What's on Your Mind?

When Anna Jarvis set out to establish a national Mother’s Day in the early 20th century, her goal was to honor her own mother’s legacy of activism, sacrifice, and maternal devotion. She envisioned a national day of gratitude where all Americans expressed their thanks and admiration for their own mothers. But just a few short years after successfully getting official recognition for the holiday, Jarvis was horrified to see Mother’s Day commercialized to benefit florists and greeting card companies. Jarvis petitioned to recall the holiday she had championed. One imagines Jarvis banging her head against the wall if she could see us now, since Mother’s Day spending co…

Pinterest’s newest ad starts with two young women doomscrolling in the dark. It’s a familiar nightly ritual for millions. As one of them slumps on the bed in a Reels-induced semicoma, the other gets an idea and opens . . . you guessed it, Pinterest. Suddenly, an energetic dance track fills the room, and the two are inspired to get their best ’fits together for a night out. It ends with the tagline, “The best thing you can find online is a reason to go offline.” When the business model for every other social platform revolves around your attention and time spent as their primary product for brand advertising dollars, this may feel like a counterintuitive strategy…

Burger King’s slogans have long emphasized personalization, like “Have It Your Way” and “Your Rule.” Now there’s a text generator that lets you personalize its logo, too. A new Burger King logo font generator lets users customize the red, rounded letters that sit between the logo’s burnt-orange-colored buns. It’s by Pixel Frame, a website that makes album cover and logo text generators for everything from Drake’s discography to Dragon Ball Z and Donkey Kong. Just a few words will render big and bold in the logo generator, but the text will become increasingly squished and stacked as you add more text, with one line stacked on top of the other like hot-off-the-gril…

Artificial intelligence—surely the most hyped technological development to seize the spotlight in a generation—does not appear to be very popular with the American public. A clear majority recognize AI is a big deal, but recent Pew Research Center polling found more concern than excitement, particularly in its impact on creativity and relationships. Quinnipiac surveys find opinions souring even as usage rises. It’s associated with job losses, cheating, dubious advice, excessive energy consumption, and a variety of doomsday scenarios up to and including the eradication of humanity. In March, 57% of respondents to an NBC poll said the risks associated with the technolo…

BlackBerry revivalist phones have been appearing in various forms over the last few years, but the Unihertz Titan 2 Elite is the most credible option yet. The small-scale Chinese boutique-of-sorts Unihertz has spent years refining its formula to balance modern Android capabilities with legacy tactile hardware. In 2026, it’s finally landed on a device that makes the most of its own identity. The naming convention here is admittedly a little confusing. Last year’s Titan 2 was a rugged, wide-format device clearly inspired by the BlackBerry Passport—it was, in every sense, “titanic.” But this new Elite successor isn’t a turbo-charged version of that phone; it’s a complete…

Below, Piera Gelardi shares five key insights from her new book, The Playful Way: Creativity, Connection, and Joy Through Everyday Moments of Play. Gelardi is a creative entrepreneur. She cofounded the media brand Refinery29 and, more recently, the creative wellness company NoomaLooma. What’s the big idea? Playfulness means being curiously, creatively, and courageously engaged with life. Being playful isn’t the easy choice. It requires showing up authentically, risking looking silly, and trying something that might not work. In a world that rewards performance and polish, choosing play is a quiet act of courage that will help you feel alive. Listen to the a…

When communications worker Suzanne Selkow decided to open her own consulting practice, she realized that going solo meant fewer opportunities to “turn to a colleague for a gut check,” she says. Knowing herself to get bogged down in “decision paralysis,” she figured she needed some kind of outside perspective as she launched her business. So she turned to a different kind of mentor—she created an AI career coach using Anthropic’s Claude. “I figured that was actually a practical use case for an LLM—to be able to take some of those bigger-picture ideas that I had workshopped with a human coach, and turn it into a week-by-week [business] plan,” she says. Now mon…

If you’re like me, your bank statement looks like a graveyard of monthly $9.99 charges for apps and web services that somehow add up to the price of a used Honda Civic every year. Somewhere over the last decade or two, software companies turned us from owners into renters. And quite frankly, the landlords are getting greedy. But here’s the good news: Whether you’re on a Mac or a PC, there are world-class alternatives that don’t require a monthly tribute to a corporate overlord. We’re talking professional-grade tools that are either free forever or have free tiers so robust you’ll forget the paid version even exists. Stop renting your digital life. Here are…

Every day, I see another LinkedIn post celebrating a company that’s AI-powered. Meaning, they have added AI systems to their workflow, built co-work agents, and are using the technology to assist their team. And every day, I find myself thinking that they’ve missed the point entirely. The problem isn’t that these companies are using AI. It’s that they’re applying 2026 innovation to a 2016 mindset. They’re slapping a Band-Aid on an old wound instead of asking where the wound came from and if it will happen again (or worse). THE AI ASSIST Consider social media management. The traditional AI-powered approach gives teams an AI assistant to help write posts fas…

Blue Cross Blue Shield is set to begin issuing nearly $2 billion in payouts to claimants in a long-running class action lawsuit. The payments are expected to begin this month and could see individuals receiving checks worth hundreds of dollars. Here’s what you need to know about the settlement and its massive payout. What is the settlement about? The settlement payout is the culmination of a nearly 14-year legal battle between Blue Cross Blue Shield and its subscribers. Blue Cross Blue Shield (BCBS) operates a federation of health insurance companies under its umbrella. As of 2026, there are 33 such BCBS-affiliated health insurers. Back in 2012, …

In the not-so-distant past, the biggest question I’d get as a CEO was cut and dry: “What’s our plan?” Today, leaders across industries face a different, core question: “Are we built for change?” Unprecedented disruption is upon us, and just about every organization needs to transform quickly, in a big way. Having led five organizations, I have always architected and executed change as a core part of my remit. After decades of this work, I can confidently say that the formulas and frameworks that have worked for decades are no longer what we need. Because these unprecedented times call for something new, here are my top six tips for leading through change today. …

Judgment is scarce in the age of agentic AI. Access is not scarce, and nearly every enterprise can now reach the same frontier models. Yes, automation is the starting line, but reimagining end-to-end processes and having context–rich process intelligence are how you get ROI from artificial intelligence. And that is incredibly hard to build overnight. That is where competitive advantage now lives, in the ability to apply AI with discipline, context, and consequence, with accountability for outcomes. Agentic AI is redrawing the competitive landscape quickly. The winners will go deep instead of wide, deliberately owning the last stretch of the process where context, …

In November 2025, nearly 300 designers began work on their submissions for the competition of a lifetime: the opportunity to design a bathroom for one of the most famous architects of all time. The competition called on designers to imagine a new public restroom for the Gropius House, the family home of the late German architect Walter Gropius. Gropius founded the famed art and design school the Bauhaus (1919–1933), which defined an entire era of modernist design through its innovative approach to technology and almost reverent obsession with materials. His self-designed home is now preserved and made open to the public by Historic New England, a non-profit that …

Walk down almost any city street, beach, or park, and you’ll see them: cigarette butts scattered along the curb, tucked into sidewalk cracks, or washed up along shorelines—4.5 trillion of them. They’re now so common they’ve become nearly invisible. But that ubiquity masks a growing environmental crisis—one that has only intensified as nicotine products evolve. For decades, cigarette butts have been the most littered item in the world. The filter—often mistaken as biodegradable—is made of cellulose acetate, a form of plastic that can persist in the environment for years. These filters don’t just sit there; they break down into microplastics, leaching toxic chemicals li…

American workers are stressed. Like, really stressed. In Gallup’s annual workplace deep dive, half of U.S. employees reported significant daily stress—in fact, the highest rate in the world out of all nine regions Gallup tracks for the report. Nerves are in tatters: Over half (52%) have experienced anxiety or panic-like symptoms at work in the last month, while nearly two-thirds (63%) of Americans have used alcohol, cannabis, or unprescribed drugs to cope with work stress in the past year. Some 52% have done so during the workday itself. And while work, in its very essence, is stressful, 2026 is serving up a particularly volatile cocktail of RTO friction, AI anxiety,…

Spirit Airlines abruptly ended operations in the early morning of Saturday, May 2 following a failed government bailout for Spirit Aviation Holdings, Inc. The company shutdown left customers stranded—it flew over 50,000 people the day before—and about 17,000 employees without a job, effective immediately. Now, some of those employees have turned to GoFundMe for support during this tumultuous time. Searching “Spirit Airlines” on the donation site leads to campaign after campaign from former captains, flight attendants, and ground staff. Many of the campaigns highlight that the person is looking for new employment, but until then, needs support to stay on their…

Few people know fame like Robert Downey Jr. The Oscar-winning actor has done everything from critical darlings like Oppenheimer to pop culture juggernauts like The Avengers. While Downey took a more traditional path to celebrity, many up-and-coming stars got their starts on social media. Two of this year’s Grammy nominees for Best New Artist, Addison Rae and Alex Warren, were known for their TikToks before they were known for their music. Several of the biggest new names in filmmaking, including directors Danny and Michael Philippou of Talk to Me and Kane Parsons of the upcoming Backrooms, went viral on YouTube before breaking into Hollywood. But according to Dow…

Anyone spending time inside a company right now can feel it. There is a growing assumption shaping decisions at the highest levels. AI will drive efficiency and therefore companies are expected to reduce headcount. It sounds logical. It sounds disciplined. But it is also incomplete. I have been in boardrooms where AI is discussed as both an opportunity and a justification. Leaders talk about transformation, and in the same breath talk about reducing headcount. The connection feels automatic, as if one must follow the other. Here’s what’s missing from the conversation: What is the work we actually want done, and how should it be done? THE EFFICIENCY SHORTCU…

My hiring philosophy is quite simple: find people who raise the bar. In practice, many of those people turn out to be parents. That’s not a coincidence, but it does require a deliberate choice about what you’re actually optimizing for, because the default settings of most high-growth companies screen parents out before they ever get a chance to prove what they can do. AI changed what great performance looks like Being great at your job is no longer about who can put in the most hours. It’s about who can identify the highest-priority problems, use AI to accelerate execution, and drive work to completion with exceptional judgment and taste. The people who excel i…

As tech companies continue slashing jobs with impunity, workers are right to be fearful—and fed up. But it appears that overall layoffs may actually be slowing down, according to the latest report from outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. In April, employers across the country announced 83,387 job cuts, an uptick of 38% from the 60,620 cuts during the month prior. That figure is, however, lower than it was in April 2025, when layoffs had reached 105,441. Overall layoffs for 2026 have also significantly dropped in comparison to last year: As of April, employers have disclosed plans for over 300,000 layoffs—half the number of layoffs that had been annou…

If the disappearing office snacks have you updating your LinkedIn, you might be the office Chicken Little. Psychologists call it intolerance of uncertainty, and your brain is literally hijacking your rational thought. Here’s how to stop the spiral before you stress out your whole team. View the full article

If the spring season has brought an urge to scrub your living space from top to bottom, why not clear out the digital detritus cluttering your electronic devices and online accounts at the same time? Carrying out the digital equivalent of spring-cleaning a home isn’t just an opportunity to tidy up our online lives. Eliminating dust bunnies like dormant accounts and forgotten files can help protect personal data, according to cybersecurity experts. “Clutter is fuel for scammers. Old accounts, exposed data, and forgotten apps give them more ways in,” Michael Sherwood, a product vice president at cybersecurity firm Malwarebytes, said. “Cleaning up your digital life i…

Artificial inteligence is being touted as the most transformative technology of the 21st century, changing everything from how people work to how they live. But forget all that—what sports fans want to know is, can it predict who is going to win the World Cup? According to a new Bank of America Global Research study shared with Fast Company, titled “The Beautiful Game: BofA’s World Cup 2026 Guide,” approximately 40% of FIFA fans they surveyed are betting on France’s Les Bleus. However, AI, specifically Microsoft’s Copilot, thinks Spain’s La Roja, or “The Red One,” will take home the gold. “Our 2026 World Cup survey . . . suggests that France will lift the trophy i…