What's on Your Mind?

When brands hire illustrators, animators, or other artists, they typically know what they’re paying for: a defined set of creative assets, delivered on deadline, with clear usage rights. But in the age of generative AI, that’s no longer the whole picture. Commissioned artwork is increasingly being used not just in finished campaigns, but as training data to power AI models—models that, in turn, generate new, derivative outputs. Often, this use isn’t spelled out in contracts. It’s not malicious. It’s just . . . new. That’s left brands, agencies, and artists in a tricky spot—trying to apply old licensing logic to a new generation of tools. The result is a growin…

Logan Ivey has tried everything to cut down on his screen time. He bought a modern “dumbphone” that’s designed to be used as little as possible, tried a device called a Brick that removes distracting apps and notifications from a smartphone, and even resorted to a classic flip phone when all else failed. Still, nothing was working. So he turned his iPhone into a 6-pound weight. The 6 Pound Phone Case is a bulky, stainless steel contraption designed to make your smartphone extremely annoying to use. Inspired by the aesthetics of an ’80s brick phone, the case transforms a typical, ultra-portable iPhone into a cumbersome eyesore—and that’s the whole point. Ivey, who has …

If you’ve noticed that the internet feels different lately—more cluttered, harder to navigate—you’re not imagining it. The system is breaking down in real time, and by 2026, researchers predict that 90% of web content will be AI-generated. Quality journalism is disappearing behind paywalls while feeds fill with noise designed purely to capture attention. An innovation that was supposed to democratize information is now drowning us in it. I know this intimately because I helped build it. As founder of AppNexus, which sold to AT&T for $1.6 billion, and former CTO of Right Media, I created the technology that became the backbone of digital advertising, a multibillion…

With more than a decade of experience working as a design and tech analyst, Andrew Hogan is all in on the efficiency and ease that tech brings to our lives. But lately at home with his daughters (ages 4 and 18 months), Hogan is grappling with something unwieldy and undefined: how parents, kids, and technology interact, from smartphones to screen time to AI. “We are so eager to remove friction—avoid it and smooth over the rough spots, especially as parents,” Hogan says. In fall 2024, Hogan began writing a newsletter called Parent.Tech, designed to help him, and other parents, better understand how to navigate the increasingly complex world of tech and consumer pro…

It’s a sound—and smell—car commuters have become intimately familiar with: the noxious fumes of asphalt repaving. U.S. road maintenance and highway expansion require a massive quantity of asphalt every year, roughly 400 million tons a year on average, according to Asphalt magazine, a publication of the international trade association Asphalt Institute. But a new process developed by St. Louis-based firm Verde Resources seeks to streamline the process, making it more sustainable and odorless. Verde’s new BioAsphalt process, which has been in development since 2022, utilizes what’s called biochar, or natural wood remnants from forestry waste that get added into the trad…

A makeup illusionist, a photography project, and an innovative DJ are among the winners of Instagram’s inaugural Rings awards. The award, whose recipients were announced on Thursday, celebrates 25 creators who, in the company’s words, “bring people together over creativity” and “aren’t afraid to take creative chances and do it their way.” Among the winners is Mimi Choi, known for turning her face into mind-bending works of art. Celebrating her win, she penned in an Instagram post: “Because of its visual nature, Instagram has really helped spread my work and jump-start my career, providing me with numerous different types of collaboration opportunities that I cou…

There’s no shortage of inspiration for what to do with a part of the house that’s not quite looking its best. Interior design magazines and furniture blogs are stuffed with idealized bedrooms, and online vision boards make it easy to cast a dragnet over the myriad images of classy lounges or perfectly ordered home offices. But there’s always the unavoidable catch that while these images may be helpful references for how to rethink a room, they don’t actually represent your room. A new AI tool offers a more personalized alternative. Created by the online interior design service Havenly, it’s an app-based AI design assistant that takes user-submitted images of rooms and…

When companies undergo a major change, such as a CEO transition, reorganization, merger, or acquisition, most leaders default to one well-worn instinct: control the message. Lock down talking points. Tighten the language. Make it polished and official. In working with executive teams across industries, from tech to retail, we’ve seen time and again that simply trying to control the message isn’t enough. In fact, it often has the opposite effect, creating more confusion and mistrust than clarity. Because in every high-stakes moment, your audience—employees, customers, investors—is asking the same unspoken question: “What’s in it for me?” And if you’re not answe…

A typical three-bedroom house in Austin, Texas, can sometimes rack up monthly utility bills of $200 or $300 in the summer. But in new homes under construction in a nearby suburb, residents will owe little beyond the basic utility connection fee. The homes, built by Habitat for Humanity, tap into a shared geothermal system in a fully geothermal neighborhood. Heat pumps in each house connect to pipes that loop hundreds of feet underground, making use of the earth’s steady temperature for heating and cooling. The houses are also built to use as little energy as possible, with features like deep eaves that shade the interior and reduce the need for air-conditioning. Solar…

The most common email messages I receive these days are obviously AI-generated pitches for guests to appear on my podcast. They all begin the same way, with a praising reference to one of my recent episodes—usually the second-to-last posted show. “Your recent interview with so-and-so was penetrating, and got to the heart of the problem of x or y.” Then comes the crucial pivot: “John Dough’s work takes that problem even further . . .” And then the pitch for John Dough to be on the podcast. The problem is not just that the publicist used AI to shotgun the known universe of podcasters with pitches artificially customized to their shows. It’s that the comparisons and con…

Prior to becoming the CEO of Lyft, David Risher didn’t post much on social media. That began to change just before his first day on the job, when Risher decided to sign up on the ride sharing platform as a driver. “I had no plan,” he says. “I just wanted to get in the car and see what it feels like to drive for Lyft and hear the rider’s story, but also experience it from a driver’s perspective.” At the end of that first outing, Risher revealed to the passenger who he was, and requested a selfie. He posted it on his personal LinkedIn account. “I drove for a couple more hours — and I didn’t tell anyone at Lyft I was doing this.” Since then, Risher has made a re…

It’s not always fun to look your finances in the eye, but it can unlock a rewarding path forward. These five books make tackling personal finance approachable, clear, and—dare we say it—an enjoyable journey. Rule Breaker Investing: How to Pick the Best Stocks of the Future and Build Lasting Wealth By David Gardner The real secret to building lasting wealth on the stock market is breaking the old investing rules. In Rule Breaker Investing, Motley Fool cofounder David Gardner teaches how to craft a purpose-driven portfolio, manage investments, and even master time management for a smarter, happier, richer investment journey. Listen to our Book Bite summary, r…

When I first ventured into self-employment a few years ago, I received a lot of advice from fellow freelance writers: Know your worth. Don’t take low-paying work. The advice was valid, as too much low-paying work is a recipe for burnout. But to the newly self-employed, I would say: Know your worth. And also, there are very valid reasons to take low-paying work, if it can help launch your business. You can open the right doors without selling yourself short. The project is good for your portfolio Potential clients will expect “proof” that your work is good—especially if it’s the type of work that can be displayed in a portfolio (design, video, writing, or…

Tell me: Do things like this ever happen to you? You have clarity of purpose. You know what you need. You walk into another room to get it. Then, distraction hits, and you forget entirely what prompted you. Or else, you search the house for your car keys or your glasses, or your wallet. A good 10 minutes later, you realize they’ve been with you the whole time. You sit down to write an article about an intriguing study having to do with memory—if only you could remember what it was. Yes, these are highly personal anecdotes. But like all the best stories, I hope they’re simply the unique expression of universal truths. Perhaps second only to the fear of d…

“Let’s circle back when we have the bandwidth to touch base on whether we need to hop on a call to tackle the low-hanging fruit.” (If this corporate buzzword bingo sent a shiver down your spine—apologies.) In the world of professional communication, business jargon is often a necessary evil. Email clichés: love ‘em or hate ‘em, we all use ‘em. Many of us are trapped in a terminal cycle of “reaching out” and “circling back” to make sure “we’re aligned.” Recent analysis from email verification company ZeroBounce looked at more than one million real work emails to find out which overused email phrases are the most common offenders. To no one’s surprise, “…

Every year, Audience Audit publishes a study on what agency clients really want—and the 2025 edition revealed a stat that should stop any agency leader in their tracks: 77% of clients say they’re more likely to hire an agency that’s a recognized AI expert (not just self-proclaimed). But only 32% believe their current agency fits that description. Here’s what’s more telling: When asked what they expect from their agency when it comes to AI, clients didn’t say “efficiency” or “cheaper deliverables.” They want new ideas, sharper analysis, and real guidance on how to use AI themselves. In other words, they’re not just looking for agencies that use AI. They want partners w…

What if, instead of working toward an exit strategy, we built companies for longevity? That’s the question at the heart of employee ownership. It’s not just a perk to lure talent. It’s a fundamentally different way of building a business, and one that might just be the key to long-term resilience. I’ve spent nearly my entire career inside a 100% employee-owned architecture, engineering, planning, and interiors design firm. Today as CEO, I lead its 1,800 employee-owners. I’ve seen firsthand how this model changes everything, from how team members treat clients to how the organization is able to weather change. But this isn’t a story about just one company. It’s abo…

In business, there’s one skill no leader would dare neglect: the financials. Financial literacy, like understanding a balance sheet, cash flow, or P&L, is one of the foundations for decision making. As climate change rewrites supply chains, consumer demand, and regulation, another fluency is becoming just as essential. Climate literacy will protect business growth and resilience, while leaders who ignore it are being left behind. But mastering it means more than knowing that emissions are a problem. It’s about being able to read, question, and apply environmental data the way a CFO interprets financials. Leaders must be able to ask, and know the answer to, questio…

On Thursday October 16, New Yorkers and people across the country who have been watching the city’s mayoral race will tune in as Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani, former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, and Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa face off in the first of two mayoral debates, ahead of New York City’s upcoming election on November 4. The debate is set to take place in Manhattan’s Rockefeller Center starting at 7:00 p.m. ET this evening. NBC 4 New York/WNBC, Telemundo 47/WNJU, and POLITICO New York are partnering to host the debate. The hotly contested three-way race is between Mamdani, a state assemblyman; Cuomo, who is running as an independent after losin…

As we scroll through our feeds, it’s not unusual to stumble upon AI-generated slop—the kind of empty, nonsensical content that’s unmistakably artificial. You click on one, and before you know it, your feed’s flooded with more of the same. It’s left users craving the authenticity they once savored—a pervasive frustration spreading across social media Pinterest has not been immune to the phenomenon. Described by Futurism as “strangled by AI slop,” the platform has been “engulfed in a torrent of uncanny AI-generated content, drowning out the human-made inspiration that once thrived there.” Amid a surge of complaints, the platform has rolled out new generative AI cont…

One of the most vital drugs with a high price tag will get dramatically more affordable next year – if you live in California. California will start selling insulin next year after striking out on its own in a bold deal to lower the cost of prescription drugs, making it the first state in the nation to do so. The state will offer low-cost insulin through CalRx, a state program designed to provide affordable life-saving drugs in California. “California didn’t wait for the pharmaceutical industry to do the right thing — we took matters into our own hands,” California Governor Gavin Newsom said in a press release. “… No Californian should ever have to ration insulin…

Want more housing market stories from Lance Lambert’s ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter. Speaking Tuesday at the National Association for Business Economics meeting in Philadelphia, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell offered his clearest reflection yet on the Fed’s pandemic-era mortgage bond buying. He acknowledged that the central bank may have kept purchasing mortgage-backed securities (MBS) for too long—but he also suggested that those purchases may have had a smaller effect on the housing market’s trajectory than some assume. “Regarding the composition of our purchases, some have questioned the inclusion of agency MBS purchases …

Uber’s U.S. drivers and couriers have a new way to earn extra money. The ride-hail app announced on Thursday a new pilot program that will offer gig workers the opportunity to train artificial intelligence (AI) through so-called “digital tasks.” They include simple, quick tasks for workers such as uploading photos, recording themselves speaking in their native language, and submitting documents written in different languages—which are then fed into AI models. Uber already offers this for gig workers in India. “A lot of these tasks are digital, meaning you can do them from your phone . . . from anywhere, and at the same time create earnings opportunities,” Sac…