What's on Your Mind?

The 2002 sci-fi thriller Minority Report depicts a dystopian future where a specialized police unit is tasked with arresting people for crimes they have not yet committed. Directed by Steven Spielberg and based on a short story by Philip K. Dick, the drama revolves around “PreCrime”—a system informed by a trio of psychics, or “precogs,” who anticipate future homicides, allowing police officers to intervene and prevent would-be assailants from claiming their targets’ lives. The film probes at hefty ethical questions: How can someone be guilty of a crime they haven’t yet committed? And what happens when the system gets it wrong? While there is no such thing as an al…

Singles are drowning their Sunday blues with work, which experts warn isn’t necessarily the healthiest coping strategy. In a recent survey of 1,000 singles by Dating.com, 52% of those without a romantic partner said they spend most Sundays alone and 65% say it’s the loneliest day of their week. To cope, 74% say they’ve turned to work to keep themselves busy, and 40% say they do so often. “Sunday is usually the quietest day of the week, and when you don’t have a family or anyone that you’re dating to spend time with, it’s a time that could feel very sad,” explains licensed clinical social worker and resident therapist for Dating.com, Jaime Bronstein. “A lot of peop…

Planes at New Jersey’s Newark Liberty International Airport were briefly left flying blind overnight as the airport experienced another radar outage – the second incident in less than two weeks. The most recent radar outage, first reported by ABC news, occurred just before 4 a.m. Eastern Time on Friday and lasted for a minute and a half. “There was a telecommunications outage that impacted communications and radar display at Philadelphia TRACON Area C, which guides aircraft in and out of Newark Liberty International Airport airspace,” an Federal Aviation Administration spokesperson confirmed in a statement provided to Fast Company. Why New York area planes are…

Square, the popular business technology platform known for its Point of Sale (POS) systems, has launched a new device designed to allow sellers to ring up various kinds of purchases and perform other tasks without carrying around the extra weight of bulkier hardware. The Square Handheld, with a screen that is slightly bigger than a cellphone, is less than an inch thick, thin enough to fit in your back pocket. Handheld card readers currently on the market are bulkier, requiring sellers to use lanyards or handstraps to carry them around. The Square Handheld frees up hands for a more seamless integration into the user’s workflows. The device supports a full range of…

When OpenAI pulled back its latest ChatGPT release—one that apparently turned the helpful chatbot into a total suck-up—the company took the welcome step of explaining exactly what happened in a pair of blog posts. The response was a notable move and really pulled back the curtain on how much of what these systems do is shaped by language choices most people never see. A tweak in phrasing, a shift in tone, and suddenly the model behaves differently. For journalists, this shouldn’t be surprising. Many editorial meetings are spent agonizing over framing, tone, and headline language. But what is surprising—and maybe even a little disorienting—is that the same editorial se…

Most brands still buy attention. The impactful ones earn devotion, the kind people will rally behind and fight to protect. Consumers want a role in movements, not just transactions. When brands focus solely on economics, spark and engagement disappear. Consequential brands ignite a shared spirit, tapping into values, not just wallets, and building communities of advocates. But how do you actually build cultural power? For my forthcoming book Branding as a Cultural Force: Purpose, Responsibility, and Resonance (Columbia University Press, 2025), I interviewed creative leaders worldwide to find out. Across those conversations, six clear strategies emerged—actionable …

“Well, friends. I did it. I’ve now had my highest-income month of my life again.” So begins a TikTok video by content creator Chelsea Langenstam detailing her “$56,244 income month” breakdown, along with deductibles, as a solopreneur. Langenstam then outlines her various income streams: budget templates, brand deals, referral fees. “I don’t share to brag,” she says in the video, currently sitting at over 100,000 views. “I share because I want to show you what’s possible in real time.” Her videos are among hundreds on TikTok and Instagram, lifting the curtain on how much solopreneurs of all kinds actually earn month to month—and exactly where each dollar come…

There’s been a seismic shift in the way we shop for fashion. We were once dependent on going in-store to physically browse, touch, and try on endless garments to ensure fit and style. However, e-commerce has introduced a virtual shopping experience eliminating these tactile touchpoints—often the difference between making the purchase or putting it back on the rack. Last year, 2.71 billion people made online purchases—and though shopping for apparel is still predominantly done in-person, 43% of U.S. consumers bought clothing and 33% bought shoes online. More consumers are embracing shopping via online storefronts and the younger, more digitally-savvy generations hold m…

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday pitched India as a central player in the global artificial intelligence ecosystem, saying the country aims to build technology at home while deploying it worldwide. “Design and develop in India. Deliver to the world. Deliver to humanity,” Modi told a gathering of some world leaders, technology executives and policymakers at the India AI Impact Summit in New Delhi. Modi’s remarks came as India — one of the fastest-growing digital markets — seeks to leverage its experience in building large-scale digital public infrastructure and to present itself as a cost-effective hub for AI innovation. The summit was also addressed by F…

On Tuesday, Microsoft said it is cutting less than 3% of its global workforce, including LinkedIn. The company which an estimated 228,000 employees as of last June, meaning the layoffs will affect approximately 6,000 employees. The tech giant, which makes popular software products Windows and Word, will make cuts across various locations, teams, and roles. “We continue to implement organizational changes necessary to best position the company for success in a dynamic marketplace,” a Microsoft spokesperson told Fast Company. The news comes less than two weeks after the Redmond, Washington-based company beat first quarter earnings expectations, driven by its Azure c…

Office dress code has been trending more casual for years, and the pandemic helped turn athleisure and sweatpants into business casual. And now, there’s a growing debate around one practice long thought to be standard for anyone wishing to look presentable and professional: ironing. In fact, many people on social media are saying they never iron anything—whether it’s work clothes or otherwise. “For science, how many of you still own an iron—the one for taking wrinkles out of clothing—AND know how to use it?” one Threads user recently asked. It’s a sentiment others have shared online from TikTok to Facebook. Naturally, the replies were divided. “I use min…

Around a decade ago, Chad Dale watched as some of his friends started to leave Seattle. “They wanted to stay in an urban environment, but the city was too expensive for them to have all the things that they wanted to have,” Dale says. His friends who were beginning to have kids wanted backyards and guest rooms for visiting in-laws; they looked for single-family houses in the suburbs. But Dale, a developer, wondered whether there could be a different solution. What if he and several friends joined together to build their own apartment building—and all lived in the same place? Some friends had already bought a vacation home together on nearby Whidbey Island, and…

One day after WeightWatchers said that it would file for bankruptcy, weight loss drug giant Novo Nordisk’s outlook is brightening. Novo Nordisk, the Danish company that produces semaglutide drugs Ozempic and Wegovy, saw its shares rise more than 7% Wednesday, in spite of recent headwinds from widely available copycat versions of its signature weight loss drugs. Following its quarterly earnings report, shares of the company rose to $71.53 before leveling off and settling around $67.70, in spite of lowered expectations for the year. Novo Nordisk lowered its sales growth forecast for 2025, now expecting growth between 13% and 21%, down from the 16% to 24% it pro…

For its 50th anniversary, Zara has partnered with 50 designers and creators for a collection you might not expect from a fast-fashion mall brand. The Spanish fashion retailer unveiled its 50th anniversary collection at Paris Fashion Week with collaborators that include photographer Annie Leibovitz, supermodel Cindy Crawford, stage designer Es Devlin, and musician Robbie Williams. Available worldwide beginning Oct. 6, the collection does include plenty to wear (Leibovitz contributed a photo for a t-shirt), but what stands out most are the non-apparel items. This is about a whole lot more than clothes. Devlin, whose build stages for artists like Adele, Beyoncé, …