Blog, YouTube & Content Monetization

Below, Arthur Brooks shares five key insights from his new book, The Meaning of Your Life: Finding Purpose in an Age of Emptiness. Brooks is a social scientist and professor at Harvard University, where he teaches the science of happiness. He is also a columnist at The Free Press, host of the Office Hours podcast, and CBS News contributor. What’s the big idea? Life hasn’t become meaningless, but most of us have adopted habits that turn meaning on mute. Reconnecting with a deeper purpose awaits in the right hemisphere of your brain. All it takes is learning how to activate that side of existence. Listen to the audio version of this Book Bite—read by Brooks h…

Hours before Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez Bezos take their places as sponsors and honorary chairs of the Met Gala—fashion’s glittery annual fundraiser in support of the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute—a different kind of fashion event was unfolding across town. Ahead of the gala, hundreds of workers, organizers, and advocates gathered in the Meatpacking District in downtown New York for the Ball Without Billionaires, a worker-led fashion show designed to contrast the one at the museum. Organized by a coalition of labor groups including the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), the Strategic Organizing Center, and the Amazon Labor Union, the…

The glory days of self-serve fountain drinks at McDonald’s are almost over, and people are not happy. Self-serve soda fountains have been a staple of fast food restaurants like McDonald’s for decades, allowing visiting customers to self-pour, refill, and even customize their order by mixing all available soda options. But as fast food chains look to optimize their operations, not all beloved features are making the cut, and fountains are quietly disappearing. In September 2023, McDonald’s announced it was eliminating the self-serve soda fountains, with a goal to remove them all by 2032, a decision made to drive consistency for staff and customers across its many o…

Like many domestic workers, Leydy is no stranger to wage theft. In a previous job, Leydy had been hired as a cleaner and then asked to take on more and more responsibilities, from cooking to childcare—with no additional pay. When she approached her employer and said she either needed a raise or additional help, she was fired, and she never got paid for her work that week. “In my rage, I went to the police,” she told Fast Company through a translator. (Leydy requested to only use her first name to avoid potential retaliation.) “They told me I had to get a lawyer and go to court in Newark. If I wasn’t getting paid, how could I pay for a lawyer?” A new AI chatbot bu…

Last month, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani celebrated Tax Day by making good on a campaign promise. “When I ran for mayor, I said I was going to tax the rich,” Mamdani said in a viral video posted to social media. “Today, we’re taxing the rich.” Mamdani went on to describe New York’s proposed pied-á-terre tax, a collaboration with Gov. Kathy Hochul. The tax specifically targets the owners of residential properties in New York City worth more than $5 million that they don’t live in full time, or “the richest of the rich,” as Mamdani called them in his video. One such property that would be subject to the new tax belongs to billionaire Citadel CEO Kenneth …

April was not a good month for the tech industry in terms of job losses. Last month, major firms—including Microsoft, Meta Platforms, and Snap—all announced significant workforce reductions. But now, May is not shaping up to be any better. This week alone, news emerged that several major tech companies, including Cloudflare, PayPal, and Coinbase, are set to cut thousands of positions. And yes, you can blame AI for the job cuts—or at least the bosses are. Cloudflare cuts more than 1,100 jobs Yesterday, Cloudflare announced that it was laying off more than 1,100 workers across the globe. That equates to roughly about 20% of the company’s workforce. …

The once-empty space over 14 lanes of interstate highway traffic coursing through the Oak Cliff neighborhood of Dallas is now an exceptional new development open to the public: Halperin Park. The $300 million freeway capping project includes a playground, splash pad, band shell, large lawn, and linear walkway that resurrects an erased section of a historic street. Joining the widely celebrated freeway-capping Klyde Warren Park, which opened its first phase over a stretch of a recessed downtown freeway in 2012, Halperin Park is a community-centric model for addressing the divisions wrought by highway building. Reconnecting a neighborhood Designed by architec…

Wendy’s shares rose on Friday after the fast-food giant reported stronger-than-expected quarterly earnings, beating analyst estimates despite poor U.S. store performance, with U.S. same-restaurant sales falling 7.8%. That slow but steady growth reflects the burger chain’s effort to turn around sales by shedding low-performing American restaurants and improving menu quality. The plan comes amid an overall decline in fast-food store traffic, as American consumers grapple with higher prices and the cost of food and living soars. “We are in the early innings of our turnaround,” Ken Cook, Wendy’s CFO and interim CEO, told analysts on Friday’s earnings call. In the …

Prediction markets have now turned their focus to hantavirus, a rare but severe category of viruses transmitted from rodents to humans, after several cases were identified earlier this month aboard an Atlantic cruise operated by Oceanwide Expeditions. It’s a serious situation that has drawn global concern: Several passengers have tested positive for the illness, at least three cruise participants have died, and a number of others on the trip are reportedly experiencing symptoms. Amid growing anxiety about the illness and, no doubt, memories of the nerve-racking first weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic, some people have taken to prediction markets to bet on what might …

Maury Povich’s daytime TV show Maury—a parade of salacious domestic disputes and paternity tests—ran for a whopping 31 seasons until his 2022 retirement. Which is why it was unexpected that 87-year-old Povich found himself at the SoHo headquarters of AI-enhanced cloud services company Air on May 5, mingling with a crowd 20- and 30-somethings, his slacks, button down, and knit half-zip sweater standing out easily amid the maxi skirts and stick-and-poke tattoos. He was there as part of Air’s “Cinco de Maury” event, a launch party and screening of the company’s new campaign, On Air with Maury Povich. The 12-minute video brought the host out of retirement (temporarily) t…

Critics of AI caution that as a relatively new technology, its long-term effects on the human brain are still unknown. But a new study shows that AI could be just as dangerous in the short-term, with sessions of AI use only 10 minutes long leading to impaired brain performance. The study, conducted by researchers at Carnegie Mellon, Oxford, MIT, and UCLA, challenged participants to complete a set of fraction-based math problems. Half the group was tasked to solve the problems on their own, while the other half was given access to an AI assistant powered by OpenAI’s GPT-5 model—only to have that AI helper removed without warning for the test’s final three problems. …

A useful rule of thumb is that when a problem persists for decades despite serious effort, the failure is usually not one of effort or intelligence, but of framing. Climate change sits squarely in this category. We have poured talent, capital, policy, and good intentions into solving it, and yet the core dynamics continue to worsen. This suggests that something foundational is off in how we are thinking about the problem. One of the clearest illustrations of that deeper issue sits far from financial centers and climate summits, in the Arctic. About 50 years ago, Denmark made a decision that looks increasingly unusual by modern economic standards. It removed around…

This article is republished with permission from Laser Wars, a newsletter about military laser weapons and other futuristic defense technology. On April 30, the Financial Times reported Israel had sent a version of its 100 KW Iron Beam high-energy laser weapon to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to help Abu Dhabi fend off hundreds of missiles and drones fired by Iran since the beginning of the U.S. military’s Operation Epic Fury. The FT notes the deployment is one of the first examples of major defense cooperation between the two countries since the 2020 Abraham Accords—a display of “the value of being Israel’s friend,” according to a regional official. There is lit…

Meta founder, chairman, and CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced on Tuesday that the company’s Meta Connect conference, which offers a glimpse into what the tech giant sees as the future, will take place September 23–24. The conference is typically a major event for the company. Last year, Meta used the stage to debut its AI glasses. Though little is known about what Zuckerberg plans to showcase this year, he has at least offered a preview of the conference vibes via a new Spotify playlist. Shared alongside the announcement, the “Connect 2026 Vibes” playlist consists of five extremely mainstream, EDM-adjacent pop tracks, including Jack Harlow’s new release “Say Hello” (p…

On May 11, media entrepreneur Byron Allen announced a deal to buy a majority stake in BuzzFeed—the millennial-favorite news site that closed its Pulitzer Prize-winning news division in 2023. Allen is swooping in as savior of the 20-year-old publication, which otherwise would have had to file for bankruptcy as a result of its shrinking revenue. Allen will replace founder Jonah Peretti as CEO of BuzzFeed; Peretti will become president of BuzzFeed AI. “Our vision is to build on the iconic foundation of BuzzFeed and HuffPost by expanding into free-streaming video, audio, and user-generated content,” Allen said in a statement announcing the deal. “As of this moment, wi…

Retail giant Walmart Inc has confirmed that it will eliminate some jobs. However, the affected positions will not impact the company’s retail staff, which makes up the overwhelming majority of its 1.6 million-strong U.S. workforce. Here’s what you need to know about Walmart’s latest round of layoffs. What’s happened? On Tuesday, the Wall Street Journal reported that Walmart would lay off or relocate around 1,000 members of its corporate workforce, citing people familiar with the situation. Walmart has now confirmed to Fast Company that it is eliminating some roles, without specifying the exact number of positions to be cut. A company spokesperson provided …

It’s time to stop calling Gen Z the youngest generation in the workforce. Gen Alpha has entered the chat. Although the oldest Gen Alphas have only just hit their teen years, they are deeply financially motivated and ready to be put to work. If you happen to be living with a Gen Alpha who seems strangely fixated on earning their own money—or who is obsessed with brands and products—you know that we’re raising a generation of hustlers (even if they’re just hustling us). But new data from public relations and marketing firm DKC is shedding even more light on the financial intrigue behind Gen Alpha. The firm surveyed 1,000 parents of 8- to 15-year-olds about their chi…

Americans paid more for their groceries last month, but high gasoline prices resulting from the Iran war were only one of the reasons why. Prices for food eaten at home rose 2.9% in April compared to the same month a year earlier, according to government figures released Tuesday. That was the highest year-over-year inflation rate for the category since August 2023. Prices at restaurants, fast-food chains and other places to get prepared meals also increased, putting overall food prices up 3.2% in the last year, the Labor Department’s consumer price index showed. Fuel prices have soared while the Iran war prevents cargo ships from passing through the Strait of Hormuz, a…

The Wendy’s Company could go private if billionaire Nelson Peltz has anything to say about it. The Trian Fund Management cofounder is looking for outside investors to help with a takeover of Wendy’s, the Financial Times reports. The news isn’t exactly surprising—in February, Trian used its regulatory filing to announce it might sell its stake or attempt a takeover of Wendy’s. Peltz and Trian currently own a 16% stake in Wendy’s, along with the Peltz family’s minority stake in a New York-area Wendy’s franchise owner. Peltz’s son, Bradley Peltz, and Trian cofounder and president Peter May are also on the board of Wendy’s. Fast Company reached out to Trian and W…

While a lot of folks embrace the futuristic vibe of autonomous cars, two veteran mobility entrepreneurs quickly spotted a looming chokepoint in their scaling efforts. The robotaxi industry desperately needs a faster, more streamlined way to service its fleets if it hopes to become profitable. George Kalligeros, a Greek car enthusiast and former Tesla engineer, and the British business strategist Dan Keene were all too aware of new mobility infrastructure. They’d navigated similar logistics with their London startup Pushme Bikes, a massive battery-swapping network for shared e-scooters & e-bikes that raised $600 million before selling to Germany’s Tier Mobility in 2020…