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Your favorite spot for slow-cooked riblets might be cooked. A number of Applebee’s Neighborhood Grill + Bar restaurants have closed their doors in the wake of mounting financial distress and declining foot traffic, according to a recent bankruptcy filing. The 10 shuttered stores, located in Florida and Georgia, are all owned by an Atlanta-based Applebee’s franchisee that last week became the latest regional restaurateur to seek Chapter 11 protection. The list of impacted locations includes long-standing Applebee’s restaurants near top tourist destinations such as SeaWorld, Walt Disney World, and the Daytona International Speedway. Most of the locations w…

Shares in AppLovin Corp were up slightly in premarket trading today after falling by double digits on Monday. The volatile movement follows a Monday report about a rumored probe by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which reversed the fortunes of what had been a high-growth tech stock for much of 2025. Here’s the latest on AppLovin and what to know: What was reported about AppLoving? On Monday, Bloomberg reported that the SEC was looking into the ad tech company’s data collection practices in response to a whistleblower complaint and multiple short-seller reports published earlier this year. Specifically, the regulatory agency is looking into whethe…

Fast Company is now accepting applications for our annual Best Workplaces for Innovators awards. This marks the eighth year we will be recognizing companies and organizations around the world that most effectively empower employees at all levels to improve processes, create new products, or invent whole new ways of doing business. In addition to honoring the world’s overall Best Workplaces for Innovators, we will recognize companies in 19 categories, including a brand-new category, Skilled Labor, singling out companies that depend heavily on talented employees with the kinds of increasingly coveted technical expertise acquired through votech training and trade sch…

The deadline to claim the early-bird rate for Fast Company’s Best Workplaces for Innovators is quickly approaching—Friday, February 20, at 11:59 p.m. Pacific time. This marks the eighth year Fast Company will be recognizing companies and organizations from around the world that most effectively empower employees at all levels to improve processes, create new products, or invent whole new ways of doing business. In addition to ranking the world’s Best Workplaces for Innovators, we will also recognize companies in 19 categories, including a brand new category that focuses on “skilled labor”—companies that depend heavily on talented employees with the kinds of incre…

Today marks a big day here on earth and in space. Not only is April 1 the first day of the month, and April Fools’ Day, it’s also the day Apple was founded 50 years ago, and the same evening Artemis II launches its NASA’s mission to the moon while April’s full pink moon rises in the night sky. Here’s what to know about when, where, and how to see it. What time does the ‘pink moon’ peak? Spring’s first full “pink moon” peaks tonight, Wednesday April 1, at 10:12 p.m. ET., just hours after the launch window opens for the Artemis II mission to the moon, according to Space.com. Where does the ‘pink moon’ get its name? This so-called “pink moon” gets its name…

Archer Aviation is installing Starlink on its Midnight electric air taxis, the company announced on February 27. The move, an industry first, will bring “stable, reliable, and high-speed connectivity” to Archer’s vehicles courtesy of Starlink’s low-Earth-orbit satellite internet systems. Starlink capabilities will allow passengers to access the internet in-flight while also enabling better communication between individual aircraft, pilots, and engineers on the ground to create a more integrated and connected infrastructure. The two companies will also work on developing connectivity technology for Archer’s future autonomous aircraft, Archer said. “Connecti…

The skies over New York City may soon get even more crowded as electric air taxi company Archer Aviation is planning to launch a network that connects the city’s major and regional airports with vertiports in Manhattan. The company, which is teaming up with United Airlines for the effort, announced the plans on Thursday. It hopes to connect Manhattan with six airports in the area—LaGuardia, JFK, Newark, and regional airports, Republic, Teterboro, and Westchester—with flights as short as five minutes. Archer’s “Midnight” aircraft could save passengers hours when trying to get between those airports or the three vertiports in Manhattan, according to the company. An…

Bellevue, Washington, is the home of thousands of Microsoft employees. Its AI-powered traffic monitoring system lives up to such expectations. Using existing traffic cameras capable of reading signs and lights, it tracks not just crashes but also near misses. And it suggests solutions to managers, like rethinking a turn lane or moving a stop line. But this AI technology wasn’t born out of Microsoft and its big OpenAI partnership. It was developed by a startup called Archetype AI. You might think of the company as OpenAI for the physical world. [Image: Archetype AI]“A city will report an accident after an accident happens. But what they want to know is, like, where are the…

In the English countryside, a new project has emerged from the landscape—quite literally. Rammed Earth House, a residential estate by London-based Tuckey Design Studio, combines renovated brick buildings with new rammed earth structures, harnessing the clay soil of the very land it sits on. “The material is already under your feet, and it doesn’t come with all the carbon baggage that other [building] materials come with,” says studio founder Jonathan Tuckey. As a building technique, rammed earth—which combines clay soil with aggregate such as gravel into tightly compressed layers—traces back thousands of years. It was widely used in ancient China, but appears globall…

Some office buildings are simply not blessed with natural light. Maybe they’re standing in the shadows of something taller. Or perhaps their windows are mostly oriented to the dark north instead of the sunny southwest. Or maybe they’re so big and wide that sunlight can’t find its way into their murky depths. Whatever the reason, the lack of natural light presents problems ranging from additional energy usage to diminished human well-being and productivity. CBT, an architecture firm based in Boston, has been exploring unique ways of solving these problems. Using passive design approaches that require no additional energy, the firm is finding innovative ways to bring mo…

It’s been a rough several years for restaurant chains. Many have been facing headwinds on two fronts: consumers who are pulling back on discretionary spending as inflationary pressures bite, and rising operating costs. These pressures have resulted in numerous chains filing for bankruptcy in recent years. Now, another chain’s owner has joined those ranks. 801 Restaurant Group, the parent company of the 801 Chophouse chain of steakhouses, has filed for bankruptcy. Here’s what you need to know. What’s happened? Earlier this month, 801 Restaurant Group, owner of several companies that own 801 Chophouse, 801 Fish, and 801 Local, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in t…

Is it lawful to call boneless chicken wings ‘wings’? According to a U.S. District Judge, yes. On Tuesday in Illinois, Judge John Tharp reached a verdict in a case brought against Buffalo Wild Wings alleging that the wings aren’t wings and shouldn’t be referred to as such on the restaurant chain’s menu. The suit, which was first brought by customer Aimen Halim in March 2023, claimed the business had violated the Illinois Consumer Fraud Act by referring to the product as “boneless wings” instead of something the plaintiff deemed more fitting, such as “chicken nuggets. In the end, the judge didn’t feel the case had any bones. In a 10-page ruling, Tharp wrote, “Bonel…

Is your green my green? Probably not. What appears as pure green to me will likely look a bit yellowish or blueish to you. This is because visual systems vary from person to person. Moreover, an object’s color may appear differently against different backgrounds or under different lighting. These facts might naturally lead you to think that colors are subjective. That, unlike features such as length and temperature, colors are not objective features. Either nothing has a true color, or colors are relative to observers and their viewing conditions. But perceptual variation has misled you. We are philosophers who study colors, objectivity, and science, and we argue …

The whole idea of advertising—using pictures and words to get people to buy stuff, or to do something—is old indeed, with the first known example dating back almost 5,000 years to the heady days of Ancient Egypt. The ads business changed a lot since we were writing notices on papyrus, but one thing that—until recently—remained the same was that it was a deeply intentional business. The advertiser had to think about the language they used, the imagery they employed, the types of people they sought to reach, and how they would go about doing that. Whether the advertiser was touting a weaving shop on the banks of the Nile during the days of the Pharaohs, or selling…

Between July and September, electric vehicle sales in the U.S. hit a record high. Americans bought more than 430,000 EVs, up 40% from the previous quarter, as they race to qualify for federal tax credits before they expire. That EV boom wasn’t just limited to the U.S., though: Global EV sales hit an all-time high of 2.1 million in September. Two-thirds of those sales were in China, the world’s largest EV market. And yet, there’s still talk of an “EV retreat,” both in the U.S. and abroad. Automakers have expressed concerns about their EV profits, and policymakers in Canada and the European Union are pausing, or adjusting, their EV mandates. There’s an “inherent…

When Kevin Ketels bought an electric 2026 Chevrolet Blazer last year, he wasn’t thinking about the cost of gas. He just thought EVs were better and “wanted to be part of the future.” Now that the Iran war is spiking prices at the pump, the Detroit man is happy he is no longer filling up his 11-year-old gas-powered SUV. “Electricity can go up, but it won’t go up nearly as much as gas will and it won’t go up nearly as fast, either,” said Ketels, 55, an assistant professor of global supply chain management at Wayne State University. Experts say prolonged high gas prices may drive some EV interest and sales, especially if drivers assume their electricity prices won’t be aff…

This September, Tim Cook is stepping down as the CEO of Apple after nearly 15 years. Cook will hand the role over to John Ternus, Apple’s senior vice president of hardware engineering. Cook shared his thoughts about his successor in a community letter. In it, he called Ternus, “a brilliant engineer and thinker who has spent the past 25 years building the Apple products our users love so much, obsessed with every detail, focused on every possible way we can make something better, bolder, more beautiful, and more meaningful.” He added that Ternus “is the perfect person for the job.” Aside from Cook’s own faith in Ternus to take over his role, the succession makes s…

There is an all-out global race for AI dominance. The largest and most powerful companies in the world are investing billions in unprecedented computing power. The most powerful countries are dedicating vast energy resources to assist them. And the race is centered on one idea: transformer-based architecture with large language models are the key to winning the AI race. What if they are wrong? What we call intelligence evolved in biological life over hundreds of millions of years starting with simple single-celled organisms like bacteria interacting with their environment. Life gradually developed into multi-cell organisms learning to seek what they needed and to avoi…

People are fascinated with leadership, and rightly so. After all, most of the “big things” that happen in the world (both good and bad) can be directly traced to decisions, behaviors, or choices of those who are in charge: presidents, prime ministers, CEOs, executives, and anyone tasked with turning a group of people into a high-performing unit, coordinating human activity, and shaping the impact institutions have on society, all the way down to individuals. In line, scientific research shows that up to 40% of the variability in team and organizational performance can be accounted for by the leader—in other words, who we put in charge, or who emerges as leaders, drast…

Chriselle Lim didn’t come from a perfume background, but she didn’t let that stop her. She realized there is always room for new brands that bring a different perspective. View the full article