Blog, YouTube & Content Monetization

I feel it—the strain, the fractured attention. The constant tug to check, scroll, click. Everything we want is a tap away. Yet when we chase it all, something essential slips through our fingers. I see it clearly in my own world of conferences and events. These are spaces meant for connection, yet people often leave feeling overwhelmed and oddly under-connected. The truth is that genuine engagement is rare. According to Gallup, only 21% of employees are fully engaged. Most are simply going through the motions. It’s a similar story at large-scale events and webinars, where participation beyond passive listening has long been the exception, not the norm. That’s exactly …

Working for myself was the goal. I did it. I made it. I work for myself. But it hasn’t fixed my life. I’m free to pursue anything I want. But achieving goals doesn’t and won’t make me complete. There’s a term for it: the arrival fallacy. It’s the reason we sometimes still feel “empty” even when we achieve what we want. Achieving a goal rarely feels like arrival. Because it’s not the end we imagined. You do everything you can to climb the ladder. But you get up there and then nothing. Or even worse, a disappointment. That happens because the end we expect doesn’t necessarily solve our problems. Goals are meant to guide us. They can show you how much you’ve grown. How f…

Inside a lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology late last year, scientists gave an AI system a new task: designing entirely new molecules for potential antibiotics from scratch. Within a day or two—following a few months of training—the algorithms had generated more than 29 million new molecules, unlike any that existed before. Traditional drug discovery is a slow, painstaking process. But AI is beginning to transform it. At MIT, the research is aimed at the growing challenge of antibiotic-resistant infections, which kill more than a million people globally each year. Existing antibiotics haven’t kept up with the threat. “The number of resistant bacteria…

In 1933, construction workers building the Rockefeller Center in New York City put up a tree around Christmas to celebrate the season. This simple action unintentionally started a beloved holiday tradition the whole world would come to enjoy. Fast-forward to tonight, and a much larger tree will be illuminated, signaling that the holiday season has officially begun. The 2025 Rockefeller Tree Lighting ceremony will be televised tonight at 8 p.m. ET. Here’s everything you need to know about the jolly event, including how to tune in. The 411 about this year’s Rockefeller Christmas tree Every year, head gardener Erik Pauze tirelessly searches for the perfect tre…

The healthcare industry faces major challenges in creating new drugs that can improve outcomes in the treatment of all kinds of diseases. New generative AI models could play a major role in breaking through existing barriers, from lab research to successful clinical trials. Eventually, even AI-powered robots could help in the cause. Nvidia VP of healthcare Kimberly Powell, one of Fast Company’s AI 20 honorees, has led the company’s health efforts for 17 years, giving her a big head start on understanding how to turn AI’s potential to improve our well-being into reality. Since it’s likely that everything from drug-discovery models to robotic healthcare aides would be …

Inc.com columnist Alison Green answers questions about workplace and management issues—everything from how to deal with a micromanaging boss to how to talk to someone on your team about body odor. Here’s a roundup of answers to three questions from readers. 1. I’ve fired my new employee before I recently took a new job in my same industry and city. In my new role, I’ll have a team of eight reporting to me in various capacities and functions. During the interview process, I got a brief read-out on the team and a high-level talent assessment. Nothing stood out as an issue. On my first day, I met the team reporting to me. One of the people on the team is someone w…

Artificial intelligence is the most exhaustively covered technology since the dawn of the internet. As any tech editor will tell you, it can be challenging to find stories about AI that are not merely new but big. So when our editorial director, Jill Bernstein, forwarded me a pitch from journalist John Pavlus, who wanted to write about a “mad scientist” attempting to “stomp out hallucinations and other gen-AI nonsense from Amazon’s cloud security/ chatbots/robots/agents,” I said yes in seconds. (He actually used a more pungent term than “nonsense,” but for decorum’s sake, I’m keeping that to myself.) And then I braced myself. The pitch promised to explain t…

Nearly a quarter of American workers didn’t take any of their vacation days this year. That’s according to a report published in October from FlexJobs based on a survey of over 3,000 U.S. workers. Despite workers being more burnt out and disengaged than ever, many refuse to take time off. Could unlimited PTO be to blame? It’s been well-documented that unlimited PTO may not be the generous gift workers are led to believe. A recent skit from TikToker and comedian Jacob Capozzi assumes the role of “the guy who invented unlimited PTO” to highlight some of the reasons why. Capozzi poses as an executive who wants to incorporate “something more interesting to get p…

UnitedHealth Group has laid off dozens of remote employees in healthcare technology and services marketing from its Optum unit, who were given two weeks notice in November, sources told Health Payer Specialist. Fast Company has reached out to UnitedHealth for confirmation. Those employees were based in “multiple states on the East coast and in the Midwest,” according to that report, and are among UnitedHealth’s roughly 400,000 employees across the U.S. (It is the parent company of UnitedHealthcare, the nation’s largest healthcare insurer.) The healthcare giant is just the latest company in a string of industries to announce layoffs, which have hit almost ever…

Google‘s corporate parent on Monday announced an agreement to buy data center energy specialist Intersect for $4.75 billion as part of its effort to secure the vast amounts of electricity needed to power artificial intelligence technology. Alphabet, which depends on Google’s search engine and other online services for most of its revenue, is buying out Intersect in its entirety after purchasing a stake in the San Francisco-based startup a year ago. Intersect had previously raised $2.1 billion from Google and other early investors. After the acquisition is completed during the first half of next year, Alphabet intends to allow Intersect to operate independently whi…

For many of us, December rushes by in a blur of holiday merrymaking and gift-giving, end-of-year invoicing and accounting, and hasty planning for the year ahead. In the rush, the thoughtful year-end reflection we might have hoped for often doesn’t happen. That’s a missed opportunity. Reflection doesn’t have to be complicated, though. Here’s a simple end-of-year exercise to help you process the year, stay aligned with your goals, and move forward with intention. Year in Review First, remind yourself what actually happened this year. It’s easy to fall prey to recency bias, focusing on the last few weeks and forgetting earlier events. We also tend to fixate on whe…

In cities across North America, the best and most exciting public spaces can increasingly be found near the water. Park spaces on and along seashores and riverfronts are in a kind of renaissance right now, with large and small cities alike opening major waterfront parks over the past few years. 2025 was especially active. Cities brought big, ambitious park designs to the water’s edge, adding valuable recreation space, ecological services, and engines for urban regeneration. Here are four of the best waterfront parks that opened in 2025. Seattle’s Waterfront Park More than 15 years in the works, Seattle’s new park is a true reconnection of the city wit…

The design of the steel-ribbed umbrella has changed little since it was introduced in the 1850s, but the mechanical engineers and origami experts who made an umbrella that works by folding say they’ve finally improved upon it. The $249 Ori umbrella has a frameless design with a laminate composite canopy, which fits into a 3.5-centimeter cylinder smart handle with an OLED display. That means there are no steel elements that can go haywire and leave you with a misshapen mess when you’re caught in a strong wind. It seems we finally have an umbrella that looks like it was invented in the 21st century. The design team included origami experts who usually work in aerosp…

You hear the blurps and bloops after you pass the food court in the Mall of Georgia on a fall Sunday afternoon, the unmistakable sound of points being scored and players eliminated. Then you see him: Standing in an oversize vitrine is a 6-foot-tall animatronic rodent. He’s grinning and waving, but frozen in place, preserved like a museum piece. This isn’t an outpost of Chuck E. Cheese, the 48-year-old family pizza chain with more than 460 restaurants in 45 states and another 88 abroad. It’s Chuck’s Arcade, a fledgling new enterprise launched this past summer by parent company CEC Entertainment in an effort to expand the brand’s reach to Gen Xers, nostalgic millenn…

Jan. 26 marks the official start date of the 2026 tax filing season, when the IRS will begin accepting and processing 2025 tax returns. April 15 is the filing deadline. Tax experts, including the IRS’ independent watchdog, have warned that this year’s filing season could be hampered by the loss of tens of thousands of tax collection workers who left the agency through planned layoffs and buyouts spurred by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency. The IRS will also be responsible for implementing major provisions of Republicans’ tax and spending package signed into law last summer. Several provisions in the law retroactively affect the 2025 tax year, likely…

Run a small business and you probably feel like you make dozens of decisions every day. Whether to cut a quality corner, or miss a ship date. Whether to respond to a customer complaint, or hope the problem goes away. Whether to address an employee’s behavior, or kick that can down the road. Then there are all the personal decisions. Whether to get up and going, or hit the snooze button. Whether to ditch the food you packed, or go out for lunch instead. Whether to keep grinding, or work out. None of those are actually decisions, though, since you already know you should do so. Nearly everything you “decide” already has an answer. Quality problem? Fix it. Custom…

Late last year, Meta confirmed it would effectively be abandoning the metaverse, a nebulously defined project that spurred the company’s 2021 rebrand and has cost it over $70 billion since. At a strategy meeting at Mark Zuckerberg’s Hawaii compound, Reality Labs, the division responsible for the metaverse, was told to cut its budget by 30%, versus only 10% across the rest of the company. Reality Labs’ fate was arguably a long time coming: The division has never turned a profit, with cumulative losses these past five years totalling $73 billion. Wall Street reacted positively to the news, adding $69 billion to its market capitalization. You remember the metaverse, don…

Americans go to great lengths to ensure they are financially set for their later years. But if you’re asking Elon Musk, you really needn’t bother. According to the world’s richest man, whose net worth is estimated at well over $700 billion, saving for retirement will soon be obsolete. Musk aired this view on a recent episode of the Moonshots With Peter Diamandis podcast. Musk let listeners in on his vision of our financial future, a world where technology, specifically artificial intelligence, creates such an abundance of resources that anyone can buy anything they want. The entrepreneur said that within just a few years, we will live in a world marked by a great…

New AI tools from Docusign aim to make contracts easier to understand and quicker to prepare. For people signing documents like leases or purchases agreements, a new AI feature will make it possible to request an overall summary of the contract and its key terms. Users will also be able to ask questions about the document, which for consumer agreements could include requesting details about cancellation procedures, fees that may apply, relevant timelines, or terms of a warranty. “The whole purpose of this is to allow and provide a level of trust to the signer so that they understand what is it that they’re signing,” says Mangesh Bhandarkar, GVP of product manage…

A few weeks ago, my iPhone woke me up at 3:30am. In a way, it was my fault. I’d technically set the alarm “for three thirty.” In another way, it was Siri’s fault. Apple’s AI assistant never thought to question if I was asking for AM or PM. And it simply assumed the most painful option for me. It’s just one of countless tiny examples of how Siri, 16 years since Apple acquired the technology, has been a disappointing product. Siri was already looking dusty before modern LLMs, and with the launch of ChatGPT, it has been completely left behind. Which is why in June 2024, with fans and investors growing impatient, Apple promised a new era of AI—”Apple Intelligence.” …

“Never skip leg day” sounds like something a swole gym bro with killer quads might harp on about. But doctors also sing the praises of lunges and split bench squats, and not for the reason you might think. In a recent article for Vogue, California-based physician Dr. Chris Renna said: “Stronger leg muscles are linked to better cognitive function in aging mainly through their effects on blood flow, metabolic health, brain structure, and physical/social activity patterns.” Muscle mass starts to decline at age 30. As the largest muscle group in the body, maintaining muscle strength in the thighs and glutes is especially important for healthy aging—and apparently, bra…

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 burnou…

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…

Most sales pitches fail for one simple reason: they try to say too much. It’s natural to be passionate about your product or service. Of course you want to showcase the features and benefits. But if you want your audience leaning in and listening, less is always more. We live in what I call an AHA world. AI-focused, hyper-connected, and always-on. Distractions abound. If you can’t capture your prospect and customers’ imagination immediately, you’ll lose them to their emails, Slack messages, and TikTok feeds. The good news is there’s a 90-second fix that will help you craft a pitch or presentation that keeps your audience on the edge of their seats. The structure…