What's on Your Mind?

Underneath the slopes of the San Jacinto Mountains of Palm Desert, California, stands a house that looks right out of the pages of a magazine. With its distinctive rolling roof and mid-century modern design, the historic Miles C. Bates “Wave House” holds a coveted spot on the National Register of Historic Places. And now, thanks to a collaboration between modern furniture-and-design company Design Within Reach (DWR) and vacation rental company, Boutique, the Wave House is beautifully furnished and open to the public for rentals. DWR chose to outfit the house with pieces from its Paul Smith Collection, a collaboration with the British luxury fashion designe…

Most of the software that truly moves the world doesn’t demand our attention: It quietly removes friction and gets out of the way. You only notice it when it’s broken. That’s not a bug in the business model; it’s a feature. In fact, “unnoticed but indispensable” is the highest customer-satisfaction score you can get. Consider these categories that already figured this out. The log-in that isn’t a task anymore Password managers, once you build the habit, fade into the background. They fill the box before you even remember there was a box. Single sign-on (SSO) systems go a step further and make logging in to everything feel like one action instead of 17 small, an…

Artificial intelligence. It’s pretty cool, I guess? Look at those neat videos. And the thousands of product design iterations just to get those creative balls rolling. Sure. Awesome. Or is it? Maybe. Who knows. All that seems to be the summary of Figma’s 2025 AI Report, based on a survey of 2,500 designers and developers. While tools like ChatGPT and Figma’s AI features are embedded in daily workflows, the report reveals a stark disconnect. Enthusiasm for AI’s potential is high, but its practical impact remains uneven, the numbers show, constrained by vague goals, quality concerns, and cooling expectations. The report underscores a paradox: professionals see AI as es…

When Chinese automaker BYD announced plans to build a massive factory in the hardscrabble city of Camacari, in Brazil’s northeastern Bahia state, locals saw a new beginning. After years of economic stagnation following Ford’s exit from the region in 2021, there was hope that the global leader in electric vehicles would bring back well-paying jobs and a brighter future. The timing seemed right. Brazil, the world’s sixth-largest auto market, is seeing a surge in EV sales—and BYD is leading the charge. For Camacari, the deal promised to fill the economic vacuum left by the American company, which had once been the city’s largest employer. Then plans went off track. A D…

The world economy has proven surprisingly durable in the face of President Donald The President’s trade wars, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said Tuesday, upgrading its outlook for global and U.S. economic growth this year. The 38-country OECD now forecasts that the world economy will grow 3.2% this year, down a tick from 3.3% in 2024 but an improvement on the 2.9% it had predicted for 2025 back in June. The organization, which does economic research and promotes international trade and prosperity, expects global growth to slow to 2.9% next year. The OECD also raised its forecast for U.S. growth this year—to 2%, up from the 1.6% it had f…

People and institutions are grappling with the consequences of AI-written text. Teachers want to know whether students’ work reflects their own understanding; consumers want to know whether an advertisement was written by a human or a machine. Writing rules to govern the use of AI-generated content is relatively easy. Enforcing them depends on something much harder: reliably detecting whether a piece of text was generated by artificial intelligence. Some studies have investigated whether humans can detect AI-generated text. For example, people who themselves use AI writing tools heavily have been shown to accurately detect AI-written text. A panel of human evaluat…

For the first time in nearly half a century, the city of Detroit has a major new addition to its skyline. Hudson’s is a $1.4 billion ground-up downtown development of two buildings covering more than 1.5 million square feet, including residential, office, hotel, retail and event space. It’s a large-scale argument that for all of the city’s troubles—from its precipitous population decline to its high poverty levels to its rock bottom 2013 municipal bankruptcy—the city has brighter days ahead. This assertion comes from Bedrock, the real estate arm of billionaire Dan Gilbert, who has almost single handedly breathed life into the city’s downtown core through a decade…

In a parking lot in Detroit next to the Henry Ford Museum, three streetlights now double as EV chargers. The site is one of the first installations of the Voltpost Air, a device that taps into existing infrastructure to quickly add charging capability at the side of the road or in parking lots. The approach is simpler than adding stand-alone EV chargers: Installation takes just a few hours. “We don’t have to do costly utility upgrades to the grid in order to this,” says Jeff Prosserman, cofounder and CEO of Voltpost. “We’re just finding pockets where power already exists and then making it work.” That’s possible partly because the chargers are Level 2, mea…

Hurricane Melissa made landfall in Jamaica on Tuesday as a devastating Category 5 storm, tied for the strongest landfalling Atlantic hurricane in history. While the extent of the destruction is not yet known, relief organizations are already mobilizing to help across the northern Caribbean. As is typical in disasters, nonprofit groups told The Associated Press that cash is the best way to help, since unsolicited goods donations can overwhelm already strained systems. Experts recommend using sites like Charity Navigator or the Better Business Bureau’s Wise Giving Alliance to check out unfamiliar charities before donating. Here is some of the work being done and ways to s…

Dick Cheney, the hard-charging conservative who became one of the most powerful and polarizing vice presidents in U.S. history and a leading advocate for the invasion of Iraq, has died at age 84. Cheney died Monday night due to complications of pneumonia and cardiac and vascular disease, his family said in a statement. “For decades, Dick Cheney served our nation, including as White House Chief of Staff, Wyoming’s Congressman, Secretary of Defense, and Vice President of the United States,” the statement said. “Dick Cheney was a great and good man who taught his children and grandchildren to love our country, and to live lives of courage, honor, love, kindness, and fly fi…

Humans are a unique species, because of our collective knowledge of our own mortality. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the average life expectancy for males in the United States is 75.8 years. That means entertainer extraordinaire Dick Van Dyke is defying statistics by turning 100 years old this Saturday, December 13. As he reaches this milestone birthday, let’s take a look back at his impressive career, what he credits his longevity to, and how he plans to celebrate. We’ll also cover how you can get in on the action and celebrate the Mary Poppins actor. A brief Dick Van Dyke biography Richard Wayne Van Dyke was born in West P…

Dick’s Sporting Goods (NYSE: DKS) announced it will close select Foot Locker stores and raised its full-year year outlook, in its third quarter earnings report on Tuesday. While Dick’s has not disclosed how many locations it will shutter (Fast Company has reached out for confirmation), it is part of a larger restructuring effort, according to executive chairman Ed Stack who spoke with CNBC. Dick’s acquired leading footwear and apparel retailer Foot Locker for $2.5 billion back in September, according to its latest earnings release. As of November 1, the company was operating 3,230 store locations across the combined Dick’s and Foot Locker businesses globally. …

On Thursday morning, Pittsburgh-based Dick’s Sporting Goods announced its plans to acquire footwear and apparel retailer Foot Locker. The two companies have entered into a merger agreement, where Dick’s Sporting Goods will buy Foot Locker for $2.4 billion. Here’s what to know about the deal. How will the deal work? Dick’s will finance the merger using a combination of cash-on-hand and new debt. As part of the agreement, Dick’s will acquire Foot Locker’s vast portfolio of brands, including Foot Locker, Kids Foot Locker, Champs Sports, and WSS. Foot Locker currently operates over 2,000 retail stores across the globe. Dick’s will operate Foot Locker as a standalo…

Nintendo has filed a lawsuit against an individual it says is a moderator on Reddit, accusing him of piracy and facilitating a network of websites that offered pirated Nintendo Switch games. The video game publisher is seeking $4.5 million in damages from James C. Williams, who went by the username “Archbox” on the social media site. (That account has since been suspended.) “Williams not only copied and distributed Nintendo game files without authorization; he actively promoted their distribution and copying to thousands of others across a variety of websites and online ‘communities,’ and knowingly trafficked in unlawful software products aimed at circumventing Ni…

According to the Center for Biological Diversity, climate change is projected to cause the extinction of over a third of the species of plants and animals in the world in 25 years. But scientists at genetics laboratory Colossal Biosciences are claiming that they may have a solution—one that has now resulted in the birth of the first dire wolves in over 10,000 years. Colossal’s website proclaims the lab to be the world’s only company working on “de-extinction,” which it defines as “the process of generating an organism that both resembles and is genetically similar to an extinct species by resurrecting its lost lineage of core genes; engineering natural resistances; an…

After more than eight decades in operation, craft retailer Joann is going out of business, closing all 800 of its stores and laying off 19,000 employees. The news comes after the retailer’s restructuring plans failed and a liquidator opted to purchase its assets. Joann is far from the only retailer in its death throes these days. Recent data shows that the number of retail-store closures is expected to double during 2025, to roughly 15,000 from the 7,300 or so in 2024. Accordingly, Joann is in a similar boat to companies such as Red Lobster, Big Lots, and Party City, which have each announced plans to either completely close up shop or enact big restructuring in …

Recently, New York Times opinion columnist Ross Douthat moderated a debate on the Interesting Times podcast between Helen Andrews and Leah Libresco Sargeant, two conservative critics of modern feminism. The podcast received major blowback, starting with (but not ending with) the fact that the original headline of the conversation was “Did Women Ruin the Workplace?” Quickly, after the predictable backlash hit, the headline was changed to “Did Liberal Feminism Ruin the Workplace?” But the diversion didn’t help the conversation’s case all that much. While the headline was softened to perhaps dress up the discussion as an urgent political issue, mostly, it felt like intelle…

Back in the summer of 2024, Boar’s Head recalled seven million pounds of deli meat that had been linked to a deadly listeria outbreak that spanned numerous U.S. states. That outbreak led to the deaths of multiple people and caused the company to shutter one of its processing facilities, which was located in Virginia. The recall led to a brand crisis for Boar’s Head, and by November 2024, when the outbreak was declared over, a total of 10 people had died, and 61 became sick. The event led to class action lawsuits against the company, one of which has now been settled. Here’s what to know about the settlement and whether you can claim any compensation. Class action…

Somewhere between 25% and 35% of working Americans are gig workers–either as a supplement to their primary income or as their full-time job. And for many gig economy workers, cash apps and marketplaces offer a simple and convenient way to receive payments. Enter the IRS form 1099-K. Third-party payment apps have to issue a 1099-K form to taxpayers who make more than a certain earnings threshold—a threshold which the IRS significantly lowered for the 2024 tax year. The IRS anticipates that millions of Americans will receive a 1099-K form for the first time this year because of that reduced earnings threshold. If you’ve been wondering why you received a 1099-K form …

Many people have been waking up over the last 24 hours to find that they have received a payment of around $40 from Facebook. The first question people have is whether the payment is legitimate. And the good news is: yes, it is. Here’s what you need to know about the Facebook payment you may have received since yesterday. Why did I get a payment from Facebook? Starting yesterday, people began posting on social media that they had received a payment of around $40 from Facebook. That payment is actually part of a class action lawsuit settlement Facebook agreed to back in 2022. At the center of the class action suit was the allegation that between April 22, 2010, …

Fraud remains a huge issue, with reports increasing 25% between 2023 and 2024, according to recently released data from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). That amounted to consumers losing more than $12.5 billion to various frauds and scams. Those eye-popping figures are what spurred AT&T to beef up its fraud-prevention smartphone application, ActiveArmor, with a slate of new features, says Matt Bailey, AT&T’s AVP of product management and development. And interestingly enough, the app will also provide protection for your physical property—including your credit and debit cards and even your driver’s license. On Wednesday, AT&T announced the five…