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Shares in major quantum computer companies were on the rise again in premarket trading on Tuesday, highlighting what has been a volatile couple of weeks for a nascent industry that continues to captivate. Here’s what’s driving the latest news: D-Wave announces Advantage2 By far, Palo Alto-based D-Wave Quantum Inc (NYSE: QBTS) is seeing the biggest boost in premarket trading, with its stock up more than 12% as of this writing. This boost follows a 7% increase in D-Wave shares on Monday. Investors are likely excited by news on Tuesday morning in which D-Wave announced the general availability of its sixth-generation Advantage2 quantum computing system, which the company says has a demonstrated ability to solve deeply complex problems that classical computers can’t. “It’s what everybody aspired to achieve, and we’re quite excited about it,” CEO Alan Baratz told Fast Company in March, when the company announced that it had achieved “quantum supremacy” using the Advantage2. Although some researchers have challenged D-Wave’s claims, investors appear to be on board for now. Shares in D-Wave are up 36.84% year to date. Quantum Computing Inc rises, falls, and rises again Hoboken-based Quantum Computing Inc. (Nasdaq: QUBT) has seen some volatility since it released its first-quarter 2025 earnings report last Thursday. The company swung to a profit, reporting net income of $17 million, versus a net loss of $6.4 million last year. Shares surged double digits on Friday after the report, but then fell more than 8% on Monday, possibly due to some profit taking from investors who wanted to lock in their gains. Now, in premarket trading on Tuesday, QUBT is back on the rise again, with the stock up almost 9% as of this writing. Who can keep up? Rigetti Computing Inc: Along for the ride? Shares in Rigetti Computing (Nasdaq: RGTI) were also on the rise in premarket trading Tuesday, up nearly 6% as of this writing. The Berkeley-based company has not announced any news this morning that would impact the share price, so it’s possible that investors are just showing a bit more excitement for the quantum computing space. Experts believe the space has the potential to transform computing as we know it, although debates persist about how far we are from widespread practical uses for quantum computing. It’s worth noting that while all three of the above quantum computing companies are enjoying a rally this week, shares in Quantum Computing Inc. and Rigetti are both down significantly year to date: 36.94% and 39.75% respectively. Only time will tell if these three stocks will continue on their upward path this week and into the future. For now, enjoy the quantum leap. View the full article

Brussels could apply a €2 handling fee on billions of small packages imported mainly from ChinaView the full article

Change aims to close a gap in regulation exposed by collapse of Silicon Valley BankView the full article

The The President administration is allowing work on a major offshore wind project for New York to resume. The developer, the Norwegian energy company Equinor, said Monday it was told by the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management that a stop-work order has been lifted for the Empire Wind project, allowing construction to resume. Work has been paused since Interior Secretary Doug Burgum last month directed the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to halt construction and review the permits. Burgum said at the time that it appeared former President Joe Biden’s administration had “rushed through” the approvals. Equinor spent seven years obtaining permits and has spent more than $2.5 billion so far on a project that is one-third complete. Equinor President and CEO Anders Opedal thanked President Donald The President for allowing the project to move forward, saving about 1,500 construction jobs and investments in U.S. energy infrastructure. He also expressed appreciation to New York’s governor, New York City’s mayor, members of Congress and labor groups, as well as Norwegian officials who worked to save the project. The Norwegian government owns a majority stake in Equinor. “We appreciate the fact that construction can now resume on Empire Wind, a project which underscores our commitment to deliver energy while supporting local economies and creating jobs,” Opedal said in a statement. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said it took countless conversations with Equinor and White House officials, and the involvement of labor and business interests, to emphasize the project’s importance and get Empire Wind back on track. Equinor is building Empire Wind south of Long Island, New York, to provide power in 2026 for more than 500,000 New York homes. “New York’s economic future is going to be powered by abundant, clean energy that helps our homes and businesses thrive. I fought to save clean energy jobs in New York—and we got it done,” Hochul said in a statement Monday. The Interior Department did not immediately respond to emails seeking comment Monday. Large offshore wind farms have been making electricity for three decades in Europe and, more recently, in Asia. But the industry has struggled to grow in the U.S. due to high costs, difficulties growing a supply chain for materials and the lengthy permitting process. The President has prioritized fossil fuels and moved against renewable energy since returning to the White House. One of his first acts was ordering a pause of offshore wind lease sales in federal waters and the issuance of approvals, permits and loans for all wind projects. But the administration’s targeting of Empire Wind, a project already underway, took that a step further. White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers said in a statement Friday that while unleashing America’s energy dominance, The President “paused certain wind projects that are detrimental to our beloved wildlife including birds and whales.” There are no known links between large whale deaths and ongoing offshore wind activities, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. While wind turbines can pose a risk to birds, wildlife conservation organizations say they support the responsible development of offshore wind because climate change is a bigger threat. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of New York said Monday that lifting the stop-work order is welcome news. Empire Wind will greatly benefit the economy on Long Island and the environment for all New Yorkers, he said in a statement. Offshore wind advocates also celebrated the decision. It’s a win for workers, the industry and companies in places like Louisiana, South Carolina, and Pennsylvania, helping to build projects in the Northeast, the Oceantic Network said in a statement. Equinor said on May 9 it would be forced to abandon Empire Wind within days unless the administration relented on its order that stopped construction. Equinor was spending up to $50 million per week and had 11 vessels on standby. Equinor finalized the federal lease in March 2017, during The President’s first term. The federal government approved the construction and operations plan in February 2024. New York aims to obtain 70% of its electricity from renewable sources by 2030 and 9 gigawatts of offshore wind by 2035. New York is getting some wind power from the nation’s first commercial-scale offshore wind farm, a 12-turbine wind farm called South Fork that opened a year ago, operated by different companies east of Montauk Point, New York. The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org. —Jennifer McDermott, Associated Press View the full article

European capitals in diplomatic flurry after US president’s call with Vladimir PutinView the full article

Comments damp expectations of breakthrough to end long-running crisis over Tehran’s nuclear programmeView the full article

Key Takeaways Exciting New Features: BookTok has introduced new features to enhance user engagement and improve the book discovery process for readers.Enhanced Discovery: Users can now access improved visibility for their book-related content through user-generated videos and trending hashtags, increasing exposure to new readers.Improved User Interaction: Upgraded capabilities for comments, likes, and shares allow deeper connections and community engagement among book enthusiasts.Impact on Publishing: BookTok significantly influences sales and marketing strategies in the book publishing industry, showcasing the correlation between platform engagement and book sales.Content Creation and Strategy: Simplified content creation tools and structured content calendars promote consistent engagement and storytelling, benefiting small businesses in showcasing their titles.Influencer Collaborations: Partnering with BookTok influencers can amplify your reach, enhance brand credibility, and connect with audiences effectively through authentic recommendations. If you’re a fan of BookTok, you’re in for an exciting surprise. The platform just rolled out a brand-new feature that’s set to enhance your reading experience and connect you even more with fellow book lovers. This change is designed to make discovering your next favorite read easier and more interactive than ever. With this update, you’ll find new ways to engage with content and share your thoughts on the books that have captured your heart. Whether you’re a casual reader or a dedicated bibliophile, this feature promises to add a fresh twist to your BookTok journey. Get ready to dive deeper into the world of literature and connect with a vibrant community that shares your passion. Overview of BookTok BookTok, a vibrant community on TikTok, connects readers through engaging video content. This platform enables users to share book recommendations, reviews, and reading experiences, fostering a sense of community among book lovers. Small businesses in the publishing and retail sectors can leverage BookTok’s influence to enhance brand awareness and engage with passionate readers. By creating user-generated content that showcases your products or services, you can tap into this growing audience. Utilize trending hashtags related to books and reading to boost organic reach. Paid social ads targeting specific demographics can further enhance your visibility within the BookTok community. Incorporate storytelling in your social media strategy to resonate with potential customers. Videos featuring book hauls, reading challenges, or discussions on popular titles can significantly improve social media engagement. As TikTok encourages creativity, your audience’s interaction with your content can transform into loyal followers and increased sales. Monitor social media analytics to assess the effectiveness of your campaigns. Adjusting your content calendar based on audience feedback ensures your posts stay relevant and engaging. By partnering with influencers on BookTok, you can expand your reach and tap into their follower base, ultimately boosting your brand’s online presence. New Features Unveiled New features on BookTok enhance your reading experience and boost connectivity among book enthusiasts. These updates aim to improve discovery and foster community interaction, making it easier for you to engage with your audience and promote your brand. Feature One: Enhanced Discovery Enhanced discovery features on BookTok amplify the visibility of your book-related content. You can leverage user-generated content to showcase your titles through engaging videos. This community-driven approach increases the likelihood of new readers finding your books, particularly within trending genres like young adult fiction and adult fiction. Utilizing trending hashtags can further optimize your posts for greater organic reach. By effectively using a content calendar for regular posting, you keep your audience informed and connected to your brand, resulting in improved engagement rates. Feature Two: User Interaction Upgrades User interaction upgrades foster deeper connections with your audience on BookTok. Enhanced capabilities for comments, likes, and shares empower you to engage directly with viewers. You can encourage customer feedback through interactive content, allowing your followers to share their thoughts and recommendations. This not only boosts your social media engagement but also helps in building brand loyalty. Collaborating with influencers for content creation ensures your videos resonate with a larger audience, increasing your credibility and brand presence within the community. These interactions reinforce your brand voice and create a dedicated following for your business. Impact on Users New features on BookTok significantly enhance user experiences, fostering deeper connections among readers and boosting community engagement. Community Engagement Enhanced features encourage user interaction, creating a more vibrant community. BookTok allows you to engage with your audience meaningfully through comments, likes, and shares. These features boost your brand visibility and encourage customer interaction. Utilizing trending hashtags effectively increases your organic reach in a competitive market. Your community can thrive when you promote user-generated content, which amplifies brand awareness and strengthens your online presence. Content Creation Simplified content creation tools lead to improved video content sharing. Your small business benefits from easy-to-use editing features, allowing for creative storytelling that resonates with your audience. Upgraded search functionalities make it simpler for users to find your social media posts. Structured content calendars can enhance your social media strategy, ensuring consistent engagement across platforms. Adopting this approach not only captures attention but also improves the engagement rate of your posts, maximizing your social media marketing efforts. Wider Implications for Book Publishing BookTok’s rise significantly impacts book publishing, influencing both sales and marketing strategies. You can see a direct correlation between BookTok engagement and increased book sales. Lesser-known titles like Colleen Hoover’s “It Ends With Us” and Adam Silvera’s “They Both Die At The End” became bestsellers after gaining traction on the platform. This trend highlights the importance of utilizing trending hashtags and engaging video content to enhance your visibility. You should also adapt your social media marketing strategies to tap into BookTok’s audience. Emphasize user-generated content to build authentic connections and increase brand awareness. Encourage readers to share their experiences with your books through creative storytelling and engaging social media posts. Implementing a content calendar can help you schedule posts consistently, maximizing engagement rates across platforms. Leveraging influencer partnerships is crucial in this new landscape. Influencers with a strong following on TikTok can amplify your book’s reach and impact through authentic recommendations. Focus on effective audience targeting by collaborating with creators whose brand voice aligns with yours. Utilize social media analytics to monitor engagement and adjust your strategies accordingly. Tracking performance helps you understand which content resonates with your audience, leading to better-informed decisions about future social media campaigns. You can enhance your organic reach by optimizing content through strategic use of hashtags and leveraging popular trends within the BookTok community. Incorporating these strategies enables your small business to thrive in the evolving book publishing landscape, enhancing customer interaction and solidifying your online presence. Conclusion The new features on BookTok are set to transform your reading journey. By enhancing discovery and user interaction, you’ll find it easier to connect with fellow book lovers and share your thoughts. These updates not only enrich your experience but also empower small businesses to thrive in the literary market. As you dive into this vibrant community, take advantage of the tools available to maximize your engagement. Whether you’re a casual reader or a dedicated bibliophile, these innovations promise to deepen your connections and elevate your BookTok experience. Embrace the changes and watch as your passion for reading grows alongside the community. Frequently Asked Questions What is the new feature introduced on BookTok? The new feature on BookTok enhances user interaction and discovery of books, making it easier for readers to find recommendations and connect with one another. It aims to enrich the overall reading experience and deepen community engagement. How does BookTok support small businesses? BookTok provides small businesses in publishing and retail with opportunities to increase brand awareness through user-generated content and trending hashtags. By leveraging these tools, businesses can reach more readers and improve sales. How can users interact more on BookTok? Users can enjoy improved commenting, liking, and sharing capabilities on BookTok, fostering deeper connections and encouraging collaboration. This interaction allows for valuable feedback and strengthens community bonds among readers. What impact does BookTok have on book sales? There is a direct correlation between BookTok engagement and increased book sales. Lesser-known titles often become bestsellers after gaining visibility on the platform, showcasing the influence of trending hashtags and engaging video content. What strategies can businesses use to enhance engagement on BookTok? Businesses can boost engagement by incorporating storytelling in their content, monitoring social media analytics, and partnering with influencers. These strategies help improve visibility and build a loyal following within the BookTok community. How can the new features on BookTok benefit readers? The new features on BookTok facilitate enhanced content discovery and user interaction, allowing readers to engage more meaningfully with book-related content. This leads to a richer community experience and better recommendations for their next reads. Image Via Envato This article, "Exciting Changes: BookTok Gets New Feature to Enhance Your Reading Experience" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

Key Takeaways Exciting New Features: BookTok has introduced new features to enhance user engagement and improve the book discovery process for readers.Enhanced Discovery: Users can now access improved visibility for their book-related content through user-generated videos and trending hashtags, increasing exposure to new readers.Improved User Interaction: Upgraded capabilities for comments, likes, and shares allow deeper connections and community engagement among book enthusiasts.Impact on Publishing: BookTok significantly influences sales and marketing strategies in the book publishing industry, showcasing the correlation between platform engagement and book sales.Content Creation and Strategy: Simplified content creation tools and structured content calendars promote consistent engagement and storytelling, benefiting small businesses in showcasing their titles.Influencer Collaborations: Partnering with BookTok influencers can amplify your reach, enhance brand credibility, and connect with audiences effectively through authentic recommendations. If you’re a fan of BookTok, you’re in for an exciting surprise. The platform just rolled out a brand-new feature that’s set to enhance your reading experience and connect you even more with fellow book lovers. This change is designed to make discovering your next favorite read easier and more interactive than ever. With this update, you’ll find new ways to engage with content and share your thoughts on the books that have captured your heart. Whether you’re a casual reader or a dedicated bibliophile, this feature promises to add a fresh twist to your BookTok journey. Get ready to dive deeper into the world of literature and connect with a vibrant community that shares your passion. Overview of BookTok BookTok, a vibrant community on TikTok, connects readers through engaging video content. This platform enables users to share book recommendations, reviews, and reading experiences, fostering a sense of community among book lovers. Small businesses in the publishing and retail sectors can leverage BookTok’s influence to enhance brand awareness and engage with passionate readers. By creating user-generated content that showcases your products or services, you can tap into this growing audience. Utilize trending hashtags related to books and reading to boost organic reach. Paid social ads targeting specific demographics can further enhance your visibility within the BookTok community. Incorporate storytelling in your social media strategy to resonate with potential customers. Videos featuring book hauls, reading challenges, or discussions on popular titles can significantly improve social media engagement. As TikTok encourages creativity, your audience’s interaction with your content can transform into loyal followers and increased sales. Monitor social media analytics to assess the effectiveness of your campaigns. Adjusting your content calendar based on audience feedback ensures your posts stay relevant and engaging. By partnering with influencers on BookTok, you can expand your reach and tap into their follower base, ultimately boosting your brand’s online presence. New Features Unveiled New features on BookTok enhance your reading experience and boost connectivity among book enthusiasts. These updates aim to improve discovery and foster community interaction, making it easier for you to engage with your audience and promote your brand. Feature One: Enhanced Discovery Enhanced discovery features on BookTok amplify the visibility of your book-related content. You can leverage user-generated content to showcase your titles through engaging videos. This community-driven approach increases the likelihood of new readers finding your books, particularly within trending genres like young adult fiction and adult fiction. Utilizing trending hashtags can further optimize your posts for greater organic reach. By effectively using a content calendar for regular posting, you keep your audience informed and connected to your brand, resulting in improved engagement rates. Feature Two: User Interaction Upgrades User interaction upgrades foster deeper connections with your audience on BookTok. Enhanced capabilities for comments, likes, and shares empower you to engage directly with viewers. You can encourage customer feedback through interactive content, allowing your followers to share their thoughts and recommendations. This not only boosts your social media engagement but also helps in building brand loyalty. Collaborating with influencers for content creation ensures your videos resonate with a larger audience, increasing your credibility and brand presence within the community. These interactions reinforce your brand voice and create a dedicated following for your business. Impact on Users New features on BookTok significantly enhance user experiences, fostering deeper connections among readers and boosting community engagement. Community Engagement Enhanced features encourage user interaction, creating a more vibrant community. BookTok allows you to engage with your audience meaningfully through comments, likes, and shares. These features boost your brand visibility and encourage customer interaction. Utilizing trending hashtags effectively increases your organic reach in a competitive market. Your community can thrive when you promote user-generated content, which amplifies brand awareness and strengthens your online presence. Content Creation Simplified content creation tools lead to improved video content sharing. Your small business benefits from easy-to-use editing features, allowing for creative storytelling that resonates with your audience. Upgraded search functionalities make it simpler for users to find your social media posts. Structured content calendars can enhance your social media strategy, ensuring consistent engagement across platforms. Adopting this approach not only captures attention but also improves the engagement rate of your posts, maximizing your social media marketing efforts. Wider Implications for Book Publishing BookTok’s rise significantly impacts book publishing, influencing both sales and marketing strategies. You can see a direct correlation between BookTok engagement and increased book sales. Lesser-known titles like Colleen Hoover’s “It Ends With Us” and Adam Silvera’s “They Both Die At The End” became bestsellers after gaining traction on the platform. This trend highlights the importance of utilizing trending hashtags and engaging video content to enhance your visibility. You should also adapt your social media marketing strategies to tap into BookTok’s audience. Emphasize user-generated content to build authentic connections and increase brand awareness. Encourage readers to share their experiences with your books through creative storytelling and engaging social media posts. Implementing a content calendar can help you schedule posts consistently, maximizing engagement rates across platforms. Leveraging influencer partnerships is crucial in this new landscape. Influencers with a strong following on TikTok can amplify your book’s reach and impact through authentic recommendations. Focus on effective audience targeting by collaborating with creators whose brand voice aligns with yours. Utilize social media analytics to monitor engagement and adjust your strategies accordingly. Tracking performance helps you understand which content resonates with your audience, leading to better-informed decisions about future social media campaigns. You can enhance your organic reach by optimizing content through strategic use of hashtags and leveraging popular trends within the BookTok community. Incorporating these strategies enables your small business to thrive in the evolving book publishing landscape, enhancing customer interaction and solidifying your online presence. Conclusion The new features on BookTok are set to transform your reading journey. By enhancing discovery and user interaction, you’ll find it easier to connect with fellow book lovers and share your thoughts. These updates not only enrich your experience but also empower small businesses to thrive in the literary market. As you dive into this vibrant community, take advantage of the tools available to maximize your engagement. Whether you’re a casual reader or a dedicated bibliophile, these innovations promise to deepen your connections and elevate your BookTok experience. Embrace the changes and watch as your passion for reading grows alongside the community. Frequently Asked Questions What is the new feature introduced on BookTok? The new feature on BookTok enhances user interaction and discovery of books, making it easier for readers to find recommendations and connect with one another. It aims to enrich the overall reading experience and deepen community engagement. How does BookTok support small businesses? BookTok provides small businesses in publishing and retail with opportunities to increase brand awareness through user-generated content and trending hashtags. By leveraging these tools, businesses can reach more readers and improve sales. How can users interact more on BookTok? Users can enjoy improved commenting, liking, and sharing capabilities on BookTok, fostering deeper connections and encouraging collaboration. This interaction allows for valuable feedback and strengthens community bonds among readers. What impact does BookTok have on book sales? There is a direct correlation between BookTok engagement and increased book sales. Lesser-known titles often become bestsellers after gaining visibility on the platform, showcasing the influence of trending hashtags and engaging video content. What strategies can businesses use to enhance engagement on BookTok? Businesses can boost engagement by incorporating storytelling in their content, monitoring social media analytics, and partnering with influencers. These strategies help improve visibility and build a loyal following within the BookTok community. How can the new features on BookTok benefit readers? The new features on BookTok facilitate enhanced content discovery and user interaction, allowing readers to engage more meaningfully with book-related content. This leads to a richer community experience and better recommendations for their next reads. Image Via Envato This article, "Exciting Changes: BookTok Gets New Feature to Enhance Your Reading Experience" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

Another week, another "gotcha" video debunked. This time it's "Cop Pulls Over Black Judge and Lives To Regret It," a piece of pseudo-documentary street drama that's been viewed millions of times on YouTube and TikTok (and elsewhere, I'm sure). The video is part of a growing online video genre based on documenting cops' confrontations with public, either through police-worn body camera footage or citizen-filmed footage. Some of these videos are real, but many of them are not. Here's the "Cop Pulls Over Judge" video: The tells: bad improv in a Florida parking lotIf you have a smidge of media literacy, it's easy to spot this as fake. The acting is sub-community-theater level. The improved dialogue is laughably on the nose. I'm pretty sure judges don't wear judicial robes when they're running errands. The taillight the cop supposedly broke is intact at the end of the video That's just the surface. If you dive deeper, you'll learn that the watermark for the bodycam isn't right and there is no city of Sunny Springs in Florida. The rage-bait cinematic universe: Who even makes these videos?The description of the channel the judge video comes from, bodycam declassified, reads, "In our channel, we bring you real, unfiltered bodycam footage, offering insight into real-world situations. In some cases, we may reenact some elements to clarify key aspects of certain encounters." I can't find any video on this channel that features real footage; Cop Slaps Arrogant Prince in Ferrari and Gets Suspended, Black Female Lawyer Vs Arrogant Cop, and the rest of these videos are fake, unless all these encounters happened in the same building's parking lot. Looking a little deeper into YouTube revealed a ton of these rage-bait vids, from different creators, with different stories. We got cops pulling over FBI agents, cops harassing people for taking their shoes off in the park, and my personal favorite: Dumb Cop Mess with the wrong FBI agent On Plane. Watch this and try not to laugh: I actually like the earnestness of the creators of this video. It reminds me of the delusional incompetence of b-movie king Ed Wood: God bless them, they tried. But that is so not an airplane cabin. And that is so not a stewardess uniform. That is so not an FBI agent. And that is so not how people talk to each other on Planet Earth. The same fake plane was used in this video, too. The "Cop vs. Judge" video is basically a reboot of a real video of Florida police pulling over Aramis Ayala, Florida’s first elected state attorney, for no reason. Comparing them makes it obvious what real body-cam footage looks like, compared to fake, but also highlights why people are drawn to the ersatz over the genuine. We don't get to see what happens to the real cop beyond momentary embarrassment. (Spoiler: nothing.) Why are these fakes so successful? I've been digging into the sub-genre of fake confrontation videos, and they seem, like the fake political confrontation videos I posted about last week, to point to a collective desire for Justice. Cops are often bastards, and we want to see them face consequences when they do wrong, so there are a lot of popular channels devoted to videos depicting just that. (Thanks for all the free, body-cam-based entertainment, Police of America!) But real police confrontations are generally murkier than the fakes (maybe the cops shouldn't have manhandled this guy but dude seems drunk to me), and even when the cops are clearly wrong, any "conclusion" to these stories takes years of legal wrangling. The fakes, though? Instant justice! Why people believe in fake cop videosThe successful formula for these videos is a cop pulling someone over who is "higher" in the Justice hierarchy than a street cop. That way the offending party can face instant karma, instead of their comeuppance coming years later, in a legal filing no one will read. We want a thuggish cop to be owned by a judge in full gown while we watch. We want to see the good guys win, now, and if it's not going to really happen, we'll pull the wool over our own eyes. Real justice usually isn't exciting, it's a slog through layers of moral relativism and triple-filed paperwork, but fake justice hits hard. The biggest giveaway that these videos are fake isn’t the bad dialogue or the dodgy production design, it’s how true they feel. (Also: the stewardess uniform.) View the full article

An appeals court has cleared the way for President Donald The President’s executive order aimed at ending collective bargaining rights for hundreds of thousands of federal employees while a lawsuit plays out. The Friday ruling came after the The President administration asked for an emergency pause on a judge’s order blocking enforcement at roughly three dozen agencies and departments. A split three-judge panel in the nation’s capital sided with government lawyers in a lawsuit filed by unions representing federal employees. The majority ruled on technical grounds, finding that the unions don’t have the legal right to sue because the The President administration has said it won’t end any collective bargaining agreements while the case is being litigated. Judge Karen Henderson, appointed by Republican President George H.W. Bush, and Justin Walker, appointed by The President, sided with the government, while Judge Michelle Childs, appointed by Democratic President Joe Biden, dissented. The government says The President needs the executive order so his administration can cut the federal workforce to ensure strong national security. The law requiring collective bargaining creates exemptions for work related to national security, as in agencies like the FBI. Union leaders argue the order is designed to facilitate mass firings and exact “political vengeance” against federal unions opposed to The President’s efforts to dramatically downsize the federal government. His order seeks to expand that exemption to exclude more workers than any other president has before. That’s according to the National Treasury Employees Union, which is suing to block the order. The administration has filed in a Kentucky court to terminate the collective bargaining agreement for the Internal Revenue Service, where many workers are represented by the National Treasury Employees Union. They say their IRS members aren’t doing national security work. Other union employees affected by the order include the Health and Human Services Department, the Energy Department, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Federal Communications Commission. —Lindsay Whitehurst, Associated Press View the full article

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Adjustable dumbbells are incredible space-savers compared to full dumbbell sets, but still, they're heavy and awkward to reposition. And look, I get it—the point of weights is to lift them, right? When testing and reviewing dumbbells like the Nüobells or REP Quickdraws, I quickly discovered that the genius of adjustable dumbbells is exactly what makes them so hard to lug around: In order to adjust from 5 to 80 pounds, they end up weighing, you know, at least 80 pounds. And not every dumbbell user has built up to that strength yet. You can buy a specialized dumbbells storage cart, but that'll run you anywhere from $112 to $350 to even $595. Enter this hack from the home gym enthusiasts of Reddit (specifically, Redditor stalechocmuffin): Use a miniature furniture dolly to roll your weights around. How to move and store your adjustable dumbbellsSure, you can drag and shove your adjustable dumbbells around in their cradles, but that sort of rough handling isn't ideal. A mini furniture dolly provides a quick, easy transition between exercises or storage positions. Plus, you'll be protecting both your dumbbells and your flooring. And if you're like me, it's stressful to drag 80 pounds around the tiny apartment you rent for way too much money. Even if I'm not worried about scratching my floors, lifting too heavy increases risk of injury. To make the most of this dolly hack, here are some tips to keep in mind: Place one dolly under each dumbbell stand for independent movement. Consider securing the dumbbells to the dolly with removable hook-and-loop straps if you have children or pets. Add rubber matting between the dolly and dumbbell base for extra protection and stability. Store against a wall when not in use to maximize floor space. The key to this hack working effectively is using the right-sized dolly. Standard furniture dollies are too large, but here are some options that should fit adjustable dumbbell bases perfectly: Ironton Carpeted Mover's Dolly ($22.99) 18" x 12" platform 1,000 lb capacity (far more than needed, but ensures stability) Carpeted surface provides cushioning Heavy Duty Furniture Dolly ($24.99) 16.3" x 11" platform 500 lb capacity 360-degree rotating caster wheels Global Industrial Hardwood Dolly ($65.06) 24" x 16" platform 1,000 lb capacity Solid deck for extra stability Compared to a storage unit that costs hundreds of dollars, a mini dolly is the obvious choice to move your dumbbells around your home. You can make your workout flow more smoothly while protecting both your investment and your home. View the full article

Hellmann’s. Axe. Ben & Jerry’s. Dove. Nutrafol. Pepsodent. Vaseline. When a brand exists within a CPG behemoth like Unilever, it can struggle to get dedicated design attention. So often, it doesn’t—and as a result, its brand can get a bit dusty on the shelf. That’s what happened to Lipton with an identity from 2014 that hewed closer to the 1999 Burger King logo than a modern leader of the tea industry. But now, with a new owner, Lipton is launching a fresh look as it celebrates 135 years in business and expands its product line. The big business of teaLipton is the titan of tea. Its products (which include Tazo, Pukka, PG Tips, and more) are sold in more than 100 countries and make up the largest tea business in the world. Moreover, tea is big business: Fueled in part by the focus on health in the beverage category, tea is projected to grow by more than 75% to $122.59 billion in 2033. CVC Capital Partners bought the Lipton family of brands in 2022 for $5.07 billion. Yet in spite of those that promise, the company has been facing what S&P Global dubbed “weaker-than-anticipated performance” last fall. And, well, that’s a design opportunity. Following the acquisition, Lipton started taking stock of its core identity, and is now rolling out its new branding, with new plans and products to boot. “If you look at what Lipton did from an innovation standpoint for the five years prior to 2023, it probably wasn’t very much,” says Racquel Harris Mason, president of Lipton Teas and Infusions North America. “And what you’ll see in America [now] is Lipton launching over 15 new flavors, new SKUs, in the next six months. So it’s really a wonderful renovation of this historical brand.” Sir Lipton’s legacyWhen he founded his eponymous tea brand in 1890, Thomas Lipton was on a mission to democratize a drink that was then traditionally associated with the upper classes. And as those numbers above attest, he indeed succeeded, and brought low-cost tea to the masses by setting up alternative distribution channels to circumvent the established trade. Of course, being a global tea behemoth in 2025 presents its own design problems, with rituals and aesthetic preferences varying by culture and country. Lipton Global Chief Marketing Officer Moritz von der Linden says the company’s numerous markets previously operated in a relatively decentralized environment with a fair amount of autonomy. As a result, the packs had become crowded with added elements, Lipton’s trademark yellow branding was waning in some territories as other colors were being brought in—and ultimately the product was becoming difficult to spot on shelves. “That’s where we said, we need to do something,” von der Linden notes. “We need to make sure that we bring this back to the brilliant basics [and] play our distinctive assets to their strengths again, making sure that everybody can recognize [Lipton] when they walk into a store from 50 meters away.” So von der Linden and his colleagues set out to establish Lipton’s first uniform global identity, partnering with the Paris-based agency Team Creatif. The team first looked to the past—in particular, Thomas Lipton’s original tin boxes. von der Linden says their bold lettering inspired the typography of the new logo, which returns to an all-caps treatment and is intended to play off of the pride the team feels around the brand and its status in the category. As an homage to the brand’s legacy, the team added the founding year of 1890 to its signature “cartouche” label, a move von der Linden says hadn’t been done in decades. “If you think about a lot of brands that are appealing to Gen Z . . . these heritage brands really do mean something,” Harris Mason says. “My children are 26, 24 and 21, and they were like, Oh, my god, that’s so cool. In a weird way, that heritage does give us a modern cool factor because of the deep authenticity of the brand.” To give the tea a bit more of a premium feel, the team tweaked the Lipton yellow to a slightly darker shade. They also added a leaf to nod at the health aspects of drinking tea. “[We’re] bringing nature into the package, and reminding people in this era of everything being artificial that tea has been around for 3,000 years,” says Harris Mason. “It’s crushed leaves in a bag.” That little leaf differentiates the brand away from ready-to-drink beverages. It’s a small element, but “in its brutal simplicity, a tea leaf makes a big difference,” says von der Linden. Finally, the team modernized the logo on the whole by paring down the 3D nature of the cartouche, greatly scaling back the “sun” element, and selecting Arpona as a primary typeface that echoes the letterforms of the refreshed logo. A new LiptonThe new brand is currently making its way to shelves, and should be comprehensive in all markets by the end of the year. Currently, Unilever and Pepsi still operate a separate Lipton bottled drink venture, but Harris Mason says she regularly meets with the team there, and they love the new work. (“I would be very surprised if this does not get adopted,” von der Linden notes.) Ultimately, their hope is that the design work will bring more people to the brand—and that innovation and new products will keep them there. To that end, they have launched a Lipton black tea speciality category, and the first two entries are an English Breakfast and an Earl Grey that tastes like the usual cardamom classic, but with a hint of citrus. Those products have officially rolled out with the new branding. On deck for the summer is a fruit and herbal range, as well as zero-sugar iced tea powders. Do they have any fears that the new products may cannibalize their other brands, such as Tazo? Harris Mason says the company is very intentional about Lipton’s positioning—a tea that’s more affordable and approachable. “[It’s about] making sure that we’ve kept the core but we’ve also innovated to have a broader portfolio of more relevant offerings, so that we can really have a tea for everyone and live up to what Sir Thomas Lipton wanted to do in democratizing tea,” Harris Mason says. “There’s so much new innovation coming. It’s not just a new design; it’s a new Lipton.” View the full article

John Michael Ormerod was allegedly involved in the procurement of oil tankersView the full article

Philippe Lazzarini says ‘primary intent’ of US-backed proposal is to push population south and even out of stripView the full article

Some Republicans warn that a tax-cutting budget will destroy the party’s standing with working-class votersView the full article

In the entertainment industry, as in life, change is the only constant. It wasn’t that long ago that streaming services such as Netflix were the outsiders making waves and altering the way audiences watched movies. Today, there’s a new kid on the block rapidly growing in popularity. Vertical dramas, essentially a 90-minute soap opera broken down into one-minute episodes viewed—you guessed it—vertically on smartphones, are here to shake things up even further. (I know this firsthand as an actor who has recently worked on some of these projects.) Joey Jia, the CEO of Crazy Maple Studios, is at the forefront of this movement. His content creation company was named one of 2024’s TIME100 Most Influential Companies and has offices in Shenzhen, Beijing, Silicon Valley, Los Angeles, Canada, Mexico, and the Philippines. Under this banner, Jia created ReelShort in 2022, a short-form video-streaming app, when he realized there was an opportunity to marry growing romance book trends and Asian micro dramas. “I noticed there is a trend,” Jia told Fast Company. “People started shooting short-form content, especially five minutes long, 10 minutes long. That inspired me to have this idea: What if we revamp the video industry?” Jia decided to put stories into one-minute bite-size content, made specifically for mobile phones as a way of testing how the market would respond. Spoiler alert: It responded well. ReelShorts’s production on track to triple in 2025 as compared to 2024. While Crazy Maple Studios declined to share revenue figures, it says it’s seen impressive growth in monthly active users, from around 45 million in October to between 55 to 60 million monthly active users. Suffice it to say, it’s in demand, paving the way for a story format that might be the future of scripted entertainment. At the intersection of art and tech The growing popularity of vertical dramas could never have occurred without the proper technology in place. The first smartphone, the Simon Personal Communicator, was invented by IBM in 1992, but it would take 18 years before these devices made their way to everyone’s pockets. Apple’s iPhone, famously announced to the world by Steve Jobs in 2007, played a big role in spreading the adoption of smartphones. The next stepping stone to verticals was social media. When TikTok was first released in 2016, it further trained users to create and view videos vertically. Instagram strengthened this habit when the app released its similar Reels feature in 2020. The stage was set for professional creators to monetize this technology. How China got there first In 2019, the Chinese company iQIYI released a special feature on its app dubbed the Vertical Video Zone, which comprised 25 sets of video, all shot in portrait mode to be viewed on a mobile phone. Around the same time, the Chinese social media platform Kuaishou unveiled “Kuaishou Small Theatre” on its app. This comedy-centered, short-form content would lead to the “micro-drama” brand Xingmang Micro Drama. By 2023, the platform would have over 94 million paid users. That same year, the larger micro-drama industry in China brought in $5.3 billion, making it 70% as large as the country’s traditional film industry. According to DataEye, a Shenzhen-based research firm, micro-dramas out-earned domestic box office sales the following year, as the Los Angeles Times reported. The American company Quibi, led by Jeffrey Katzenberg and Meg Whitman, tried to put its own spin on this trend, launching in April of 2020. This app utilized “turnstyle” technology that allowed viewers to watch content both vertically and horizontally. However, its short-form videos were expensive to make, running about 10 minutes utilizing Hollywood stars. Just seven months after its creation, Quibi was forced to shut down due to low subscriber counts. ‘Emotion-driven stories,’ made for humans by humans Jia saw a potential opening in the American market and learned from Quibi’s failure. He attributes ReelShorts’s success to its focus on “emotion-driven stories.” Plot is “the missing component,” he says, “So our job is to come up with a feel-good moment, feel-good stories, and we always have data to make sure we are on the right track. So our stories are evolving.” Vertical dramas tend to use well-known, over-the-top storytelling tropes, such as enemies to lovers, Cinderella-type makeovers, and corporate revenge. Some even explore fantasy plotlines, such as werewolves and different historical eras. ReelShorts’s subscription service differs from traditional streamers because it is not a flat monthly fee. The first 10 or so episodes are free, but to see the story’s conclusion, users have to pay based on consumption. This forces writers to make sure their content is fast-paced but not so quick that the audience gets lost. “There is a fine balance between the story beats and the emotions. So this is really tricky,” Jia mused. Jia trains directors, producers, and screenwriters in-house and does not utilize artificial intelligence. “I think of creativity coming from a human being, so I don’t trust AI, to be honest,” Jia explained. He also uses simple, inexpensive sets and costumes, and unknown nonunion actors. What does the future hold? When asked if Jia thinks vertical dramas complement or disrupt the traditional movie and television industry, he replied: “I think it’s a disruptor. I think mobile entertainment will become a brand-new industry in the next few years. It will coexist with a traditional film industry, but it will bypass and beat the size so it gets bigger and bigger.” He thinks colleges will in the not-so-distant future add this format to its film school curriculum. As more and more people forgo traditional movie theaters while staying glued to their phones throughout much of the day, his predictions don’t feel that far-fetched. Indeed, the average ReelShort user might surprise you. “We initially thought the majority of our audience is like a teenager and younger demographic—but no, it’s full spectrum,” Jia explained. Jia has already been approached by big-name studios but finds it difficult to work with established intellectual properties because of all the rules and hoops to jump through. Verticals are inexpensive to make and move quickly, with a movie essentially completed in about 11 days. That doesn’t mean he isn’t open to bigger collaborations. In the next five years, Jia aims to prove that this space has merit, saying he feels there is still very much a stigma attached to it. “There’s wide opportunity here,” he says. “So the door is always open.” Jia is not alone in this space. Shelly Caldwell founded DramaBox, a mobile TV series company, in 2022. Similarly, ShortMax, a Chinese-based media company, was created in 2023 by Jiuzhou Wenhua. Other players in the game include FlexTV and LokShorts. Even Netflix is dipping its toe in the pool. It recently announced that for some select users, its app will begin testing a vertical video feed. Meanwhile, ReelShort is expanding into new genres, such as action. Undercover Prison King, the story of a private prison owner who poses as an inmate to reveal corruption, is performing very well. The recent in-person premiere of Wings of Fire: The Dragonslayer Is My Ex-Lover in Culver City successfully signaled verticals’ legitimacy to the larger City of Angels. Jia also recently launched ReelShort Publishing House, a new division that will novelize popular romance titles on the app, a full circle moment for the man who saw the desire for this content early on. With a distribution deal with Amazon already in place, audiences may soon find themselves asking which came first, the vertical or the novel? As the way we consume media continues to evolve, Jia’s foresight appears to have been the fulfillment of a prophecy of sorts. What direction is the future of entertainment going? It appears to be vertical. View the full article

Some office buildings are simply not blessed with natural light. Maybe they’re standing in the shadows of something taller. Or perhaps their windows are mostly oriented to the dark north instead of the sunny southwest. Or maybe they’re so big and wide that sunlight can’t find its way into their murky depths. Whatever the reason, the lack of natural light presents problems ranging from additional energy usage to diminished human well-being and productivity. CBT, an architecture firm based in Boston, has been exploring unique ways of solving these problems. Using passive design approaches that require no additional energy, the firm is finding innovative ways to bring more natural light deeper into office buildings. There’s no single solution, according to Tyler Lombardi, an associate principal at CBT, but there is an increasingly accessible toolbox of approaches that architects can use to bring more light into buildings, including reflective surfaces and finishes, data-informed adjustments to building facades, and even curving walls that bend light in a space. Lombardi says these approaches have been put to work in recent office projects, including for law firms and financial services companies. He says these industries have tended to prioritize private offices with good views, turning an office building’s perimeter into well-lit spaces and the rest of the floor into a dark pit. “They’re all 90-degree angles and it’s very rigid, ” he says of these projects, noting that many of the firm’s clients are confidential. “We’re trying to find ways to make that space feel more visually connected.” To do so, CBT has altered floor plans to include curving walls that wind their way into the center of a floor. “We’ll use the natural light coming in from a courtyard or a balcony or an exterior window and then we’ll shape the wall so that the light is exposed 40 or 50 yards down,” Lombardi says. Reflective paints or shiny surfaces can also be deployed strategically to milk even more brightness from this distant light. The interventions can be very subtle. Even shadows inside a room can build up. So, working with lighting designers, Lombardi says he’s been on projects that have focused on minute details like the edges of shelving units, which can be beveled and smoothed to cast a shadow line that’s less harsh. Technology plays a large role in this work, Lombardi says, with 3D modeling programs capable of performing light and contrast studies while projects are in the design phase. Small changes to wall curves or window heights can translate into significant increases in light at certain times of the day, or different ways of moving light into a room. “You really get into the details of certain nominal dimensions that will work for washing light versus bending light versus reflecting light,” he says. “It can be very technical and very complex, but a successful project may hide those complexities.” Many of the design interventions that can make a space brighter are actually simple material choices. CBT uses its physical modelmaking shop to test out some of these materials, including paints with glossy finishes or metals with various amounts of sheen. “The nature of being in the design world, everyone’s looking for the latest and greatest product or material or strategy or tech tool,” Lombardi says. “When it comes down to some of these architectural principles we have to sometimes remind ourselves, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel every time.” View the full article

A year ago today, Microsoft unveiled what it believed would be the future of home computing. Copilot+ PCs, optimized to harness the power of AI, were introduced with the promise of revolutionizing how we interact with our laptops and desktops. The reaction, however, was far from enthusiastic. Critics mocked the addition of an AI button on the keyboard, likening it to the redundant action keys from late-1990s PCs. More concerning was the backlash to Recall, a feature designed to continuously record user activity to provide smarter assistance. Many found the idea invasive. Public alarm grew when it became clear that Recall stored this data off-device, raising serious privacy concerns—particularly with sensitive tasks like entering bank details. The feature was eventually, well, recalled. “Copilot+ PCs are finally here. You don’t want one—yet,” read one scathing op-ed published in Computer World at the time. Fast-forward a year, and the landscape has shifted. AI adoption continues to grow, and the once-ridiculed concept of agentic AI has gained traction. That shift in sentiment has helped normalize features like Recall, which quietly returned in the April 2025 Windows 11 update. This time, it’s opt-in rather than opt-out, and stores screenshots locally instead of on the cloud. In the background, Microsoft has been refining its AI offerings. The company’s updated Copilot+ strategy seems more measured, and after a year of growing accustomed to AI in our daily lives, users may now be more ready for what these devices offer. Microsoft says Copilot+ PCs accounted for “up to 15% of premium-priced U.S. laptops” during the 2024 holiday quarter—the first specific sign of market traction. Analysts at Gartner predict that by the end of 2026, every enterprise PC sold will be AI-equipped, with consumer adoption expected to follow soon after. Persistence also plays a role in adoption. “It’s become more and more prominent in Windows 11 in particular,” says Catherine Flick, a researcher in AI and ethics at the University of Staffordshire. “People who might otherwise be skeptical or not want to touch it, might just go in because it’s so conveniently there,” she says. “It doesn’t seem to cost anything at the moment, so yeah, basically people are going to use it.” Every new user represents a win for Microsoft, helping to normalize AI as part of everyday workflows. While there may still be no single “killer app” that compels users to buy an AI-powered PC, growing familiarity can be just as powerful as clever marketing. With momentum building, the moment for Copilot+ PCs may have finally arrived. View the full article

I’ve served the NASA space program for many years as an adviser, research scientist, flight surgeon—and astronaut. My career has encompassed both in-flight and non-flight contributions to NASA, supporting space missions, space medicine, and research in advancing human space flight. Space exploration encompasses a fair amount of uncertainty by nature. The space program’s early days were fraught with a number of crew losses, including the Apollo 1 mission, and the Challenger and Columbia space shuttle missions. The challenges of space flight were on full display during the Apollo 13 crew’s near-disastrous mission on the way to the moon in 1970. We all know those infamous words: “Houston, we have a problem.” But the determination of a mission control team led by flight director Gene Kranz—marked by the phrase “failure is not an option”—ended in a successful mission. Anyone, though, can pick up smart leadership lessons from space travel, even if you’re not headed to the moon yourself. Here’s how the best leaders think like astronauts. Recognize The Power of Vision Every great leader starts with a vision. Whether you are leading a company, a team, or a personal endeavor, the ability to see beyond present circumstances and chart a course for the future is what separates extraordinary leaders from the rest. When I first dreamed of becoming an astronaut, I had no road map. The road ahead was full of uncertainty, doubts, and obstacles. After determining that doctors were needed in the space program, my pathway was set. My goal was to become a physician with the knowledge and skills to work in space. But I learned early on that it’s not about having all the answers—it’s about having the courage to pursue a vision, adapt to challenges, and inspire others along the way. In business, just as in space exploration, those who succeed are the ones who remain focused on their mission despite adversity. Turn the Vision into a Mission The mark of a good leader is their ability to transform the vision into tangible goals and objectives for the mission. We accomplish this at NASA through extensive training and mission preparation. The flight crew and mission support team dedicate countless hours to training in simulators and facilities, preparing for every scenario, whether it’s smooth sailing or unforeseen challenges. They focus on identifying the critical factors for success, then conduct “nominal” training for ideal outcomes and “off-nominal” training to tackle potential setbacks. We have a saying in the Astronaut Corps: “Fly as you train.” Training reflects conditions similar to those of the mission so we’re best prepared for the unexpected. Once those conditions are clear, we set high expectations to drive high performance. People and organizations can achieve amazing things when they know what’s expected of them. The most successful leaders embrace challenges, set high expectations, remain adaptable, and focus on the greater impact of their work. Let High Expectations Drive High Performance Leaders who expect mediocrity will get just that, while those who challenge their teams to push beyond limits foster excellence. On my second flight, STS–63 in February 1995, we had multiple challenges. During my spacewalk, my fellow crew member and I experienced unexpected extreme temperatures of -165°F at orbital night and +200°F during the day, which exceeded the temperature capability of the space suit. There were other malfunctions on the mission, like issues with critical equipment on the spacecraft that almost canceled our rendezvous with the Russian space station. NASA’s training program assumes that astronauts must be prepared for the unknown. The same principle applies in business. Leaders must prepare their teams for challenges that may not yet exist, setting expectations that encourage innovation, accountability, and excellence. If you want to see growth in your organization, ask yourself: Are you setting high-enough expectations? Are you fostering a culture where your team is encouraged to reach beyond what they believe is possible? Success is often the result of leaders who challenge their teams to think bigger, work harder, and embrace bold ideas. Buckle into Resilience in Challenging Times One of the most valuable leadership lessons is understanding that failure is not the enemy—complacency is. Some of the best business leaders I have met share one trait: they’re not afraid of failing. They see failure as feedback, as a necessary component of growth. I also had moments of uncertainty during my first flight—STS-55 in April 1993. As we were about to launch, one of the three main engines of the Space Shuttle Columbia failed 2.5 seconds before liftoff. Fortunately, the safety system worked, cutting the fuel to the engine while simultaneously putting out the ensuing fire. This event certainly got my attention, as we say when things don’t go well. I’m lucky to be here today. During my astronaut training and missions, I faced countless setbacks. Physical demands of endless hours of spacewalk training underwater in the neutral buoyancy facility pushed me to my limits, technical challenges of microgravity simulation forced me to rethink strategies, and high-stakes flight simulations that exposed weaknesses I needed to improve. Had I let failure define me, rather than energize me, I would never have made it to space. Resilience is just as crucial for leadership in life and business. Markets change, competitors arise, and setbacks occur. The best leaders are those who are resilient and thrive to adapt, learn, and continue forward with an unwavering commitment to their goals. Maintain Confidence in the Face of Adversity Great leaders possess both confidence and humility. Confidence allows you to make bold decisions, take risks, and lead with conviction. But humility ensures that you remain open to new ideas, feedback, and growth. In my career at NASA, in venture capital, and as an entrepreneur, I’ve worked with some of the most brilliant minds in science, engineering, and business. The leaders who stand out are those who strongly believe in their abilities yet understand they don’t have all the answers. They surround themselves with talented individuals, listen more than they speak, and remain adaptable in the face of change. In your leadership journey, have the confidence to make difficult decisions and the humility to recognize that leadership is a lifelong learning process. Build a Legacy of Impact After my time at NASA, I joined SpaceHab as an SVP and chief medical officer, contributing to one of the pioneering companies in commercial spaceflight. In 2002, I founded a venture capital firm focused on telemedicine and healthcare technologies. Later, I founded the Harris Foundation and Institute, which has been involved in math and science education for over 25 years. Leadership is not just about personal success—it’s about the impact you leave behind. For business leaders, this means looking beyond profit margins and quarterly results. It means fostering a culture where employees feel valued, innovation thrives, and measuring success by long-term impact rather than short-term gains. Ask yourself: How do you envision the legacy you wish to leave as a leader? Are you investing in people? Are you creating a vision that extends beyond yourself? Leadership lessons from space Leadership is a journey of vision, mission, expectation, resilience, and confidence. The most successful leaders embrace challenges, set high expectations, remain adaptable, and focus on the greater impact of their work. As you lead your organization, your team, or even your own personal ambitions, remember that the key to success lies not in avoiding obstacles and uncertainty, but in using them as stepping stones to greater achievements. View the full article

Yair Golan says Israel not ‘acting like a sane country’, as UK, France and Canada threaten action in response to offensiveView the full article

The year, 1993. A rudimentary computer-generated T. rex—a reptilian skin stretched over a wire frame—played on a loop in a computer at Industrial Light & Magic in California. Three film legends—VFX supervisor Dennis Muren, animator Phil Tippett, and director Steven Spielberg—watched silently as the implications sank in. “Cinema history changed,” Rob Bredow recounts in his April 2023 TED Talk, which has just been published on YouTube. Tippett, a stop-motion pioneer, dryly told Spielberg, “I feel like I’m going extinct.” As most movie buffs know, that line landed in Jurassic Park. Tippett’s fear, however, turned out to be unfounded. The legendary effects company fused Tippett’s stop-motion puppetry with nascent CGI, using a “dinosaur input device”—a rigged armature with motion encoders—to digitize frame-by-frame animation. The result? A seismic shift that expanded artists’ tool kits worldwide and opened a new era in filmmaking. Bredow was only 19 when that happened. Now, as SVP of creative innovation for Lucasfilm and chief creative officer of ILM, he sees a direct parallel to today’s artificial intelligence debates. “Headlines say, ‘AI is coming for our jobs,’” he says in the TED Talk. From the Dykstraflex—the computer-controlled motion camera that enabled Star Wars’s iconic dogfights—to the StageCraft—a 270-degree LED curved wall that projected hyperrealistic 3D environments for The Mandalorian and now many other shows and movies—Bredow argues that ILM’s 50-year history is a demonstration of how technological leaps redefine, rather than replace, artistry. Stop-motion transformed and merged with 3D effects. So did physical models, full-size sets, and matte paintings. Just like it’s happening now with AI. “Innovation thrives when old and new technologies are blended,” Bredow argues. ILM was late to the AI game. This became painfully obvious when the effects company created a rejuvenated version of Mark Hamill for the Season 2 finale of The Mandalorian (despite fans cheering on Luke Skywalker’s return to the screen). Done with traditional computer face tracking and 3D models—the same technique used to create Peter Cushing as Grand Moff Tarkin and Princess Leia—Return of the Jedi Luke was slammed for being unrealistic. Then a Star Wars fan and AI aficionado called Shamook re-created the scene using AI. The former took hours. The latter took weeks. There was no doubt about which one looked more realistic. The difference was so obvious that the company realized it had to act: ILM hired Shamook days after the deepfake remake was released. He worked on Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, where ILM merged generative AI, trained on Harrison Ford’s past performances, with a meticulously handcrafted CG model to de-age the actor. The AI captured Ford’s micro-expressions; artists fine-tuned subtleties like eye moisture and skin texture. Ford himself said it was pretty good and really felt like him. Because it did. AI is just another tool in the toolboxThe ethos that now guides its AI integration has been in ILM’s DNA since its origin. It was what drove George Lucas to pair engineers with artists to solve visual storytelling challenges. “We’re designed to be creative beings,” Bredow says. “We love seeing tech and creativity work together.” Bredow hinted at ILM’s embrace of AI tools in a Fast Company interview back in August 2024: “I do see a path forward with some combination of the algorithmic tools that we’ve had and some machine learning-based tools that we either already have or can imagine developing, that are really going to help accelerate artist workflows.” Now he has made clear that AI has reached a point in which it is just another toolbox in ILM’s toolbox. His stance about the technology is one that I have been seeing more and more since independent filmmaker Paul Trillo, one of the pioneers in using generative AI for his shorts, told me the same years ago. Trillo thinks that AI will enable indie projects to achieve blockbuster-grade VFX: “It is just a powerful tool in a creative’s arsenal.” It’s just too bad that the example that Bredow presented in the TEDTalk was so underwhelming: A video that shows some uninspired sci-fi animals that looked like Photoshop-made images quickly turned to video using Kling, a commercial AI video generation tool developed by Chinese tech company Kuaishou. He described it as ILM’s “moving mood board,” but it falls short of what you would expect from the mother of all VFX houses. But his points and the lesson from ILM’s half-century of visual innovation stand. The Dykstraflex didn’t kill cinematography—it birthed a new process and visual language. CGI dinosaurs didn’t erase animators—they just demanded hybrid skills. Now, as AI reshapes VFX, Bredow says we are witnessing another T. rex moment: one where artists, armed with generative tools, push storytelling beyond current limits. Adaptation is nonnegotiable. New tools should be embraced as long as they are not unethically taking advantage of other people’s artwork. “The next game changer,” he said, “will light up screens worldwide.” The credits won’t fade on human creativity. Hordes of people’s names will keep rolling. At least for a few more years to come. View the full article

Dallas and Houston are just 250 miles apart, but a train trip between the two cities currently takes more than 23 hours, including a seven-hour stopover in San Antonio’s Amtrak station. The Texas Central high-speed rail project aims to change that. The proposed project would cut the travel time down between the nation’s fourth- and fifth-largest metro areas to 90 minutes, using Japanese technology to propel the trains 200-plus mph. It also would include a stop in the Brazos Valley. Former President Joe Biden’s Department of Transportation was eager to help advance the project. Amtrak came aboard in August 2023 to determine if it was viable. The DOT also issued a $63.9 million planning grant last year. But the DOT under President Donald The President quickly reversed course. Last month, the department announced that it had rescinded the grant and that Amtrak would no longer be involved in the project. “If the private sector believes this project is feasible, they should carry the preconstruction work forward, rather than relying on Amtrak and the American taxpayer to bail them out,” Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy stated in the news release announcing that the department was canceling the $63.9 million grant. The move comes as the U.S. continues to lag behind other wealthy countries in its pursuit of high-speed rail—a mode of transport that’s safer, more efficient, and more sustainable than traveling by car. High-speed trains can cover the 820 miles between Beijing and Shanghai in a little over four hours. In Europe, a new high-speed train connecting Paris and Berlin launched in December. Even though it’s a red state, Texas has recently been pursuing high speed rail—and it could certainly use it. For example, Houston ranks among the 10 most congested cities in the country and among the 10 most polluted. The state of Texas hasn’t gone a day without a death on its roads since November 7, 2000. High-speed rail in a pro-car administration The The President administration’s early actions show that the next four years are likely to be challenging for high-speed rail projects. The DOT has set its sights on two of the country’s three most advanced high-speed rail projects. In February, it announced a review of a high-speed rail project in California—another state with air quality and congestion issues—that would connect San Francisco and Anaheim. Eric Goldwyn, an assistant professor at New York University’s Marron Institute of Urban Management, said it’s not a great moment to be working on a high-speed rail project—particularly one that needs public funding. That said, it’s not totally clear how the The President administration will come down on projects that rely on private financing. “Right now, it sort of has the feeling of dramatic statements coming from USDOT and dramatic gestures, but less substantive actions,” Goldwyn said. The President’s DOT seems to favor privately funded projects. In the announcement about the California High Speed Rail probe, the department praised Brightline, a private company that operates a rail line between Orlando and Miami and plans to open another line between the Los Angeles area and Las Vegas in 2028. Even those projects require public support, including a $3 billion grant for Brightline West—of which the company has spent $98 million thus far. The San Bernardino County Transportation Authority also received $25 million from the federal government for Brightline West stations in Hesperia and Victor Valley, California. The long and winding history of Texas Central The Texas Central project has seen many iterations since it first kicked off in 2014. In fact, the state’s efforts to build high-speed rail go back to 1989 when it created the Texas High Speed Rail Authority. As for Texas Central, it appeared to be dead when transportation projects nationwide slowed to a halt during the pandemic, but the partnership with Amtrak helped to revive it. Peter LeCody has been advocating for high-speed rail in Texas since the early 2000s and has watched the entire Texas Central battle play out. LeCody, who’s the president of the Texas Rail Advocates, sees a line between the two cities as a no-brainer. “You’ve got two of the largest population areas in the country that really don’t have much of a transportation system, unless A. you want to drive, or B. you want to fly,” he said. Now, he said the project is on the “10-yard line,” because of the regulatory hurdles it has cleared. The FRA approved the route in 2020. The Texas Supreme Court ruled that the Texas Central project had eminent domain authority in 2022. The preference for privately backed rail projects could portend well for the Texas project. As Amtrak exits the project, Texas Central has turned to the private sector. Kleinheinz Capital Partners, a Fort Worth-based hedge fund, became the lead investor on the project earlier this year, although they declined to share specifics about how much they had invested so far. (Kleinheinz Capital did not respond to a request for an interview but in a statement said the project was “shovel ready” and would create new jobs in Texas. “We agree with Secretary Duffy that this project should be led by the private sector, and we will be proud to take it forward.”) A representative from Texas Central told Texas legislators the project could be completed in 80 to 86 months during an April 17 hearing. John Kleinheinz, the company’s CEO, told the Houston Chronicle that he believes the The President administration is “interested in this deal” if it comes from the private sector. Kleinheinz, a longtime Republican donor, will likely be looking to bring aboard additional investors to push the project across the finish line. The DOT news release stated that the project cost is $40 billion. A project with bipartisan support—kind of Despite having some bipartisan support, skeptics and opponents remain. In November, State Representative Brian Harrison filed a bill seeking to strip Texas Central of its eminent domain authority. State Representative Cody Harris filed a bill that would bar the state from spending on a high-speed rail project operated by a private entity. It also would forbid the state from spending money to alter the roadway for high-speed rail. “For years, I’ve led the fight to expose the truth about Texas Central and protect our landowners from an overreaching, taxpayer-funded boondoggle,” Harris said in a statement. At the time of publication, neither Harrison’s nor Harris’s bills have been voted on by the Texas House of Representatives. ReRoute the Route is one of the groups opposed to the project. While they aren’t opposed to high speed rail in theory, the group says it wants the rail’s alignment moved from its currently proposed route to run alongside I-45—the highway that connects Houston and Dallas—instead. ReRoute the Route spokesperson Jennifer Stevens said the organization wants the project to proceed without “taxpayer dollars,” but said she isn’t confident Kleinheinz is the right person to lead the project. “We’ve had a lot of discussion about his overall lack of knowledge or experience in the rail industry,” she said. Stevens added that her group has not met with Kleinheinz, who has been an investor in the project for 10 years. Jim Mathews, president and CEO of the Rail Passengers Association, said high-speed rail projects should be seen as an enticing investment for private entities. “All these rail investments, they’re very capital-intensive, but they return enormous, enormous multiples on what you put into them,” he said. “When you put the money in, you get alongside it mixed-use, retail, condo buildings, high-rises. . . . That, in turn, generates additional economic activities.” He added that the DOT’s decision to rescind the grant isn’t necessarily a death blow to the project, but he said government money is typically needed for well-run high-speed rail systems. High-speed rail doesn’t exist yet in the U.S., Mathews said. In fact, it’s so unique that the FRA needed to create a special set of rules for the Texas Central project. But he and other advocates say high-speed rail is attractive to Americans. A 2015 APTA survey found that 63% of Americans said they were likely to use high-speed rail if it were available to them. “From a policy and a psychology standpoint, we tie bricks around our ankles and then we wonder why we can’t run,” Mathews said. “It gets done everywhere else. We’re just uniquely bad at it. There’s no reason we have to be.” View the full article

Twenty-four-hour customer support with zero hold time, infinite personalization, customized care, and behavior-based response are all aspects of the customer experience that will be expected sooner rather than later from every one of your customers. All of this is becoming reality, thanks to agentic artificial intelligence. Agentic AI is the most advanced form of artificial intelligence to date. It works autonomously, can understand natural language, sets goals and plans workflows, and makes decisions in real time based on the data it collects and examines. It learns from results and then teaches itself a new way to satisfy the needs of those that interact with it, immediately. An Expert Answers Every Question Agentic AI agents never need a break, never need vacation, and don’t need benefits or mental health days. They can work without respite for as long as your company exists. This is important because your customers hate waiting. Waiting for a mere two minutes will cause 60% of potential customers to hang up and call a competitor, and if your competitor deploys agentics before you, your customers will become their customers. You’ll either want to outsource to a top-end team or to use your more talented in-house programmers to finalize design and create your AI guardrails before deployment. This one implementation will free up revenue dedicated to customer service agents, alleviate time your current team has to spend solving mundane simple questions and issues, and leave your top talent free to solve customer challenges that actually require a creative solution. AI-Powered Personalization at Scale People will become increasingly accustomed to advertising and products tailored to feel exclusive to them. A staggering 91% of people will shop with a company that provides personalized, relevant offers and recommendations, and 68% of people have increased brand affinity due to personalization. On the flip side, 62% of customers will abandon a brand if they are not delivered a personalized experience. The days you could rely on simple generic offers in an ad or subject line are dead. Remember, you’re not sending an email to an inbox; you’re sending it to a person. Think of your inbox every morning, filled with dozens of emails you’ve been meaning to unsubscribe from that don’t speak to you. Every email you send is being seen exactly as the ones you receive. What Employees Will Fear The surface level fear around agentic AI centers around loss of jobs, but a deeper dive shows employee fears are far more complex. A recent survey revealed that 47% of employees feel AI lacks emotional intelligence, 40% are not comfortable submitting AI-generated work, and 34% don’t think AI-produced work will be as good as theirs. Involve your most trusted employees throughout the duration of your AI development. This will make them a part of the process, giving them a sense of ownership. Additionally, the better they understand the process from start to finish, the more likely they are to trust it—and trust that your use of the technology isn’t just to save costs or cut jobs, but for their benefit as well. They will become the ones that can sell the rest of your workforce on your new processes and technology. The message must be that this technology is being used to better serve customers, stay ahead of the competition, and grow the business. With that growth comes opportunity for current employees to grow and advance. Preparing Your Business for Ethical AI Integration Stricter audits and bias-free practices need to come first for any AI system implementation. All components that enter the system need careful planning, such that each instruction and training parameter reflects focused ethical direction. Assemble a cross-functional advisory group—comprised of trusted leaders and high-performing team members—to collaboratively design, test, and evaluate your AI tools. This internal coalition acts as a safeguard, ensuring that your deployment adheres to both ethical standards and your company’s values. A Human-Centric Approach to AI Deployment The adoption of AI should always be in service of your workforce, not in place of it. Before rolling out any system, ask: Does this enhance or hinder the employee experience? AI systems deliver their best results when organizations prioritize human needs at the start of their integration efforts. From the outset, align your AI strategies with your organizational culture and principles. Transparent Communication is Equally Crucial Engage your team in open conversations about the role of AI, and how it will enhance the customer experience and lighten the load on the workforce. Present clear background information while scheduling question-and-answer discussions, or an open office hour, accepting feedback from the team. Reinforce that AI is not a replacement but a reinforcement—designed to improve working conditions and to elevate team performance and customer satisfaction. The use of agentics will only increase across industries in the months and years to come. As its prevalence grows, any end user that interacts with it will become accustomed to the experience. They will start to expect quicker complaint resolution, zero wait times, personalized communication, and tailored product and service recommendations, and they will reject any generic approaches from companies. Ultimately, as business leaders, we bear a collective responsibility to uphold excellence—not only in our products and services but also in the systems we use to build and support our teams. Your willingness to embrace this technology for the benefit of your clients, your employees, and ultimately your business are what will keep you ahead of your competition and on a clear path to growth and increased relevancy. 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It’s no secret that when it comes to simplicity and convenience, insurance has lagged behind modern businesses across most industries. While many legacy products have been overturned by newer, intuitive solutions or adapted to meet today’s consumers’ needs, insurance offerings have remained a complex anomaly—built more for business and regulatory needs rather than real people. We already know that healthcare in America is too expensive, and far too many people simply can’t afford to get sick. Health insurance deductibles are at an all-time high, while denied and delayed claims payments persist. Insurance companies have continued making money while a staggering number of people are putting off care because of the cost, or pulling money out of their 401(k) plans early to pay for medical expenses. We also know that there is no shortage of people who are fighting for healthcare policy changes, more accountability around business practices, and broader reform. But consumer patience is running out. And with 100 million American adults in medical debt, incremental regulatory changes won’t be quick enough to take on the challenges that so many people face today in affording basic, and sometimes unexpected, costs related to their healthcare. Consumer Sentiment It’s time we ask the question: Can we start making progress by rethinking how health insurance products are fundamentally designed? In order to do this, we have to accept some consumer truths about health insurance today. First, more than 50% of Americans don’t understand their health insurance. That’s because, unlike most other industries that have embraced simplicity and ease, insurance remains complex, filled with exclusions, jargon, and unnecessary paperwork. So even with the best of educational tools, we’re looking at a large literacy gap. Second, consumer animosity toward health insurance companies is almost as old as the business itself. Even traditional supplemental health insurance offerings like Accident Insurance and Critical Illness that are intended to provide extra support were not designed to cover very much. And the amount of money that goes back to the insured at the end of the day is low for every dollar of premium paid. So it’s not surprising that people are tired of frequent claim denials and delays, and don’t trust that their coverage will minimize their out-of-pocket exposure as much as they need it to. It’s obvious that we have to start with addressing what’s covered, and how we pay claims, which is core to any insurance product. We can’t just slap technology onto insufficient coverage and hope that it’ll improve consumer confidence and trust. But there are some things we can do today to help health insurance catch up with other consumer industries through human-centered design. Here are three: 1. We can set up insurance products like subscriptions Digital simplification across industries has been happening since the dawn of Amazon and Uber, and has taught consumers to have certain expectations around their apps and online experiences. Just for the purposes of this exercise, let’s think about insurance in terms of the direct-to-consumer fulfillment model—and treat insurance like a subscription where care is the purchase and benefits are refunds. Thinking of benefits as refunds enables us to align insurance innovation with the digital simplicity today’s consumers expect. By removing the complexity wrapped around benefits, we can make claims intuitive and the delivery of benefits seamless. We have to eliminate the common limitations and restrictions as well as the excessive paperwork and evidence required for claim approval to enable quicker benefit decisions. People should be able to track the status of their claim in real time, so they can stop chasing their insurance companies for answers. Payment should be electronic, and take days, not weeks. In doing this, we can start to replicate the standards of efficiency and transparency people today are accustomed to when they buy and return products, and build a modern insurance experience that meets digital consumers’ expectations and needs. Treating health coverage like a subscription also provides clear opportunities for engagement. And insurance companies across sectors are just starting to take note. Beam Technologies tracks teeth-brushing habits through a Wi-Fi-connected toothbrush to tailor dental insurance discounts, while Discovery offers its Vitality Program that rewards customers with points for preventative checkups. By encouraging consumers to engage with their coverage, motivating them to use it by offering rewards and discounts like other consumer businesses, these companies drive utilization and deliver value as a result. 2. We can take an (active) back seat Another school of thought tells us that the best insurance companies are the ones that people don’t think about at all. Unlike the previous approach, which assumes consumers will use their coverage like they do their subscriptions, this strategy doesn’t expect that the modern consumer wants to interact with their insurance company at all. Instead, it offers a simple promise of value without any participation required. This approach provides obvious opportunities for leveraging data and automation to set up a product experience where the claim end-to-end is managed by the health insurance company, with no necessary intervention from the insured at all. Innovators in the space are just getting started automating several, if not all, aspects of the claims process. Current players like ClaimsMinder, Human API, and Claritev are just beginning to unlock the power of data to streamline the notification, filing, processing, and payment of a claim so that employees can get more out of their benefits. Ansel Health offers “medical claims integration,” which enables them to determine when individuals have a covered condition and are eligible for a benefit, and pays them directly without requiring them to ever file a claim. In doing this, we eliminate coverage disputes, delayed claims payments, or even just make someone’s day a little bit easier—and maybe then begin to build some trust. 3. We can become a logical extension of the modern care-delivery revolution When people get sick, they don’t see their preventative care or treatment and their health insurance as two separate entities, but rather one experience. Unlike insurance, modern care delivery has evolved at a rapid pace over the past 25 years. Digital and in-person clinics like Wally, Maven, Tia, Omada, Parsley, and One Medical are setting new standards for the way people experience care, and even legacy care providers are mimicking their practices with apps and more. Notably, most of these providers have chosen to offer subscription-based or up-front payment models and to “cut out the insurance middleman.” Why? Because it just doesn’t align with their promise of simplicity and empathy through the provider experience. By applying human-centered design, we can bridge this gap—creating insurance brands that look and feel like a natural extension of the modern care delivery experience. Companies like Oscar, Rightway, and Sana are already proving this is possible, offering an integrated experience that resonates with today’s consumers. It’s a fair question to ask, but why will business stakeholders care? A part of it will be about finding a set of believers and innovators who are both mission-aligned and consumer-focused. But it’s also important to acknowledge that fixing the flaws in the health insurance experience doesn’t just address the financial crisis around healthcare, it aligns with business needs too. In fact, there’s a clear business case for creating simpler health insurance products. According to the Integrated Benefits Institute, serious illnesses, when not treated, result in an average of 1.5 billion lost work days per year, costing employers $575 billion annually. When employees don’t delay or skip care because they’re confident in their health coverage, they’re less likely to require sick time, workers’ compensation, disability, or family and medical leave. Employers see higher retention, insurance brokers and agencies build deeper trust with their clients, and insurance companies see a higher rate of renewals. Established companies can participate too through partnerships with modern solutions, allowing them to stay competitive in an evolving marketplace, benefiting new, innovative players seeking broader distribution. Our goal is simple: In 10 years’ time, we want people to be talking about how complex health insurance used to be, and finally build some real trust. View the full article

Country’s prime minister says the US has accepted many gifts from allies in the past, including the Statue of LibertyView the full article