Blog, YouTube & Content Monetization

Lorrie Faith Cranor’s latest effort to educate people about privacy is a short, colorfully illustrated book written for an audience who probably can’t read it yet. Cranor, a professor at Carnegie Mellon University and director of the Pittsburgh school’s CyLab Usable Privacy and Security Laboratory, wrote Privacy, Please! after publishing more than 200 research papers, spending a 2016–2017 stint as the Federal Trade Commission’s chief technologist, and making a quilt and dress illustrated with commonly used weak passwords. In a Zoom video call, Cranor says she got the idea for this self-published children’s book when planning for a privacy-outreach event at a loc…

The holiday season always reminds me that there is such a thing as too much of a good thing. My kids start winter break thrilled—new toys to play with, days at home, permission to veg out. But by the time the new year rolls around, they’re itching to go back to school, eager to show off their favorite holiday gifts and dive back into their routine. It got me thinking: why don’t we, as adults, approach returning to work after a vacation with that same positive energy? More often than not, coming back from time off stirs up feelings of anxiety. For some, it reaches the point of canceling out any lingering benefits of the break. Others overcompensate by overworking upon th…

The new year often brings sticker shock. A glance at our bank statements and credit card bills shows just how much we spent during the holidays, serving as a painful reminder that with the festivities behind us, we should work on getting our expenditures under control. A good first step toward doing that is to cancel unnecessary subscriptions—whether that’s Netflix, Apple TV, Amazon Prime, or any other service you pay for monthly but don’t use. These unnecessary subscriptions can add up—especially as prices continue to rise. A 2025 CNET report found that the average U.S. adult spends $17 a month on subscriptions they don’t use—that’s more than $200 a year. (A Self…

Every January, leaders are told to do the same thing: set ambitious goals, map out the year, and commit to executing harder than before. We frame this as discipline or vision, but more often than not, it is a ritual of pressure. The assumption is that success comes from wanting more and pushing faster. After years of leading teams, building companies, and advising executives at the intersection of AI, work, and leadership, I realized something uncomfortable. Most people are not failing because their goals are unclear. They are failing because their capacity is already exhausted before the year even begins. That realization fundamentally changed how I approach the …

New York City kicked off the new year with a new mayor in democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani, whose inauguration flooded the internet with viral moments. Mamdani took the oath of office via two separate swearing in ceremonies. The more intimate one took place underground at midnight at a decommissioned City Hall subway station. With just a few hours as mayor under his belt, Mamdani was then sworn in for a second time by fellow Democratic Socialist Bernie Sanders. Mamdani first reached internet stardom during his mayoral campaign thanks in part to his campaign’s design and witty social media content, prompting a landslide victory and the highest mayoral race voter…

A California lawmaker has introduced a first-in-the-nation bill meant to ban companies from embedding AI chatbot technology into toys designed for children. Announced on Friday, the measure comes amid growing concerns about the impact of artificial intelligence on child welfare, and a number of local and federal proposals to limit kids’ access to LLM chatbots. This particular legislation would target toys that simulate friendship and companionship through large language technology. For toy manufacturers, LLMs can provide an easy, albeit risky, way of creating a personality for a particular doll or character. AI models aren’t pre-scripted the way most talking toys are — …

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. …

This new year comes with a new moon. Skywatchers are in for a treat this weekend as 2026 rings in the first supermoon of the year, along with a Quadrantid meteor shower. The January full “wolf moon” is forecast to appear overnight into tomorrow morning Saturday, January 3, peaking at 5:03 a.m. ET when it will be at its fullest, according to EarthSky. However, don’t be fooled: It will appear full both nights, due to its close proximity to Earth (making it appear 14% larger), and proximity to Jupiter and Gemini’s twin stars—all of which will make it appear even brighter. All that light, however, could make it harder to see the Quadrantid meteor shower: bright, …

A new year has brought a new pay rate for more than 8.3 million Americans. The minimum wage is going up in 19 states this week, with workers in Hawaii earning as much as $2 more an hour. Collectively, these pay increases will boost paychecks by a total of $5 billion, according to the Economic Policy Institute. While the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour hasn’t budged in nearly two decades, and still applies in eight states, many states and cities have steadily been increasing their minimum wages to well over double that amount. Seattle’s minimum wage, at $21.30 per hour, is now nearly triple that federal threshold. As is the case with Seattle, 47 cities …

A group of about 19 Buddhist monks and their rescue dog, Aloka, are walking from Fort Worth, Texas, to Washington, D.C., to promote world peace. Their planned route spans approximately 2,300 miles across 10 states and is expected to take 120 days to complete. Here’s what to know about their journey and how to follow along in real time: Why are the monks walking? The group has been sharing updates about their journey on their official Walk for Peace Facebook page. According to the Facebook page, the walk is intended to promote the “awareness of peace, loving kindness, and compassion across America and the world.”​ Their movement has drawn massive support …

I started building Simple in 2019 with a vision that one day, a digital product could help people fix their health as effectively as a human. Five years later, we turned this vision into a company with 160M in ARR, and a team of more than 150 people across multiple countries. If you only look at the highlights, my story can look like a straight line of an entrepreneur’s journey. However, getting there required me to rebuild my own thinking and habits. You see, I have ADHD, and a mind that constantly scans for what can go wrong. For years, I treated that as a bug. It only became my superpower once I learned how to direct it. That isn’t an easy journey, but these lessons h…

A wild winter storm was expected to bring strong winds, heavy snow and frigid temperatures to the Great Lakes and Northeast on Tuesday, a day after a bomb cyclone barreled across the northern U.S. and left tens thousands of customers without power. The storm that hit parts of the Plains and Great Lakes on Monday brought sharply colder air, strong winds and a mix of snow, ice and rain that led to treacherous travel. Forecasters said it intensified quickly enough to meet the criteria of a bomb cyclone, a system that strengthens rapidly as pressure drops. Nationwide, more than 153,000 customers were without power early Tuesday, more than a third of them in Michigan, accord…

Shares opened mixed in Europe on Tuesday after slipping in Asia as some regional markets wrapped up trading for the year. Crude oil prices edged higher and gold and silver resumed their ascent. U.S. futures were flat. In Tokyo, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi rang out the final session for 2025 in a traditional year-end ceremony. “By realizing a Japanese economy that earns the trust of investors around the world, we will create a virtuous cycle in which global capital flows into Japan,” Takaichi said. The benchmark Nikkei 225 shed 0.4% to 50,339.48, its first year-end close above 50,000. It ended 2025 up nearly 25%. With just two trading days left before the y…

I’ve done it, you’ve done it, we’ve all done it. With the best of intentions, we set big goals for our future: get a work promotion, lose 20 pounds, run a marathon. And too often, we give up a few months later, realizing we bit off more than we could chew. Why? We get enamored with the idea but the execution? Not so much. Goals can seem straightforward, but without a specific plan or realistic milestones, they quickly fizzle out. The Appeal and Problem of Big Goals Big goals can quickly inspire us and make us feel like we’re putting effort into forward progress. But goals are only as good as the plans that support them. You can’t build your dream house without an archite…

Hello and welcome to Modern CEO! I’m Stephanie Mehta, CEO and chief content officer of Mansueto Ventures. Each week this newsletter explores inclusive approaches to leadership drawn from conversations with executives and entrepreneurs, and from the pages of Inc. and Fast Company. If you received this newsletter from a friend, you can sign up to get it yourself every Monday morning. It’s the time of year when we all make promises to ourselves. I’m committing to read more, procrastinate less, and squeeze in an extra hour of piano practice a week. I asked other CEOs to share their 2026 New Year’s resolutions; here are seven responses, in their own words. Omar Abbosh, chief…

Ketchup-inspired luggage. Soap based on the characters from Stranger Things. A hot sauce energy drink. These are just a few of the brand collaborations that we’ve seen in 2025—and it’s safe to say that all’s not well in the world of brand partnerships. A few years ago, the art of the brand collab most often involved bringing together two brands that already had overlapping design styles, fanbases, or product categories. Recall partnerships like Nike and Apple’s successful 2016 Series 2 Watch launch, for example; or Dolce & Gabbana’s elevated designs for Smeg in 2019; or even Lego’s 2020 collection with Ikea. All of these pairings make some measure of intuitive sen…

There’s bad news for those using digital surveys to try to understand people’s online behavior: We may no longer be able to determine whether a human is responding to them or not, a recent study has shown—and there seems to be no way around this problem. This means that all online canvassing could be vulnerable to misrepresenting people’s true opinions. This could have repercussions for anything that falls under the category of “information warfare,” from polling results, to misinformation, to fraud. Non-human survey respondents, in aggregate, could impact anything from flavors and pricing for a pack of gum, to something more damaging, such as whether or not someone cou…

Many traits—like impulsivity, hyperfocus, and nonlinear thinking—that get pathologized in school or corporate environments are the same ones that create natural entrepreneurs. View the full article

As employers have wrested back control of the job market, it has been a sharp contrast to the post-pandemic years when workers seemed to hold the power. In 2025, employees fretted about their job security and the sweeping impact of artificial intelligence on their work lives—not to mention corporate America’s continued commitment to keeping them in the office for longer. Here, we’ve compiled some of the most popular Work Life stories from this year—on the issues that consumed you most. The “996” schedule This year saw the return of hustle culture in Silicon Valley, as AI startups popularized a grueling work schedule that became popularized in China. The “996” schedul…

If you’re a millennial or simply a fan of sci-fi, you likely remember 2010’s smash hit Inception, written and directed by Christopher Nolan. The story follows Dom Cobb (played by Leonardo DiCaprio), a professional thief who specializes in stealing privileged secrets from people’s minds while they dream. He uses advanced technology to enter another person’s subconscious while they’re asleep and take whatever information he wants. The problem DiCaprio’s character faces is that the line between reality and dreams become blurred, making it increasingly difficult to tell what’s real. In many ways, especially for retail investors, that’s a picture of the modern market. A place…