What's on Your Mind?

People often take walking for granted. We just move, one step after another, without ever thinking about what it takes to make that happen. Yet every single step is an extraordinary act of coordination, driven by precise timing between spinal cord, brain, nerves, muscles, and joints. Historically, people have used stopwatches, cameras, or trained eyes to assess walking and its deficits. However, recent technological advances such as motion capture, wearable sensors, and data science methods can record and quantify characteristics of step-by-step movement. We are researchers who study biomechanics and human performance. We and other researchers are increasingly app…

Phones have always been fashion statements. What started as simple cases to protect your phone has evolved into decking out the devices with every accessory imaginable: dangling charms and key chains, PopSockets, phone wallets, straps, and now . . . pockets? Apple just launched a new product called the iPhone Pocket, and it’s effectively a knitted bag for your iPhone. Apple designed the pouch in collaboration with high-end Japanese fashion brand Issey Miyake, whose relationship with Apple stretches back to the Steve Jobs era. (Jobs’s signature turtlenecks were designed by Miyake, who retired the iconic shirts following Jobs’s death in 2011.) The tech giant say…

In 2010, Phil Gilbert was a longtime startup entrepreneur when IBM acquired the software company he ran. The “slower, process-oriented culture” was a struggle for someone who was used to the faster pace of startup life, he writes in his new book, Irrestible Change: A Blueprint for Earning Buy-In and Breakout Success. When IBM tapped him to lead a transformation of the company, it was a daunting task. Over the next few years, Gilbert guided IBM’s shift toward design-thinking and re-trained thousands of employees to work differently, all without mandating a thing. Today, he sees corporate mandates as pointless: They don’t work, he says. And yet, they’re ubiquitous—take …

You might not have noticed if you’re the type to upgrade your smartphone frequently, but the main cameras that they use have been getting wider and wider in their field of view throughout the years. While phones are now indisputably the most popular cameras in the world, most manufacturers have settled on a type of lens that used to be considered quite exotic and challenging to use in the camera space. The main camera on the iPhone 17 Pro, for example, has the same field of view as a 24mm lens on a full-frame camera, which is the general photographic standard for measuring focal lengths. This is a perspective that few companies would have considered using on a point-a…

Below, co-authors Suzy Burke, Rhett Power, and Ryan Berman share five key insights from their new book, Headamentals: How Leaders Can Crack Negative Self-Talk. Suzy, president and co-founder of the leadership consultancy Accountability Inc., is an organizational psychologist and seasoned executive with an exceptional track record in a diverse array of businesses, from a Fortune 20 technology company to a highly successful beverage start-up. She is also a National Institute of Mental Health scholar and member of the Marshall Goldsmith 100 Coaches Agency. Rhett is the CEO and co-founder of Accountability Inc. and was named the #1 Thought Leader on Entrepreneurship b…

Self-growth requires two things parents often lack: time and energy. Between cleaning messes, cooking meals, and managing extracurriculars, the average parent gets just two hours a week to focus on personal development. Growth doesn’t stop when you become a parent. Raising children offers lifelong learning. Yet, for parents used to measuring their success in qualifications and promotions, it often doesn’t feel like growth—especially when you’re sleep-deprived and energy-drained. To them, professional development and personal development are one and the same. It’s no wonder 50% are left feeling as if parenthood has hijacked or delayed their growth. As Headway’s pro…

On Tuesday, SoftBank, the Japanese financial giant, announced plans to dump all 32 million of its shares in Nvidia, the AI chip maker. The news won’t be the needle that pops the AI bubble, but it did cause enough of a stir to make Nvidia’s shares drop 2% Tuesday morning. The bad vibes were muted somewhat by news of what SoftBank says it will do with the proceeds of the sell off, along with those from the sale of some of its $9.17 billion T-Mobile stake: The firm will double down on another big bet in the AI space–OpenAI. SoftBank expects to directly invest $30 billion in OpenAI this year, according to its second-quarter financial statement in September. And it had …

When Amazon proposed building its Project Blue data center in Tucson, Arizona, the company faced intense pushback. Residents raised concerns about the enormous amounts of water and electricity that the data center would need, two major ways such projects impact the environment, especially in a desert city. Ultimately, Tucson’s town council rejected the proposal (though its developer hasn’t given up). But the story highlights both the growing environmental impacts of data centers, and how location matters to that impact. A study published this week in the journal Nature Sustainability makes that connection even clearer. Led by researchers at Cornell University, t…

Just when you thought you’d seen it all on Capitol Hill, reopening the federal government appears to have hit yet another roadblock: Hemp. A day after Democratic Senators reached a deal with their Republican counterparts in the Senate to end the longest government shutdown in history, a vote on the agreement was held up by a provision in the bill that would ban the unregulated sale of hemp-based or derived products. The provision relates to funding for the Department of Agriculture, and was flagged by Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, home to a burgeoning hemp industry. Paul introduced an amendment to strip the language on Monday, but the amendment failed. Subsequent…

Apple said it has pulled two of China’s biggest gay dating apps, Blued and Finka, under pressure from Chinese authorities, in the latest sign of a tightening grip on the LGBTQ+ community. An Apple spokesperson said in a statement that the company removed the two dating apps from China “based on an order from the Cyberspace Administration of China”, without further elaborating. “We follow the laws in the countries where we operate,” the spokesperson told The Associated Press. A check by The Associated Press on Tuesday found that the two apps are not available on Apple’s app store in China, although an “express” version of Blued could still be found. It was uncl…

The tech industry is moving fast and breaking things again—and this time it is humanity’s shared reality and control of our likeness before and after death—thanks to artificial intelligence image-generation platforms like OpenAI’s Sora 2. The typical Sora video, made on OpenAI’s app and spread onto TikTok, Instagram, X, and Facebook, is designed to be amusing enough for you to click and share. It could be Queen Elizabeth II rapping or something more ordinary and believable. One popular Sora genre is fake doorbell camera footage capturing something slightly uncanny —say, a boa constrictor on the porch or an alligator approaching an unfazed child—and ends with a mild sh…

ByHeart Whole Nutrition Infant Formula is being recalled in 12 states due to concerns it may be contaminated with Clostridium botulinum, as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention continue to investigate a multi-state outbreak of infant botulism. As of November 10, 15 infants who were either fed the formula or exposed to it have developed infant botulism in 12 different states. Those states are: Arizona, California, Illinois, Kentucky, Minnesota, North Carolina, New Jersey, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Texas, and Washington. The investigation remains ongoing. All 15 infants were hospitalized, and no deaths …

Young people early in their careers are understandably alarmed by reports that their jobs are most at risk from AI automation. Some are even reconsidering their career choices due to what’s been dubbed AI anxiety. But job seekers shouldn’t give up. People whose jobs are threatened by AI must look for ways to play to their strengths and their human qualities. They should focus on the many areas where humans outshine AI—things like relationship building, resourcefulness, emotional intelligence, teamwork, and leadership. For much of the labor force, of course, it won’t be possible to avoid AI completely. Many occupations will involve working with AI not just as an as…

You may see more smiles next time you walk into a Target. That’s because the big box retailer is hoping to provide an “elevated” customer experience with it’s new “10-4” policy, requiring staffers out on the floor to smile, wave, and welcome customers within 10 feet—and greet those just 4 feet away, USA Today reported. Fast Company has reached out to Target for comment. The policy comes less than three weeks before Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, which officially kicks off the busiest and most profitable time of the year. Many stores, including Target, have already begun to roll out their Black Friday sales this year. Target’s early 2025 Black Frida…

Retirement saving requires key decisions: when to start, how much to save, and where to invest. The investing decision has drawn more attention as government regulators work to open 401(k) plans to alternative assets such as private market investments. Below, we compare the paths of two hypothetical retirement savers and their outcomes. A tale of two retirement savers Laura and JR are two 25-year-olds newly employed at the same company, in the same role. Step 1: Deciding to Save On her first day at work, Laura committed 10% of her $75,000 salary to her 401(k). That earned her company’s 3% annual match (it matches 50% up to 6%), and 13% in total savings. She…

After enough Democrats caved this week and agreed to fund the federal government without guarantees for extending healthcare subsidies for tens of millions of Americans, a big question on the minds of many is “Will my health insurance premiums go up?” Unfortunately, the answer is likely to be a resounding yes, according to data compiled by the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), the nonprofit health research institute. Here’s how much more individuals and families of four can expect to pay for their healthcare premiums in 2026, unless Republicans decide to extend Affordable Care Act (ACA) enhanced premium tax credits—something the majority of GOP congresspeople have …

To the uninitiated, the term Scope 3 might sound like an obscure technical label. However, for those managing corporate carbon emissions, the term can inspire a range of emotions, from dread to dismay. Scope 3 emissions are generated by indirect upstream and downstream operations, and typically account for the largest share of a company’s carbon footprint. They also lie outside the organization’s direct control. Although one of the sustainability agenda’s most daunting items, technology can provide solutions to the Scope 3 challenge. There’s mounting pressure to tackle these emissions, as institutional investors such as pension funds pay close attention to the cli…

Major League Baseball said its authorized gaming operators will cap bets on individual pitches at $200 and exclude them from parlays, a day after two Cleveland Guardians were indicted and accused of rigging pitches at the behest of gamblers. MLB said Monday the limits were agreed to by sportsbook operators representing more than 98% of the U.S. betting market. The league said in a statement that pitch-level bets on outcomes of pitch velocity and of balls and strikes “present heightened integrity risks because they focus on one-off events that can be determined by a single player and can be inconsequential to the outcome of the game.” “The risk on these pitch-level marke…

Japanese technology giant SoftBank said Tuesday it has sold its stake in Nvidia, raising $5.8 billion to pour into other investments. It also reported its profit nearly tripled in the first half of this fiscal year from a year earlier. Tokyo-based SoftBank Group Corp. said it sold the stake in Silicon Vally-based Nvidia in October, a move that reflects its shift in focus to OpenAI, owner of the artificial intelligence chatbot ChatGPT. SoftBank reported its profit in April-September soared to about 2.5 trillion yen (about $13 billion). Its sales for the six month period rose 7.7% year-on-year to 3.7 trillion yen ($24 billion), it said. The company’s fortunes tend to flu…

Amazon ushered in a new era for television advertising when it converted Prime Video into an ad-supported experience by default in 2024. By the middle of this year, some 130 million U.S. viewers were on Prime Video’s ad tier, watching between four and six minutes of ads per hour, according to an Adweek report. The move is part of the company’s long-term plan to dominate television advertising as viewership shifts from traditional broadcast and cable TV to streaming platforms. “The digital advertising landscape is rapidly evolving with streaming TV becoming mainstream,” says Kelly MacLean, VP of Amazon DSP, the company’s ad-buying platform. Under MacLean, Amazon’s…

The Senate passed legislation Monday to reopen the government, bringing the longest shutdown in history closer to an end as a small group of Democrats ratified a deal with Republicans despite searing criticism from within their party. The 41-day shutdown could last a few more days as members of the House, which has been on recess since mid-September, return to Washington to vote on the legislation. President Donald The President has signaled support for the bill, saying Monday that “we’re going to be opening up our country very quickly.” The final Senate vote, 60-40, broke a grueling stalemate that lasted more than six weeks as Democrats demanded that Republicans negoti…