 rolls around. “At our ag…

Concerns about an AI bubble and increased competition are weighing on Nvidia as the stock fell to a three-month low on Wednesday. Shares of the Santa Clara, California-based company tumbled more than 3% amid a broader decline for those chipmakers that are key to the artificial intelligence boom. Shares of Advanced Micro Devices and Broadcom were also down 4% and 5%, respectively. In recent weeks, a slew of companies have made moves that could chip away at Nvidia’s domination as the go-to maker of chips for the AI industry. One such company, MetaX Integrated Circuits of China, debuted an initial public offering on Wednesday and surged nearly 700%. BEHIND NVIDI…

For years, deepfakes were treated as a political or social media oddity, a strange corner of the internet where celebrity faces (of women 99% of the time) were pasted onto fake videos (porn in 99% of the cases) and nobody quite knew what to do about it. But that framing is now dangerously outdated, because deepfakes have quietly evolved into something much more systemic: an operational risk for corporations, capable of corrupting supply chains, financial workflows, brand trust, and even executive decision-making. Recent headlines show that synthetic media is no longer a fringe experiment. It is a strategic threat, one that companies are not prepared for. When a …

Experts have compressed their predictions for when artificial general intelligence (AGI)—the type of AI that can equal or exceed human intelligence—will arrive. When predictions were first made in 2023, AGI was expected to arrive in 50 years. Newer estimates say five years. When GPT-5 came out this summer, it demonstrated surprising leaps in reasoning and memory, further accelerating those timelines. Progress is moving faster than anyone anticipated, and what once felt speculative now feels inevitable. Meanwhile, small teams are shipping products that would have required 100-person companies two years ago. The gap between the AGI debaters and the builders (those w…

The flap of a butterfly’s wings in South America can famously lead to a tornado in the Caribbean. The so-called butterfly effect—or “sensitive dependence on initial conditions,” as it is more technically known—is of profound relevance for organizations seeking to deploy AI solutions. As systems become more and more interconnected by AI capabilities that sit across and reach into an increasing number of critical functions, the risk of cascade failures—localized glitches that ripple outward into organization-wide disruptions—grows substantially. It is natural to focus AI risk management efforts on individual systems where distinct risks are easy to identify. A senior ex…

Thank you once again for reading Fast Company’s Plugged In. A quick programming note: We will be taking the next two Fridays off. Happy holidays to all, and I look forward to resurfacing in your inbox next year. For any number of reasons, 2025 has hardly been my favorite year. But if I were to make a list of things that went well, my relationship with AI would be on it. This was the year I went from being an AI dabbler to a daily user. And while some of that usage still amounts to messing around—hello, Sora!—even more involves tasks that make me more productive. More importantly, it brings me better results, a goal I hold dear. (Sadly, not every AI enthusiast …

Stocks rose in morning trading on Wall Street Friday and further trimmed losses from earlier in the week for several major indexes. The S&P 500 jumped 0.8%, adding to gains made on Thursday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 283 points, or 0.6%, as of 10:05 a.m. Eastern. The Nasdaq jumped 1% and is now on track for a weekly gain. Technology stocks with an focus on artificial intelligence once again led the market. Nvidia jumped 3.4% and Broadcom rose 2.4%. Oracle rose 7% on news that it, along with two other investors, had signed agreements to form a new TikTok U.S. joint venture. Oracle, Silver Lake and MGX each get a 15% share in the popular social video pla…

In the Star Trek universe, the audience occasionally gets a glimpse inside schools on the planet Vulcan. Young children stand alone in pods surrounded by 360-degree digital screens. Adults wander among the pods but do not talk to the students. Instead, each child interacts only with a sophisticated artificial intelligence, which peppers them with questions about everything from mathematics to philosophy. This is not the reality in today’s classrooms on Earth. For many technology leaders building modern AI, however, a vision of AI-driven personalized learning holds considerable appeal. Outspoken venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, for example, imagines that “the AI tut…

Planning to hit the road this holiday season? Or maybe just thinking about an extended drive of some sort for sometime in the new year? The next time you’ve got a driving adventure ahead of you, today’s Cool Tools discovery is exactly the new virtual companion you need. It’s a truly cool app I encountered recently that enhances your standard navigation setup and offers some really smart extras that’ll make whatever trip you’re taking infinitely more interesting—and enjoyable. Lemme show ya what it’s all about. This tip originally appeared in the free Cool Tools newsletter from The Intelligence. Get the next issue in your inbox and get ready to discover all sor…

Costco’s latest promotional offering just dropped, but members aren’t rushing to claim it. At select warehouse club locations, members can now take home complimentary 3-pound bags of Gala apples. The shopping warehouse’s unique business model, wherein membership fees contribute largely to its revenue, means that it focuses on plugging its membership more than advertising specific products. Costco puts significant effort into encouraging people to join, or upgrade and renew, existing memberships. In the past, Costco has offered enticing items like tote bags to coax customers into automatic membership renewals, but the promotional bag of apples is not as appealing…

In November, Apple laid off dozens of sales employees in a rather unexpected move for the tech giant. Apple is the rare tech company that has steered clear of mass layoffs, particularly among its peers in the trillion-dollar club. The layoffs “came as a surprise” for those who lost their jobs, according to a Bloomberg report—and they impacted some employees who had been with the company for decades. The post-pandemic job market has come to be defined by layoffs, in tech and beyond: A Glassdoor analysis finds that there was a peak in 2023, but layoffs have since continued at a more frequent cadence relative to the years prior. A variety of sectors have been hit hard—a…

Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s net worth surged to $749 billion late Friday after the Delaware Supreme Court reinstated Tesla stock options worth $139 billion that were voided last year, according to Forbes’ billionaires index. Musk’s 2018 pay package, once worth $56 billion, was restored by the Delaware Supreme Court on Friday, two years after a lower court struck down the compensation deal as “unfathomable.” The Supreme Court said that a 2024 ruling that rescinded the pay package had been improper and inequitable to Musk. Earlier this week, Musk became the first person ever to surpass $600 billion in net worth on the heels of reports that his aerospace startup SpaceX…

Instacart said Monday that it will no longer allow retailers to use an AI-powered price testing program, two weeks after an extensive investigation showed wide discrepancies in the cost of groceries purchased through the platform. Effective immediately, retailers will no longer be able to use Eversight technology to run price tests on Instacart, the San Francisco-based company said in a blog post. Previously, a small number of retail partners were able to conduct testing that resulted in different prices for the same item at the same store—something that “missed the mark for some customers,” Instacart said in a blog post. “At a time when families are working excep…

Say what you will about Crumbl Cookies. It’s always sure to get a reaction. Earlier this month, when a sudden swirl of social media rumors began to suggest that the polarizing bakery chain was closing down, some of the online reactions were downright gleeful. “Too sweet and too expensive!” went one typical comment. The chatter was so loud that Crumbl cofounder Sawyer Hemsley took to TikTok to dispel the rumor, explaining that the fast-growing chain is just moving offices as it prepares for its next wave of expansion. But while reports of Crumbl’s demise may be premature, the chain has in fact closed a number of locations over the last few years following a pe…

Meta’s decision to end its professional fact-checking program sparked a wave of criticism in the tech and media world. Critics warned that dropping expert oversight could erode trust and reliability in the digital information landscape, especially when profit-driven platforms are mostly left to police themselves. What much of this debate has overlooked, however, is that today, AI large language models are increasingly used to write up news summaries, headlines, and content that catch your attention long before traditional content moderation mechanisms can step in. The issue isn’t clear-cut cases of misinformation or harmful subject matter going unflagged in the absenc…

Artificial intelligence is fundamentally reshaping countless industries; education is no exception. As AI tools rapidly enter classrooms, there are concerns about fair access, effective implementation, and the risk of widening the still persistent digital divide. Who are the players best positioned to guide this transition in a way that truly benefits every student? I recently spoke with Alix Guerrier, CEO of DonorsChoose, an education nonprofit where teachers submit funding requests based on classroom needs. Ninety percent of public schools in America have teachers using DonorsChoose, which tackles funding gaps by focusing on the most granular level: individual teach…

When you hear the phrase “family business,” you might think of the backstabbing Roys of Succession or the dysfunctional Duttons of Yellowstone. But while TV’s family companies are entertaining, their real-life counterparts may be even more compelling. Around the world, family businesses produce about two-thirds of all economic output and employ more than half of all workers. And they can be very profitable: The world’s 500 largest family businesses generated a collective US$8.8 trillion in 2024. That’s nearly twice the gross domestic product of Germany. If you’re not steeped in family business research—and even if you are—their ubiquity might seem a little strange…

It’s time to reckon with the reality that nonstop doomscrolling has delivered us: a hard-to-ignore erosion of our cognitive skills. We’ve lost the ability to focus on words for long stretches of time . . . er, read books. Years of turning everything worth consuming into “content” that’s been “optimized” for attention has turned our brains into mush, shoved our mental health into free fall, and reduced our ability to pay attention to anything for more than five seconds at a time. (In fact, I clicked away from completing this sentence to check Facebook Marketplace for credenzas on sale.) While we’re still in the early days of what the long-term impact of artificia…

For the past three years, AI’s breakout moment has happened almost entirely through text. We type a prompt, get a response, and move to the next task. While this intuitive interaction style turned chatbots into a household tool overnight, it barely scratches the surface of what the most advanced technology of our time can actually do. This disconnect has created a significant gap in how consumers utilize AI. While the underlying models are rapidly becoming multimodal—capable of processing voice, visuals, and video in real time—most consumers are still using them as a search engine. Looking toward 2026, I believe the next wave of adoption won’t be about utility alone, …

Nvidia has agreed to license technology from AI startup Groq for use in some of its artificial intelligence chips, marking the chipmaker’s largest deal and underscoring its push to strengthen competitiveness amid surging demand. Here is a list of multi-billion-dollar AI, cloud and chip deals signed recently: OPENAI DEALS Amazon and OpenAI Amazon is considering an investment of around $10 billion in OpenAI, though talks remain “very fluid,” according to a source who requested anonymity due to the private nature of their talks. Disney and OpenAI Walt Disney to invest $1 billion in OpenAI and will let the ChatGPT-parent use characters from Star Wars, P…

Want more housing market stories from Lance Lambert’s ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter. Zillow economists just published their updated 12-month forecast, projecting that U.S. home prices—as measured by the Zillow Home Value Index—will rise 2% between November 2025 and November 2026. Heading into 2025, Zillow’s 12-month forecast for U.S. home prices was +2.6%. However, many housing markets across the country softened faster than expected, prompting Zillow to issue several downward revisions. By April 2025, Zillow had cut its 12-month national home price outlook to -1.7%. In the second half of this year, Zillow began upgrading its fo…