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We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication. Ever since Apple released the latest Apple Watch Series 10 earlier in September, it has been steadily dropping in price; it's currently sitting at $299 (originally $399) after a $100 drop, the lowest price yet, according to price-tracking tools. This price is for the 42mm case, 130 to 180mm size bands, in black, denim, and rose-gold case colors. The bigger 46mm case is down to $329 (originally $429), also the lowest price yet after a $100 discount. Memory Storage Capacity: 64 GB, Connectivity Technology: GPS, Screen Size: 42 Millimeters Apple Watch Series 10 [GPS 42mm case] $299.00 at Amazon /images/amazon-prime.svg $399.00 Save $100.00 Get Deal Get Deal $299.00 at Amazon /images/amazon-prime.svg $399.00 Save $100.00 Memory Storage Capacity: 64 GB, Connectivity Technology: GPS, Screen Size: 46 Millimeters Apple Watch Series 10 [GPS 46mm case] $329.00 at Amazon /images/amazon-prime.svg $429.00 Save $100.00 Get Deal Get Deal $329.00 at Amazon /images/amazon-prime.svg $429.00 Save $100.00 SEE -1 MORE The Apple Watch Series 10 is the best Apple Watch for most people and a great replacement if you're still wearing the more budget SE, according to Lifehacker associate tech editor Michelle Ehrhardt's review. There are also some key upgrades from the Apple Watch 9, although they're less noticeable than previous Apple watch upgrades. If you're curious to know how it compares to other flagship smartwatches, you can check out our head-to-head comparison post here. Some of the first things you'll notice on the Series 10 are a thinner case and a bigger OLED screen (either 1.6 inches or 1.8 inches, depending on which size you get). Unlike the Series 9, which could only take calls on the speaker, the Series 10 has audio playback, meaning you can listen to podcasts or Spotify on its speakers. The sleep features were also improved, with a notification that gets triggered by sleep apnea symptoms. There are also new depth and water temperature sensors that automatically turn on when you go underwater, a feature that used to be unique to the more premium Apple Watch Ultra series. The battery will last you anywhere between 18 and 36 hours, depending on your use. You still get the same fitness features, heart rate monitor, and sleep tracker from previous models—but still no blood oxygen sensor. View the full article

By now everyone knows that scrolling social media isn’t exactly good for you. But did you know it might be making you sweat? Researchers from the psychology department at Durham University tracked the physiological responses of scrolling on social media and found a rather strange side effect. The researchers asked 54 young adults to browse Instagram for 15 minutes while monitoring their heart rate and their skin conductance (which would tell how much sweat they produced). Compared to reading a news article on a phone, they found scrolling Instagram made people’s heart rates slow down and, simultaneously, made them sweat more. From the control group, who just read the news article, they could tell it was not being on the phone or reading that was causing this response. It was something about social media. Researchers found that the physiological responses were present in all participants, regardless of how they scored on a questionnaire that assessed the symptoms of social media addiction. When participants were purposefully interrupted from their scrolling, rather than snapping out of the excitement and returning to a calmer state, participants continued to sweat and their heart rates increased. When they were asked to completely disconnect, participants reported being stressed and anxious. They even reported having cravings for social media at that moment. Such bodily and psychological stress responses are similar to those addicts experience when going through substance withdrawal. Most Americans don’t need another reason to want to cut down on screen time. Over half (53%) of Americans say they want to cut down on phone usage in 2025 (33% more than in 2023), with people spending an average of 5 hours and 16 minutes per day on their phones—a 14% increase from the 4 hours and 37 minutes people reported in 2024. While researchers didn’t attempt to answer the question of whether we’ve developed a physical addiction to social media, the study does suggest that social media indeed has addictive elements. My screen time could’ve told you that. View the full article

Rocket expects the combined company to achieve more than $200 million in run-rate synergies by 2027, it said in a statement. View the full article

Gold-adjusted GDP forecasts. Really!View the full article

Detroit-based fintech platform Rocket Companies (NYSE: RKT) has reached an agreement to acquire the Seattle mortgage services company Redfin (NASDAQ: RDFN) in an all-stock transaction valued at $1.75 billion, the companies announced on Monday. Each Redfin share will be exchanged for 0.7926 shares of Rocket’s Class A common stock, with the deal expected to close in mid-2025, pending shareholder and regulatory approvals. Following the announcement, Redfin’s stock soared nearly 70%, reaching $9.91 in premarket trading. This surge came after Rocket Companies agreed to acquire Redfin for $12.50 per share, representing a premium of 63% over Redfin’s recent average price. On the other hand, Rocket’s stock dropped around 13%. Forming a real estate-lending powerhouse The acquisition brings together two major players in real estate and mortgage lending. Redfin, founded in 2004, operates one of the nation’s most visited real estate platforms, with nearly 50 million monthly users and a network of over 2,200 agents. Rocket Companies, known for its mortgage and financial services, views the deal as a step toward streamlining the home-buying process. “Rocket and Redfin share a unified vision of a better way to buy and sell homes,” said Rocket CEO Varun Krishna. “Together, we will enhance the experience by connecting traditionally separate steps of the search and financing process with leading technology.” The acquisition is expected to drive Rocket’s mortgage growth, giving Redfin users direct access to Rocket’s financing products. Rocket anticipates over $200 million in synergies by 2027, including cost savings and new revenue opportunities. View the full article

Party officials reject €500bn infrastructure fund plan and change to debt borrowing rules to fund defence spendingView the full article

Even though Tarana Burke is still correcting some past misconceptions about the #MeToo movement that went mainstream about eight years ago—it’s not dead, for example, and it wasn’t a witch hunt—she’s focused on the future. Specifically, the movement’s founder said organizing has already begun for the 2026 U.S. midterm elections. “I’m really looking forward to what we can do to build on the campaign we started in 2024,” Burke, chief vision officer of Me too. International, said Saturday during a discussion at the Fast Company Grill at SXSW. “I’m really excited about the idea of building a constituency; imagine us voting along the lines of our survivorship.” One goal for the movement’s future, Burke said, is to help people see how sexual and gender-based violence is interwoven with so many other issues, including gun violence, homelessness, prison reform, food deserts, and maternal mortality. “Part of our work is helping people to understand that there’s not an issue that you care about that does not touch on sexual and gender-based violence,” she told the audience. “We need to stop trying to silo these issues; there’s so much work that we can do together.” Working in tandem on social issues may elicit more attention from politicians or leaders who don’t address issues of sexual and gender-based violence, according to Burke. “We need to keep holding people’s feet to the fire.” Solving a solvable issue That said, activists face new challenges. Funding for support work to end sexual and gender-based violence is at an all-time low, Burke said, while local rape crisis centers are at-risk of losing all of their federal funding. Writing a check, of course, is one solution, but the fight to end sexual and gender-based violence will require interventions on various fronts—similar to approaches taken to make America smoke-free. “This is a solvable issue if we want to solve it,” Burke said. There are still problems to be fixed, however, like the framing that a man’s life is being ruined if he’s accused of sexual violence and a frequent premise that the person making the accusation isn’t telling the truth. That’s why it’s important for people to be given the respect and dignity of an investigation, Burke said. “That helps everybody involved,” she added. “If you are the person being accused or you’re the person who has the accusation, everybody involved should be treated with respect and humanity.” A focus on accountability Another misconception is that people who inflict harm on others must be banished, and there’s no pathway back for them. Burke wants to see accountability from the people who have caused harm, rather than for them to disappear for a while and reemerge again as though nothing happened. “What we’re saying is, if you want to be amongst civil society, we need to understand that you won’t cause harm again, that you understand that you caused harm in the first place,” Burke told the audience. “And the biggest problem with a lot of these men who have these accusations and have these things that have actually been proven is that we don’t see any of that.” Without accountability, it’s tempting for voters to excuse past accusations by justifying some of the good work a politician did in the past. And there’s a pertinent example right now that Burke, a New Yorker, weighed in on. New York City currently has a “terrible” mayor in Eric Adams, at least in Burke’s opinion, but she feels “a little angry” that he could be replaced by another “terrible” politician. That’s because Andrew Cuomo, the former governor of New York who stepped down amid numerous sexual harassment accusations, recently announced he’s running for mayor. “I just want us to do better and dream better and think bigger,” Burke said of this political situation. “If we actually want these things to stop, if we want to make an impact on the issue of sexual and gender-based violence, we have to figure out where the line is and hold the line.” A movement of ‘everyday’ people Of course setbacks are inevitable, as Burke acknowledged, though when the pendulum swings back the other way, she said there are tangible signs of the movement’s progress since #MeToo went viral in 2017 that won’t simply disappear. She points to law and policy changes in that time, along with the way people think and talk about sexual violence. “There has been a cultural shift,” said Burke, who coined the “Me Too” phrase nearly two decades ago while working with sexual assault survivors. “This is a movement that has empowered so many survivors, that has helped so many find community, that has been such a catalyst for healing and action, which is what our organization is about.” Still, she said there is more work to be done. And looking to the future, Burke is calling on the public’s help. “Movements are not just about the people with the microphone, the person with the bullhorn in the front,” Burke said. “Movements are built from everyday people.” View the full article

Hedge fund turned family office eclipses rivals with currency and bond wagers on a slowing US economyView the full article

Kendra Scott, founder of her eponymous jewelry brand, still believes business can be a force for good. And she’s got the numbers to back it up. Today, the brand announces that its foundation has donated $70 million in monetary and in-kind contributions over the last fifteen years to a wide range of causes. It’s supported literacy by providing multicultural and bilingual books to low-income elementary schools. It’s set up a women’s leadership institute at the University of Texas, Austin. It has funded more than 40,000 hours of breast cancer research. At a time when the government is cutting funding to education and medical research, pouring money into these causes matters more than ever. Speaking to Student Athletes at the Kendra Scott Center at UT Austin [Photo: Kendra Scott] Scott says she’s only getting started. As the company grows explosively—generating a reported $500 million in revenue last year, a 20% increase from the year before—Scott believes it has the potential to donate even more. And even though many other companies are pulling back on their diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts, Scott is continuing to prioritize DEI. The brand’s most recent impact report, lists many DEI initiatives including creating an internal “Hispanic Pod” to better connect with Hispanic consumers year-round. “I am not changing anything about my mission, end of story,” she says. “It doesn’t matter who the president is.” Scott’s stance goes against the grain in corporate America. Many companies that once boasted about their social justice and equity initiatives—like Target and McDonald’s—have pulled back from these efforts in response to the new political climate. Scott believes this is a mistake and will drive customers away. And indeed, there are now boycotts planned against both of these companies, and many others, including Amazon, Nestle, and General Mills. “If you’re constantly pivoting who you are as a brand, you will not survive,” says Scott. “You won’t just falter in this political climate; you’re not going to survive in future ones.” [Photo: Kendra Scott] Kendra Scott’s Unusual Philanthropy Model Scott was always interested in how she could build a profitable business that could also do good in the world. She launched the brand in 2002 out of a spare room when she was a young single mother. But even back then, she committed to helping any organization came to her asking for support. “I had no money at the time,” she says. “But I said that I wasn’t going to turn anybody away, even if all I could contribute was a pair of earrings for a silent auction.” Eventually, the brand took off. In 2010, she began opening stores, and that’s when she decided to formalize the charitable giving part of her business. Rather than picking a single cause, Scott wanted to give her customers some say in where money would go. So she developed a unique model where any customer can host a “Kendra Gives Back” event in-store where 20% of proceeds can go to a cause they care about. Last year alone, the company supported 12,600 causes, ranging from the girl scouts to pediatric cancer. [Photo: Kendra Scott] Scott believes this approach allows the brand to become more embedded in the community. “We’re fostering a genuine connection with our customers because we’re meeting them in some of the darkest moments of their life,” she says. “We’re meeting them when their kids are fighting cancer and raising funds for things that could be tragic. We are trying to spread light in dark places.” As the company has grown, Scott has been able to invest in other causes that are important to her. In 2016, when Scott lost a close friend to breast cancer, the foundation began pouring money into breast cancer research and has already donated $2 million to this cause. Scott is also passionate about supporting literacy efforts in under resourced communities. She’s launched a program called Yellow Libraries, where the foundation partners with a literacy non-profit called First Book to provide multicultural and bilingual books to low-income schools that receive federal funding. Now, the government is slashing funding to scientific research and is contemplating eradicating the department of education. Corporate donations are now increasingly important to keeping these causes going. [Photo: Kendra Scott] Social Good Is Good For Business While some business leaders worry that philanthropy might be a distraction from building a profitable company, Scott believes philanthropy has been directly tied to the brand’s growth. “It’s what differentiates our brand from our competitors,” she says. “It’s what keeps customers engaged and loyal.” The company is now scaling quickly, generating half a billion dollars in annual sales. In 2016, the private equity firm Berkshire Partners acquired a minority stake in the business, valuing the company at $1 billion. This allowed it to expand its retail operations. It now has more than 100 standalone stores, while also selling through retailers like Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom and Bloomingdale’s. It also sells products through its e-commerce website. The brand has been deliberate about appealing to new generations of customers. It offers a wide range of price points, and many tweens gravitate towards the brand’s more affordable necklaces like the Elisa, which sell at a rate of one a minute. Scott points out that Gen Z is very socially conscious, and are more likely to engage with brands that support a social cause. But the brand also remains popular with older customers, many of whom have been loyal fans for years. “When we closed all our stores during COVID, customers started writing in to ask about the employees in the stores,” Scott recalls. “It was a testament to how these stores were really part of the community and had shown up when customers needed donations.” Scott believes it would be a mistake to change the brand’s approach now, even as the political climate in the country is changing and many other companies are turning their back on social justice initiatives. “Consistency is so important,” Scott says. “When we say we’re going to do something, we do it.” View the full article

Helicopters, lifeboats and firefighting vessels sent to the scene off the coast of HumbersideView the full article

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication. The Harman Kardon Onyx Studio 8 is currently $129.99 on Woot, a massive drop from its usual $499.95 price tag. According to price trackers, this is its lowest price ever—and if you're a Prime member, you get free shipping (otherwise, it's $6). This deal is set to last for the next 27 days or until it sells out, but note that you can't have it shipped to Alaska, Hawaii, or a PO box address. Harman Kardon Onyx Studio 8 $129.99 at Woot $499.95 Save $369.96 Get Deal Get Deal $129.99 at Woot $499.95 Save $369.96 The asymmetrical shape of this speaker might make it seem wobbly at first glance, but there are rubber feet to keep it stable. One of the standout features of this speaker is its room calibration technology, which automatically adjusts the sound to your space. Whether you’re in a small apartment or an open loft, the speaker fine-tunes its output for the best possible experience. The sound profile of the Onyx Studio 8 is well-balanced, particularly in the midrange, making it great for podcasts and general listening. However, if you love deep, thumping bass, this isn’t the speaker for you. It lacks serious low-end punch, so while bass lines are present, they won’t shake the walls. It also doesn’t have an EQ or sound customization options, so what you hear is what you get. Also, its controls are a bit of a mixed bag—they’re simple but suffer from inconsistent tap recognition, which could easily get frustrating when trying to adjust volume or playback. The Bluetooth multipoint pairing feature of this wireless speaker lets you connect two devices at once, but there’s noticeable latency with video playback (so if you’re planning to use this for movies or YouTube, expect some sync issues). While the Onyx Studio 8 improves in sound quality over its predecessor, the Onyx Studio 6, it drops its water resistance entirely, making it more suited to a safe, dry living room setup. That said, it does come with a one-year manufacturer limited warranty for added peace of mind. Battery life is advertised at eight hours, but real-world use is closer to seven, depending on usage (your mileage may vary). Also, there’s no auto-off function, so if you forget to power it down, you’ll lose battery even when the speaker's idle. View the full article

Digits is taking on QuickBooks and Xero, with the world’s first AI-powered Autonomous General Ledger, allowing small business owners and accountants to put their accounting needs almost completely in the hands of AI. Digits announced the service—which went live Monday—at HumanX in Las Vegas, after working on it for the past five years in stealth mode and putting it in the hands of hundreds of companies to test out over the past year. The platform serves as an alternative to other accounting software or platforms, such as QuickBooks or Xero, but stands out as it uses its own proprietary AI technology. Jeff Seibert, the co-founder and CEO of Digits, says that puts the platform ahead of other competing accounting programs, even those that purport to also utilize AI technology. In many cases, he says, those platforms are simply throwing numbers into broad-based LLMs like ChatGPT, and not purpose-built AI tools, like what Digits has built in-house. “We went all the way,” Seibert says. “We went heads-down, and spent the past five years creating the first end-to-end accounting platform for the AI era.” And when comparing Digits to key competitors, Seibert says that “we’re feature-competitive, we can do everything that they can do,” but again, “the difference is that we’ve spent five years training our own models,” allowing for automation for “a vast majority of the work.” So, for accountants or small business owners, using Digits is a matter of connecting the right accounts, and letting the AI take over—it can record and categorize transactions in near-real-time, reconcile accounts, and then create insights and reports. In effect, processes that may take weeks can be winnowed down to minutes. Interestingly, Seibert says that he hopes Digits can help stymie a larger issue in the accounting field: The lack of accountants. Currently, three-quarters of accountants are near retirement age, and the number of prospective accountants (those taking CPA exams) is the lowest in decades. While there’s already a glut of accounting talent, it’s set to get worse. “Nobody in Gen Z wants to be an accountant,” Seibert says. As such, he hopes Digits can prove to be a stop-gap of sorts—not replace human accountants entirely, but allow those accountants to do more with less. Digits has already garnered a good amount of attention from investors, having raised around $100 million in recent years from investors such as Benchmark and SoftBank. And customers seem to be buying in, too, as the group of businesses that spent the past year testing the product are giving it a thumbs-up, according to Seibert. “We already have hundreds of firms that want to access it,” he says. “It’s magical.” View the full article

A one-day strike by workers at 13 German airports, including the Frankfurt and Munich hubs and all the country’s other main destinations, caused the cancelation of most flights on Monday. The 24-hour walkout, which started at midnight on Sunday, involves public-sector employees at the airports as well as ground and security staff. At Frankfurt Airport, 1,054 of the day’s 1,116 scheduled takeoffs and landings had been canceled, German news agency dpa reported, citing airport traffic management. All of Berlin Airport’s regular departures and arrivals were canceled, while Hamburg Airport said no departures would be possible. Cologne/Bonn Airport said there was no regular passenger service and Munich Airport advised travelers to expect a “greatly reduced flight schedule.” The ver.di service workers union’s strike also targeted the Bremen, Hannover, Duesseldorf, Dortmund, Leipzig/Halle, and Stuttgart airports. At the smaller Weeze and Karlsruhe/Baden-Baden airports, only security workers were called out. The German airports’ association, ADV, estimated that more than 3,500 flights in total would be canceled and about 560,000 passengers affected. The union announced the strike last Friday. But at Hamburg Airport, it added a short-notice walkout on Sunday to the strike on Monday, arguing that it must ensure the measure was effective. The so-called “warning strike,” a common tactic in German wage negotiations, relates to two separate pay disputes: negotiations on a new pay and conditions contract for airport security workers, and a wider dispute over pay for employees of federal and municipal governments. The latter already has led to walkouts at Cologne/Bonn, Duesseldorf, Hamburg, and Munich airports. Pay talks in that dispute are due to resume on Friday, while the next round of talks for airport security workers is expected to start on March 26. View the full article

Over the past 20 years, the Walt Disney Company has spent billions acquiring the world’s most recognizable intellectual properties, including Star Wars, Marvel, and Pixar. It’s not just putting those assets to use on the big screen. Increasingly, those properties are an ever-larger part of the company’s theme parks, including Disneyland in California and Disney World in Florida. Last August, Disney announced an expansion of its parks, and now, at the annual South by Southwest (SXSW) festival in Austin this month, Disney has provided more details about new experiences and rides coming to those parks—and yep, the upcoming theme park experiences are all about Marvel, Star Wars, and Pixar. Here’s what to expect. Fly like Iron Man at Stark Flight Labs Disney’s most valuable property in recent years has been Marvel. One of the cinematic franchise’s most popular and recognizable characters is Iron Man, made famous by Robert Downey Jr.’s portrayal in numerous films. It’s no wonder then that Disney is getting ready to launch a new Iron Man-themed experience at its Avengers campus in Disney California Adventure Park. The new experience is called Stark Flight Lab, and it will allow people to try out some of Iron Man’s toys. Walt Disney Imagineering reveals newly unclassified details for the new Stark Flight Lab attraction, inspired by Tony Stark's beloved robotic friend DUM-E, setting up shop in Avengers Campus at Disney California Adventure. 🦾 https://t.co/Wkvnq0C01X pic.twitter.com/lvrz1qDnJO — Disney Parks (@DisneyParks) March 8, 2025 Part of the experience will see guests “sit in ‘gyro-kinetic pods’ and roll along a track before stopping in front of a giant robot arm,” says Disney. “This robot arm will hoist you into the air where you’ll make several high-speed maneuvers inspired by Iron Man and some other Avengers.” Mandalorian and Grogu movie tie-in One of the biggest Hollywood tentpoles of 2026 is expected to be The Mandalorian & Grogu—the first new Star Wars film in nearly seven years by the time it debuts on May 22, 2026. Disney, never one to miss a cross-promotional opportunity, will also launch a new experience at its Millennium Falcon: Smuggler’s Run attraction in Disneyland. JUST ANNOUNCED! The new Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run adventure featuring Mando and Grogu will debut May 22, 2026 at Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge at Disney Parks! https://t.co/RRNZ9lsYBm 💫 #SXSW pic.twitter.com/SYY9aO23pE — Disney Parks (@DisneyParks) March 8, 2025 While details were scarce, Disney said the attraction will be based on scenes from the film. “This isn’t going to retell what happens in the movie – it’s more like participating in something that’s happening just off-camera from what you see in the film,” Mandalorian & Grogu director Jon Favreau said. Pixar’s Cars and Monsters get new rides, too Finally, Disney previewed two new Pixar-themed experiences at its parks. First up is a Cars attraction coming to Disney World that the company first announced last August. The company showed concept sketches of some of the race cars that will be part of its off-road racing ride. A closer look at early concept sketches and new race car personalities designed by @Pixar for the brand-new Cars attraction coming to Frontierland at @WaltDisneyWorld. https://t.co/RXOT36XOod #SXSW pic.twitter.com/2hGdhQXJBp — Disney Parks (@DisneyParks) March 8, 2025 But perhaps the most exciting for amusement park thrillseekers is the new ride based on Monsters, Inc. The ride, based on one of Pixar’s most popular films, will feature a first for Disney theme parks. “The upcoming door ride will feature the first-ever suspended coaster at a Disney Park, and the first-ever vertical lift,” the company said in a blog post. Walt Disney Imagineering shares a new look at the Monsters, Inc. coaster loading area and first-ever vertical lift that will hoist riders in the air like never before as they zoom into the door vault! https://t.co/9Rwf0YtRGX 🚪🎢 #SXSW pic.twitter.com/fnTaDIA6AR — Disney Parks (@DisneyParks) March 8, 2025 While Disney previewed the experiences above at South by Southwest, it has not announced a release date for any of the above attractions besides the new Mandalorian and Grogu experience, which opens in May 2026. View the full article

The US’s tariff policy evokes bafflement as well as fearView the full article

Consolidation of subscale operations comes as Big Four firms re-examine operating modelView the full article

Saturday, March 8, was International Women's Day. March is a whole women's month, even if Google erased it from its calendar. So I'm taking a look at young women—and not in a creepy way. I want to know: what's up with young women? What are they about? What are their dreams? How are they feeling deep in their hearts? So I'm checking out Reddit's woman-centric corners, listening to Doechii and "Call her Daddy," and consulting some "coochie doctors." The state of young women in two subredditsTo try to get some insight on young women between the ages of 18 and 25 or so, I took a look at some Reddit communities ostensibly made for, by, and about women. I started at Reddit's TwoXChromosomes. at over 13 million subscribers: This is by far Reddit's largest woman-centric community, and it's bleak. The top posts of the week are dominated by tales of creepy dudes, sexual violence, violence-violence, and more creepy dudes. There's an occasional "here's something funny/cute that happened" to lighten the mood a little, but overall, it's bad out there: "Growing up is realising how much the world hates you" is how redditor gaycat21 puts it. For a way less depressing and way more interesting women's subreddit, check out NSFW meme subreddit R/LetGirlsHaveFun. At only around 100,000 subs, it's much smaller than TwoX, but it's proof that crudeness and no-censorship vibe of online culture doesn't have to be misogynistic, and it's much funnier that way. According to its creator, Let Girls Have Fun is a place for "girls to post their deranged thoughts, from a girl perspective," because "Girls can also like edgy and crude humor." Posts like this, this, or this seem like open rebellion against society's endless set of rules and expectations for women, expressed in the most explicit way possible. Alex Cooper's Call Her Daddy is the biggest podcast among young womenAlmost everyone who listens to the Call Her Daddy podcast is a young woman. According to research firm Edison Research, 70% of CHD's audience are women, and 70% of them are under 35. A full 93% of its listeners are under 45. The podcast made news when it scored an interview with Vice President Kamala Harris in October, but politics isn't the show's usual subject matter. Host Alex Cooper has been described as "Gen Z's podcast queen" and "the female Howard Stern" by The Hollywood Reporter, tends to focus on sex and relationships when she's not interviewing celebrities like Miley Cyrus and John Mayer. Like Stern, Cooper is frank, open, and raunchy. In the early days of her show, she focused more on sex, but the subject matter has expanded into topics like female empowerment, self-love, and pop culture. Unlike boy's top podcaster Joe Rogan, Call Her Daddy's host doesn't regularly fall victim to believing in crap that isn't true. AI-generated "coochie doctors" invade TikTok When someone describes themselves as a "coochie doctor," it's probably safe to ignore any medical advice they offer, especially when they're online and they're not actually human. For the last few months, weirdos and/or algorithms have been using an app called "Caption" to spam TikTok with hundreds of videos featuring lifelike, AI-generated avatars who call themselves "coochie doctors," "booty doctors," "tata surgeons," "booby doctors," and "Korean butt doctors" followed by terrible medical advice. These videos generally start with a variation of the phrase, "13 years a coochie doctor and no one believes me when I say this," followed by some questionable health tips geared toward women like "rubbing fig seeds on your breasts will make them go from saggy to perky" and "sea moss is a great way to cleanse your gut." It's worth noting that these tips are about neither coochies nor butts, so these medical professionals are working outside their area of expertise. These videos generally end with exhorting viewers to search out a specific "wellness" product on Amazon. It's like all these medical professionals are only offering advice to get money out of the gullible! “Dating a GM,” and the mystery of what “GM” means A few weeks ago, TikToker @myak.tt posted the video you see above, a short, random clip with the caption "Dating a GM." It's been viewed over 11 million times since then, and sparked an online debate over what a GM is. My first thought is "game master," the more inclusive form of "dungeon master," but I'm a damn nerd, and that's almost definitely not what Myak.tt meant. Others have suggested "gang member," "gun man," or "grand master." It's frustrating because the video gives no information, and as of yet, the young woman who posted the video has offered no explanation. The video has inspired "99% accurate" reenactments like this one: and this one: But these give no indication of what a GM is either. Maybe as big a mystery is: Why did this video get popular? Why did the TikTok algorithm choose to share this over the millions of other short, meaningless clips posted all day on the site? I have no answers. (For a glossary of slang words I'm pretty sure I do know the definition of, check out 'Mewing,' 'Sigma,' and Other Gen Z and Gen Alpha Slang You Might Need Help Decoding') Viral video of the week: Doechii's “Anxiety” Rapper/singer/songwriter Doechii, born Jaylah Ji'mya Hickmon, has been blowing up over the past couple months. Aided by a legion of fans using her song "Denial Is a River" on their TikTok videos and a stand-out performance at the Grammy Awards, Doechii has become so popular that her older songs are being dug out of mothballs and getting huge. This week's viral video, Anxiety (Visualizer), was posted on Doechii's YouTube with no fanfare, and almost three million people watched it in its first two days online alone. The original video for the song was posted back in 2020, and features COVID-era Doechii rapping in her bedroom over Gotye’s “Somebody That I Used to Know." But part of Doechii's "Anxiety" was also sampled on a track from rapper Sleepy Hallow, for his song called "Anxiety." You know what: Here's Doechii explaining the deep lore around this song: This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. View the full article

Among the resignations are Mark McArdle, who was instrumental in creating the Qualified Mortgage rule, and Operations Chief of Supervision David Bleicken. It is unclear if the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau will hire anyone to succeed them. View the full article

We may earn a commission from links on this page. This is a website about hacks, so you know I'm not going to advocate for a cleaning product unless it really gets the job done. Lifehacker has years' worth of archives explaining how, for the most part, common things like hydrogen peroxide, baking soda, and vinegar get the major cleaning jobs taken care of, and all you need is a rag or a sponge to go with them. Still, there are some more specialized products that are worth having on hand. These are what I use to make cleaning easier and faster. Useful cleaning tools you might not haveFirst up, you need a little squeegee. In fact, I think you should have a few. The first one should be stored in your shower and, after you finish washing up, you should use it to get the fog, scum, and water off your shower doors and walls. Doing this every time you bathe takes just a few seconds, but drastically reduces how much and how often you need to clean the tile and glass in the shower. Get one with an adhesive holder so it dries straight up and down, then stick it to the shower wall. This one is $9.59. Second, you should keep one in the kitchen. Use it to scrape wet messes off your countertops or to gather spills on your floor. Why waste a bunch of paper towels or dirty up a rag when you could just push the wet mess off the counter and into a container, then put it in the trash? Pick up a two-pack for $13.99. We aren't finished with squeegees, actually. You also need a gigantic one for your floor. This will replace your broom and I'm serious. It's $29.99 (though you can apply a 30% coupon on Amazon right now) and it solves all the annoying little problems you face with a regular broom. There are no bristles, so hair and dust don't get caught in anything and there are no gaps for dirt and debris to slip through. To wash it, you just wipe down the silicone. What's even better is that, unlike a standard broom, you can tackle wet messes with this, dragging all the droplets and rivulets into a more concise puddle that is a lot easier to wipe up. Magic Air Broom $29.99 at Amazon /images/amazon-prime.svg Shop Now Shop Now $29.99 at Amazon /images/amazon-prime.svg Next, consider some soap-dispensing brushes. You may have seen these for dishwashing, which is great, but they're also perfect for scrubbing floors, tile, and hard-to-reach spots, all without having to fill up a whole container of soapy water and drag it around. Obviously, keep the one you use for household cleaning away from the one you use for the dishes, so get at least two. Better yet, this one for $9.89 comes with detachable heads, so you only need one handle. Speaking of brushes, it's time to upgrade to an electric one. Stop getting on your hands and knees, putting too much elbow grease in, or over-exerting yourself when you could outsource the strenuous part of your labor to technology. You can get an electric spin scrubber with a telescopic handle and eight different brush heads for $49.99, then use it as a handheld or long-reach solution when you just don't want to scrub. My favorite cleaning solutions and productsThe wide array of tools and gadgets available to address needs you didn't realize you had is great and all, but what about cleaning solutions and products? It might seem like, hey, an all-purpose cleaner is an all-purpose cleaner, but that's not true. For instance, I recently tested out "double concentrated" solutions from Pine Sol and Fabuloso and found both of them to be way more effective than their standard-concentration predecessors. Did you know floor-cleaning solutions were innovating? Well, now you do. Another innovation I really like counts as both a tool and a product. Yes, you probably have a melamine sponge, like a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser, on hand and yes, you probably also have some kind of foaming soap you use around the house. But now they've been combined into one product: It's called the Mr. Clean Ultra Foamy Magic Eraser and I can no longer live without it. You get five for $8.94 and with them, you can clean a lot faster and easier. It takes me far fewer passes of the eraser over any kind of grime to remove it than it does when I use the original version. Mr. Clean Magic Eraser Ultra Foamy Multi Purpose Cleaner, Foaming Magic Eraser Sponge Multi Surface Cleaner, 5ct $8.94 at Amazon /images/amazon-prime.svg Shop Now Shop Now $8.94 at Amazon /images/amazon-prime.svg And the last unexpected product that has really changed how I clean is this set of coatings from spotLESS. Three bottles of coating cost $24.99 and you get one for glass and mirrors, one for toilets, and one for sinks and fixtures. I spray these on their respective surfaces after cleaning and have definitely noticed I need to clean those areas again more infrequently. The coating works to keep grime from accumulating and makes it easier to wipe off when it eventually does appear. The glass spritz has proven especially helpful for the glass table I got a few months ago. Again, I didn't realize I had these problems until I found a product that fixed them. We're truly living in the future. View the full article

The US president has provided the biggest stimulus towards European integration since the end of the cold warView the full article

Hello and welcome to Modern CEO! I’m Stephanie Mehta, CEO and chief content officer of Mansueto Ventures. Each week this newsletter explores inclusive approaches to leadership drawn from conversations with executives and entrepreneurs, and from the pages of Inc. and Fast Company. If you received this newsletter from a friend, you can sign up to get it yourself every Monday morning. During December 2024, Workday CEO Carl Eschenbach and his leadership team, including cofounder and executive chairman Aneel Bhusri, arrived at a big decision: the software company would restructure itself to free up operating dollars for investment opportunities tied to artificial intelligence (AI). The move would involve shedding hundreds of jobs, marking the biggest layoff in the company’s history. Even though the plan was finalized, Eschenbach says he was “not at peace” because he had not had a chance to share his thinking in person with Dave Duffield, Workday’s other founder and its largest individual shareholder. So, Eschenbach met Duffield at the Jax Truckee Diner near California’s Lake Tahoe—the very diner where Duffield and Bhusri decided to start Workday, and offer cloud-based software to human resources and finance departments—to lay out his rationale. “Dave said, ‘Carl, I support you. We brought you in to scale the company and we’re supporting you 100% in this very difficult decision,'” Eschenbach recalls. “The only thing he asked, which was obviously a ‘yes’ on my part, was that we take care of our employees who were moving on.” Humans vs. AI: Finding the balance In early February, Workday announced it was cutting 1,750 employees, or 8.5% of its workforce, with U.S.-based employees receiving a minimum of 12 weeks of pay with additional severance based on tenure. Workday is just one of many tech companies, including Salesforce, Microsoft, and Meta, announcing layoffs this year. Workday CEO Carl Eschenbach [Photo: Workday] But even as Eschenbach restructures his company to make room for more AI investments, he insists AI will not result in mass unemployment. In fact, he says of Workday’s layoffs: “If you fast-forward one year later, we’ll have the same, if not more people in the company because we’re going to rehire as we invest in [the AI] opportunity.”  The workforce more broadly will “peacefully coexist with the technology, we’ll leverage it, and we’ll become more productive as humans and as employees because of the technology,” he says. “It’s not just a replacement.” AI for CEOs I asked Eschenbach what kinds of AI agents or automation tools CEOs should embrace. He says all executives would benefit from agents that help with day-to-day “mundane” tasks (this is a common AI talking point) such as managing calendars or summarizing email messages. But he also noted that Workday is starting to roll out agents that can summarize financial data ahead of earnings calls and monitor transactions to help with audits. Aneel Bhusri [Photo: Workday] It’s a perspective echoed by Bhusri, who has served as CEO of Workday at various times over the company’s 20-year history. “Every CEO should be thinking about how to integrate agents that enhance their ability to think strategically and make informed decisions faster,” he says. “There are two primary types of agents: task-based and role-based. Task-based agents can create some efficiencies but can become easily siloed. Instead, I’d encourage executives to adopt role-based agents that can transform entire workstreams to free them up to focus on more strategic, impactful work.” But AI also has the potential to free up leaders to do more of the meaningful, person-to-person work that’s become an increasingly important part of the job. In 2018, Michael Porter and Nitin Nohria published research in Harvard Business Review that showed CEOs spend 61% of their time in in-person meetings. And while the study predated the pandemic and the rise of remote and hybrid work, there’s no question that face-to-face interactions—like Eschenbach’s meeting with Duffield at the Jax Truckee Diner—will continue to be part of the CEO playbook in the age of AI. How is AI helping you? Are you a CEO using AI to help you manage your time or run your business? Send your best examples to stephaniemehta@mansueto.com. Your responses may form the basis of a future newsletter. Read more: overcoming CEO challenges 4 ways top CEOs are making AI work for them The 4 most common problems for founder-led startups From founder-led to founder-inspired View the full article

Harvard Business Publishing Corporate Learning recently surveyed leaders and L&D professionals about what they’re looking for in a leadership development program. At the top of the list? Scalability. One of my passions—and one of the reasons my company developed our own learning platform—is expanding access to leadership development, so it’s exciting to see companies recognizing how important scalability is. At the same time; however, I know that making scalability work at your organization can be a tall order. For a long time, scalability and quality have seemed at odds in leadership development. An organization could spend its budget on highly effective, but expensive options like coaching for fewer people. Or it could bring leadership development to more employees, but settle for cookie-cutter programs. But that conundrum is becoming a thing of the past. Scalability and quality can go together in leadership development—no matter the size of your training budget. To get both, though, you have to embrace an approach that’s both high-tech and high-touch. Why is scalability so important? Before we get into the nuts and bolts of scaling quality leadership development, let’s talk about why it’s such a big deal right now. For starters, there’s a real gap in leadership pipelines. Only 20% of companies feel confident that they have strong future leaders lined up, and this is something we hear from clients all the time. At the same time, companies are starting to recognize the power of informal leaders—the people who don’t have a leadership title but still play a huge role in driving teams forward. A recent Harvard Business Publishing report highlights how organizations are shifting toward flatter structures and more cross-functional collaboration. That means people who used to simply carry out tasks are now expected to influence stakeholders, make strategic decisions, and communicate business impact—in other words, to lead, even without a formal title. With leadership expectations evolving, the challenge isn’t just developing leaders—it’s making sure leadership skills reach everyone who needs them. With tech, think beyond AI That brings us back to the question of how to make leadership development more scalable while maintaining quality. With just about any issue in business, people seem to rush to AI as the answer. While exciting things are going on, AI isn’t a magic-bullet solution for leadership development yet. The lingering problem is getting people (and teams) to actually use and benefit from them. But AI can be part of your scalability solution. In the Harvard survey, 60% of respondents said they’re incorporating AI into their development programs. (As my own company trains an AI coach, we’re focusing on making sure that using the coach will fit into people’s busy schedules.) However, don’t let AI overshadow other useful technologies. Micro-learning platforms are another huge trend right now, with nine out of 10 L&D professionals saying that the employees they serve prefer them. I’ve seen firsthand with our own platform how busy professionals embrace using “snackable content” to get leadership insights when and where they need them. Technology can also extend the reach of other leadership development tools. If you’re used to thinking in terms of using a single leadership development program at your organization, this may require a shift in mindset. But there’s lots of potential. For example, my company is very excited right now about the potential of combining our learning platform with our coaching services to help companies stretch their budgets farther. Enlist your current leaders for development  As I touched on earlier, technology is only part of the story when it comes to scaling leadership development. Leaders will always need to learn from other leaders, no matter how advanced AI and other high-tech tools become. I’ve also found that most organizations haven’t fully tapped into the knowledge their own people have. Unleashing this knowledge makes it a whole lot easier to scale leadership development. One strategy I always recommend is teaching your current leaders (including the informal ones) how they can help develop others. Ensure that the development they receive includes both coaching and delegation skills. Employees whose managers are adept coaches are eight times more engaged. And delegation gives employees a chance to grow “in the flow of work”—I’ve seen firsthand that this approach amplifies engagement, innovation, and customer satisfaction. Another way to enlist current leaders in scaling development is creating a mentoring program or updating your current one. Some of your employees may already have mentors or mentees, but formalizing mentorship programs makes them more powerful. Mentorship doesn’t just impart the information your people need to develop as leaders. It also ensures that information is relevant—the “touchstone” of an effective leadership development program—and it helps build the relationships your future leaders need. What’s next? I’m optimistic about scalable leadership development and the possibilities it holds. Making leadership development available to more employees will affect productivity—and even small shifts in productivity across a large population of employees can lead to big results. So how do you want to get the ball rolling to integrate scalability into your organization’s approach?    View the full article

Does it feel to you like there are way too many AI assistants to keep track of? Between ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, Google Gemini, Anthropic Claude, DeepSeek, and others, it’s hard to remember what each one excels at—if anything. Beyond just the underlying differences in large language models, each AI assistant has its own features, integrations, premium features, and peculiarities. I’m writing this guide both for myself and for anyone who wants to stay informed about generative AI. While I have some reservations, I also think it’s worth keeping an eye on what’s available. Rather than getting into the technical details of how these AI assistants work, I’ll focus on what they can actually do. ChatGPT by OpenAI The most recognizable name in generative AI is also the most fleshed out as a standalone consumer tech product, with features like web search, a built-in document editor, and a conversational voice mode. ChatGPT also provides one of the most robust free tiers of any AI assistant, with all but its most bleeding-edge features available in some capacity without a subscription. Notable features: Voice mode for engaging in back-and-forth conversation, including an advanced version with more emotive responses. Traits that define how ChatGPT should converse with you. Temporary chats that don’t appear in your history and don’t train OpenAI’s models. Canvas document editor that uses AI to generate and revise content. Web-search for bringing in real-time information. GPTs that bring in information from third-party apps and services. Reason button that offers more in-depth problem solving and decision making. Price: Free for limited model access, $20 per month for more advanced models and new features, $200 per month for unlimited access to experimental features. Claude by Anthropic As The New York Times has noted, Claude is a favorite among AI insiders for its sense of emotional intelligence, with responses that are “less like the generic prose generated by other chatbots.” While its features are on the bare-bones side—it can’t search the web and lacks a voice conversation mode (for now)—it does offer some helpful features for creating and interacting with documents. Notable features: Projects mode, which lets you upload documents and data for context in your chats. Artifacts, which are standalone documents and image files you can download for use in other apps. Styles, which let you refine how Claude writes its responses. You can even upload a document for Claude to try and mimic. Price: Free for limited usage. $20 per month for additional models, reasoning, and the Projects feature. Google Gemini Google’s AI products are more diffuse than some of its startup rivals. While Gemini exists in standalone form on the web and in mobile apps—and serves as the default voice assistant on newer Android phones—it also generates summaries in Google Search, and is baked into other Google products such as Gmail, Docs, and Chrome. All this makes Gemini a bit tricky to quantify as a whole, except that it feels unavoidable if you regularly use Google’s products. Notable features: Extensions for interacting with other (mostly Google) services, for instance by summarizing YouTube videos or flagging important message from Gmail. Gemini Live for free-flowing voice conversations. Google Assistant features such as smart home control and reminders. NotebookLM, a separate but popular product that can analyze your documents, create summaries, and even turn them into podcasts. Price: Free, with $20 per month Gemini Advanced subscription for Workspace integration, book-length document analysis, and more advanced models. Microsoft Copilot Just as Gemini is built into Google products, Copilot is weaved into Microsoft’s Windows operating system, Office suite, and Edge browser. Its actual capabilities aren’t much different from other AI assistants—it primarily uses OpenAI’s large language models—but it’s easier to access if you’re deep into Microsoft’s ecosystem. (Microsoft’s GitHub also has its own version of Copilot for programmers.) Notable features: Office tie-ins, including writing assistance in Word and spreadsheet analysis in Excel. Think Deeper offers access to OpenAI’s reasoning models. Copilot Voice offers free-flowing voice conversations both on desktop and mobile devices. Edge sidebar lets you summarize and ask about web pages. Pricing: Free for limited usage, requires Microsoft 365 (starting at $10 per month) for full Office integration, $20 per month Copilot Pro for advanced models, early features, and Copilot in Office web apps. DeepSeek DeepSeek, the product of a previously-obscure Chinese company, shook up the AI world earlier this year, offering performance on par with OpenAI’s latest models with training costs that were apparently miniscule (though later disputed). It’s also raised privacy concerns over the data it sends to China, and it won’t talk about topics that are censored in China, such as the Tiananmen Square massacre. Even so, American companies are now looking to use DeepSeek’s open-source code, including Microsoft, which is offering local DeepSeek models on Qualcomm-powered PCs, and Nvidia, which offers its own online version. As for DeepSeek’s own app, it’s a bit on the crude side, but it offers image recognition, document scanning, web search, and a “DeepThink” reasoning model for problem solving and decision making. Notable features: Unlimited access to DeepSeek’s latest models. Pricing: Free. Grok While Elon Musk’s AI assistant looks like a lot of its rivals on the surface, it has a kind of edgelord sensibility lurking underneath. Grok won’t flat-out tell you how to build a pipe bomb, for instance, but it won’t shut the conversation down, either. Instead, it’ll encourage you to ask more about pipe bombs in general and give you details about how they work when prompted. (Meanwhile, researchers have coaxed into providing dangerous weapon-building instructions in detail.) Notable features: Voice modes with distinct personalities, including “unhinged” and “sexy” versions. “Think” and “DeepSearch” modes that reason through answers and pull information from online sources, respectively. Price: Free with limited use of the latest models, $30 per month for increased rate limits and access to Think, DeepSearch, and voice modes. Perplexity This GPT-based AI tool started off as an alternative to traditional web search, but has since evolved into a more all-encompassing personal assistant with tools for managing documents and interacting with apps. It’s also developing its own web browser. (In other words, it’s becoming less reliant on scaping websites against their wishes.) Notable features: Web search results, with summaries and citations. Spaces for summarizing and analyzing documents. Agent features on Android devices, including music playback, reminders, and calendar interactions. Discover section with AI-generated news summaries. Price: Free for basic web search with some usage limits on other features, $20 per month for more deep research usage, unlimited document uploads, and a choice of AI models. Duck.ai With Duck.ai, DuckDuckGo offers a more privacy-focused alternative to the major AI assistants. DuckDuckGo says it’s made agreements with major AI providers so they won’t train their models on your data, and will only store it for 30 days at most. There’s no document interaction or voice chat, but it’s good enough for basic conversations. Private chat history that’s stored on your device, not online. Choice of large language models, including GPT-4o, Llama 3.3, Claude 3, o3-mini, and Mistral. AI answers in search results, with an option to customize how often they appear. Price: Free A few others Siri: While the current version of Siri isn’t based on large language models—and may not be for years—it will occasionally ask ChatGPT for answers on devices that support Apple Intelligence. Alexa+: Amazon’s just-announced AI overhaul promises more conversational capabilities than the old Alexa while still offering features like home automation, music playback, and TV suggestions. It’s launching on select Echo Show devices in an “early access period” next month. Meta AI: This one’s powered by Meta’s llama open-source models but is pretty basic as a consumer-facing product. It’s only available on the web or as a feature of the Meta Ray-Ban smart glasses. Standalone mobile apps are reportedly coming. View the full article

Workplace stress reached an all-time high in 2022, according to a Gallup report. And a 2022 Work and Well-Being Survey from the American Psychological Association found that workers appreciate and seek mental health support in the workplace. That’s why it’s important for employees to learn and practice techniques that will help them lower their stress during moments when stress levels are high. One way to do this is by creating positive experiences during highly stressful situations, such as recalling times when we were confident, calm, and in control. These serve as emotional anchors that we can trigger at will. In my book, Emotional Intelligence Game Changers: 101 Simple Ways to Win at Work + Life, I share tips on how to increase our confidence. Here are several techniques for bringing ourselves into that state. 1. Identify the state we want to experience Take a moment to think of a time when you were in charge of the situation, relaxed and confident with the way things were working out. Remember the feeling that came to you. Think back to that time and try to replay the feelings and sensations in your body when that was happening. Focus on feelings such as confidence, calm, and joy you experienced. Ask yourself, what details can you remember that will bring you back to that place? 2. Find something that will trigger that state, time, and place Work on finding a physical action that will cause you to automatically think of the situation that brings you into a positive state. This could be a physical gesture, such as tapping yourself on a part of your body. Practice this gesture while bringing yourself into a positive state. And make sure you keep this gesture specific to this purpose, and try to avoid using it for anything else. 3. Check out the anchor in less stressful situations Instead of waiting to use it in a highly stressful situation, test out the anchor in moments when you aren’t feeling stressful. If it works effectively, then it should be able to work when stress is more prevalent. If the anchor isn’t working as you’d expect or want it to, revisit the anchor technique by intensifying the emotion around the event, and modify your trigger accordingly. 4. Keep practicing and strengthening the anchor Look for situations throughout the day when you can practice using your anchor. Any situation that increases your stress, even in small levels, is an opportunity to use and solidify the effects of the anchor. You’ll find that if you practice this technique over time, it will become easier to access when you most need it. You’ll no longer need to think of the anchor because it’ll become your natural response in stressful situations. 5. Put your body into it Another way of strengthening the anchor is to align our physical state with the feelings of confidence. When you straighten your body, put out your chest, and pull back your shoulders, you encourage your body to amplify readiness, strength, and confidence. Add this posture to your anchor. 6. Add an inner mantra Repeating a mantra over time can also add strength to the anchor. Personalize it to make it more uniquely yours. You’ll want to use words that are powerful, that deeply resonate with you, and that are true of how you felt during the time when you’re experiencing the feelings. 7. Think of situations where the anchor will be helpful The best way to strengthen the anchor is to anticipate situations where you know it can be useful, then practice using it during these times. Any place, time, or circumstance that brings you out of your comfort zones is a great time to practice. As you begin to experience the benefits of using this in various situations, you’ll find it more and more natural to practice these anchors, and you’ll also embed it in your habits and memories. View the full article

“This is for the crafty girls who want to save money,” goes the voiceover on a recent TikTok, panning over the cheerful purple-and-gray exterior of Savannah’s Starlandia Art Supply and its shelves stocked with art supplies. “You need to be going to creative reuse stores, which are like thrift stores, but for crafts.” Another TikTok keeps it even simpler, with the text “pov: you find out thrift stores for arts & crafts exist,” overlaid on a montage of the treasures available at Seattle Recreative—paint brushes, markers, a whole wall of yarn. In fact, there are dozens of these “creative reuse centers” spread out across the country, from Anchorage, Alaska, to Atlanta, Georgia. Some centers have been operating for decades; others have sprung up since the pandemic, amid renewed enthusiasm for crafty hobbies. They sell everything from crayons to stamps to beads to fabric, and their mission is explicitly tied to sustainability. Organizers say they’re getting more and more emails and calls from people interested in establishing their own local spot. And yes, the young people on TikTok—who love crafting—are very enthusiastic about the idea. It’s likely that interest will only grow with news that the fabric store Joann—a decades-old stalwart for sewers, knitters, and other crafters—is closing all its remaining stores. “My feeling is every municipality should have one of these,” says Barbara Korein of Retake/Remake in Peekskill, New York. [Photo: courtesy of the author] Retake/Remake is a bustling little spot tucked into a converted turn-of-the-century hat factory in northern Westchester County—and it’s my local creative reuse center, a regular stop on my Saturday morning rounds and my go-to for everything from old National Geographic maps for Girl Scout projects to cross-stitch materials to slightly patchouli-scented wrapping paper. Retake/Remake accepts donations on the first Tuesday of every month and typically gets around 1,000 pounds of materials, says Korein. “We’ve converted about 113,000 pounds of waste from the waste stream.” The items are affordably priced when they put them out on the shelves, too: I once bought several skeins of hand-dyed yarn, a merino wool and alpaca blend, for $10 each, with an original sticker price of $32; I’ve bought needlepoint canvases, which are famously pricy, for as low as $1. [Photo: courtesy of the author] The concept is an elegant solution to a longstanding problem: Generally, traditional thrift stores don’t know what to do with half-used art supplies. “It’s an easy thing to identify and it’s a hard thing to donate,” says Korein. Often, they go straight into the trash and eventually the landfill. But there’s demand for that half-empty box of crayons—teachers, for instance, who often spend their own money on classroom supplies. Many creative reuse centers have special programs to serve this group: Austin Creative Reuse, for instance, has a Materials Mobile, which brings a truck full of no-cost supplies straight to educators. Creative small businesses often turn to these stores, for instance, and artists are a core constituency: “If you have $20 left for your art supplies, and you go to a traditional art center and buy a $20 tube of yellow paint, then whatever you’re painting is going to be yellow, and also it’s going to be paint,” says Jenn Evans of Austin Creative Reuse. But at a creative reuse center, that same $20 might buy a variety of paints and materials—and broaden artistic horizons. “It allows the artist to create artwork from their brains and their heart and not just have it limited by the materials that they can afford.” [Photo: Austin Creative Reuse] “We’ve seen all people from all walks of life come in,” says Ulisa Blakely, Director of Programs and Development at The Wasteshed in Chicago. “But the patterns we typically see are students, teachers, artists whether they’re emerging or established, and also a lot of BIPOC people, which is awesome.” [Photo: Austin Creative Reuse] The basic idea has been around for decades: The country’s first creative reuse center, San Francisco’s SCRAP, was opened in 1976 by Anne Marie Theilen and artist Ruth Asawa. SCRAP grew out of a program by the San Francisco Arts Commission to bring working artists into schools, but money for supplies was scarce. Two years later, New York City’s Materials for the Arts was founded by Angela Fremont, an artist working at the Department of Cultural Affairs; it’s now a 35,000-square-foot behemoth (though shoppable by appointment only) supported by the City of New York. [Photo: Anthony Sertel Dean/courtesy Materials for The Arts] The idea percolated around the country over the years that followed, often in association with other reuse organizations. But it seems there’s been a jump in the last decade, and it’s accelerating. Each center serves as a catalyst for the next one—Korein, for instance, volunteered at Materials for the Arts for a decade and served on their board. “The more centers there are, the more people become aware of this idea,” says Evans. And it turns out to be a pretty seductive idea. [Photo: Anthony Sertel Dean/courtesy Materials for The Arts] New technologies are making it possible for word to spread faster, too, and TikTok in particular can translate directly to increased business. Kimberly Maruska, Executive Director of SCRAP Creative Reuse (which is unrelated to the San Francisco original and has four locations across the country), says that after a popular TikTok featured their Ann Arbor outpost, they saw a huge jump in sales and new customers who cited the Tiktok. “Those people are still coming in,” says Maruska. “They didn’t stop.” Part of the appeal of creative reuse centers is their sheer practicality—why trash perfectly good materials, when teachers and artists are both famously cash-strapped? They’re handy for businesses with leftover materials, or individuals who want somewhere to take emotionally complicated donations—people who don’t knit, for example, want their beloved great aunt’s yarn stash to go to somebody who’ll appreciate it. [Photo: Anna Droddy/courtesy Materials for The Arts] “In general, being creative is getting very expensive,” says Evans. Creative reuse centers are a way to try something new without a huge financial commitment, and even seasoned crafters are keen for more affordable options. But there’s a broader, less concrete appeal, too. “It’s an easy way to get involved in grassroots causes,” says Blakely. It’s an approachable step into a more sustainable life, and that’s by design. “We attract people to the idea of creative reuse by offering them low-cost art and craft and school supplies,” says Evans. “But then once they come to us, we want to open a conversation with them about the environmental aspects of what they’re doing and celebrate the fact that they’re shopping secondhand.” In an era of fast fashion and haul videos, creative reuse centers offer a particularly charming glimpse at another path. Creative reuse centers serve as community hubs, too. Centers generally offer programming beyond the materials. The Wasteshed and Austin Creative Reuse have both hosted trash fashion shows, for example, where competitors have to use provided materials in a kind of creative reuse-themed Project Runway. “We create communities around us,” says Maruska. “We’re taking in donations from local community members, businesses, we’re having educational programming, we’re partnering with other local nonprofits or libraries or schools.” Most of these centers are nonprofits; there’s little chance of a financial jackpot, and it’s a mission-driven labor of love that tends to attract passionate people. “It really feels good to be part of something that everybody seems to benefit from,” says Korein. All those aspects combine to create the quality I personally love best about Retake/Remake, which is that it allows me to imagine art as a practice for its own sake. I don’t have to produce anything gallery-worthy; I don’t have to justify it as a potential side-hustle. It doesn’t even have to be particularly good. It can just be for me—art as part of a straightforward human impulse to create. View the full article