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The lawlessness of big numbersView the full article

A $19 strawberry has broken the internet. Over the weekend, several content creators went viral with reviews of one very expensive berry, purchased from the upscale Los Angeles-based grocery chain Erewhon. “Apparently it’s the best-tasting strawberry in the entire world,” influencer Alyssa Antoci says in a video that has racked up more than 15 million views. It’s worth noting that Antoci appears to be a social media manager for Erewhon, and her family also owns the store. “Wow. That is the best strawberry. That’s crazy,” she adds. Along with the $19 price tag, the berries from luxury Japanese fruit vendor Elly Amai are individually packaged, set on a small cushion inside a miniature plastic cloche for protection—exactly how one would expect such an expensive berry to be packaged. On its website, the company claims to sell only the “highest-quality fruits from Japan’s most celebrated farms.” Not everyone is impressed. “People in L.A. are so gullible,” one commenter wrote. “If I dropped $20 on a strawberry, I’d probably convince myself it was the best one I’ve ever tasted too,” wrote another. “It does taste good but is it worth the $19?” content creator @janemukbangs questioned in a TikTok video with 5.5 million views. (Spoiler alert: It wasn’t.) Whether people are willing to pay a premium for Japanese berries or it’s simply a case of clever marketing, this isn’t the first time the celeb-loved L.A. grocery store has made headlines for its pricey products. This month, it’s a $19 strawberry; last year, it was a $32 bag of specialty ice. In a time when many are struggling to afford even basic groceries, it’s easy to see why a ridiculously expensive strawberry has rubbed some people the wrong way. Or, as one commenter theorized, “Erewhon was 100% started by a group of uni students who wanted to run a social experiment on consumerism. They ended up accidentally creating a successful grocery so now they just watch and laugh.” View the full article

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager. It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go… 1. My boss is great in some ways but is he crossing lines? I’m trying to figure out if my manager is interested in me as more than a coworker, or if the lines he crosses are just a part of his personality. I’ve been with my company as a general manager for eight months, hired into a lower position and immediately promoted by this man. He is always kind and funny with me. He calls me awesome, amazing, sunshine, tells me how funny I am, tells me I’m tough, and that he wants to make my life easier. And these are just the things he regularly says. He is never sexual, and mentions his wife casually in group conversation we are both involved in. He is very stern with other people, but still outgoing and friendly. He isn’t stern with me. He makes sure I’m set up for success in every situation he can. Now to the parts that are a bit on the fence, so to speak. He often asks me to come and see things on his laptop at a hightop table; I’m 5’2” and he is about 6’4″ and he keeps the laptop in front of him, even if asking me to type something for him, which leads to very close contact. While we speak, he keeps non-broken full eye contact the entire time. He often stands so closely behind me that when he breathes deeply, I feel his chest as he inhales. Other people claim he is “different” with me. He is an extremely extroverted person, who in my opinion is usually more openly friendly with others than with me. But he makes sure we speak every day, even if one or both of us is off. Flip side, he visits other locations more often than mine. He brags on others more openly than he does me. But something has gotten strange. Does this seem like normal extroverted behavior? Could I just seem like a child to him, paternal affection type stuff? I just don’t know if maybe I’m misreading and it’s just that I have the best boss ever, not a potential issue. You have alarm bells going off for a reason; don’t talk yourself out of it. I don’t know exactly what’s up with your boss, but standing so close that you can feel his chest when he breathes is not normal behavior, and is in fact very creepy. The laptop thing could be simple lack of consideration or it could be pervy, I don’t know — but in combination with standing practically against you, it alarms me. In both these situations, you should feel free to create more physical separation between you. When he’s standing behind you practically touching you, move away! You can do that without announcing it, or it would also be fine to say, “Oh, let me move so we’re not so crowded.” With the laptop, you can say, “I can’t easily reach it from where I am, let me move it closer to me if I need to type” and then move it somewhere where you can access it without leaning into his lap (or whatever is going on in this configuration that he’s arranged). I suppose it’s possible that you have an otherwise good boss who is remarkably oblivious about physical space issues, but I doubt it. Is he breathing all over male colleagues? If he does it to everyone, regardless of gender, perhaps he simply has no sense of physical boundaries. Otherwise, he knows what he’s doing, which moves him solidly out of “good boss” territory (and, frankly, into “not a good person” territory, too). 2. Coworker injecting medication at their desk I work in a small office with about 15 people. One of my colleagues has diabetes and has to regularly monitor their blood sugars, which is of course of absolute importance. However, this colleague regularly pulls up their shirt to inject themselves in the stomach while sitting at their desk, and has once or twice done this in front of clients. I completely understand that this is a medical issue that they have to act on urgently, but part of me wonders whether it’s appropriate to ask them to do this in a private space. I’m not weirded out by injections, but some people can be, and I don’t necessarily want to see so much of my colleague’s skin on a regular basis. I have a feeling that this is a me problem and I should just ignore it, but any advice on how to appropriately support my colleague would be gratefully received. (To note, this is an early professional job for my colleague, who is still learning business norms, and helping them learn these is part of my role.) I’d leave it alone. You’re right that people can be squeamish about needles but there’s no way for you as a colleague to know how urgent the situation might be and they need insulin to live. So it makes sense to err on the side of assuming that if they’re doing it at their desk, it’s because it needs to happen right then (and they might feel a public bathroom isn’t a particularly sanitary place to inject something into their body). To be clear, if your coworker were the one writing to me, I’d tell them that if they’re able to avoid doing it in front of clients, that’s preferable (with the caveat that it might not always be optional). But as a colleague, I’d stay out of it. 3. Reference for an employee who didn’t perform well I’m in a situation where I may have to respond to reference checks about a mediocre employee. My direct report was with us for about nine months. In that time, I quickly discovered some of her basic skills were not as good as her resume or her small test had revealed. I invested a solid chunk of time in training her, and I saw a trajectory of improvement that was slower than I’d have liked, but still reasonable. However, she recently made a few egregious mistakes. I gave her very serious feedback in the moment and also discussed the situation with my manager and HR. We decided a formal PIP was needed to more formally codify what she needed to fix and improve, and how soon. We all agreed that she had the potential to get there, and this was not a performative PIP where you go through the motions because you want to fire a person. We had not finished drafting this plan and communicating it to her when, for entirely unrelated reasons, many people on our team, including her, were laid off. I was not involved in the decision-making, but it made sense to me given the circumstances of our organization. She has mentioned that in her job search, she’ll be asking me to be a reference. I don’t feel like I can recommend her without reservations. She has potential, but it was a lot more work to bring her along and train her than I expected or think should have been necessary. If I receive a reference call, how do I respond? Despite my feedback in the moment, I’m not sure she’s fully aware of the pattern of errors she was making, because I was expecting to emphasize that during our PIP discussion that never happened. Do I talk with her about this? Refuse to be a reference? Act as a reference but be up-front about her strengths and weaknesses? She’s a good person, and I don’t want to be careless and damage her chance at a new job. But I don’t want to give a great recommendation that makes people doubt my judgment, either. Talk to her and let her know so she can decide whether she wants to offer you as a reference or not. I’d frame it this way: “I want to be transparent that the reference I’d give would be mixed because of what happened with X and Y. The layoffs cut off our discussion about those issues, but otherwise we would have needed to move a formal improvement plan because those concerns were such serious ones. In a reference I’d be able to share that I saw A and B as strengths, but would need to be honest that I wasn’t seeing what I needed in C and D. I want to be up-front with you about that so you can decide whether it makes sense to share my name as a reference or not.” On my first read of your letter, I was going to add that it’s really important to be giving feedback all along so that the person isn’t blindsided by something like this if it comes up later. But in this case, the way things unfolded made it more understandable that you didn’t: you thought she was coming along, just more slowly than you’d expected, and then when things became more dire you were preparing to address it, but then the layoffs cut you off just as you were about to. It’s not ideal but it sounds like that’s largely a consequence of the layoff timing, not a mistake on your end. 4. Are the federal layoffs causing layoffs at private companies? I was discussing the federal layoffs with a coworker and she said her in-laws who work at (a) a big private financial services company and (b) the Bezos space company have all seen layoffs recently. Is this in reaction to the federal layoffs? I had thought my and my husband’s jobs in the private sector were safe for now, but now I’m worried. I can’t speak to the layoffs at those specific companies, but in general, yes, there will be layoffs at private companies as a response to the federal government cuts. Loads of private companies have contracts with the government and so will be affected by the cuts there. And then it’s likely to trickle down further; heavy job losses in any large sector will start affecting other businesses because people will begin restricting their spending (either out of necessity because their households have less or no income or out of caution at what’s happening around them and uncertainty about what’s to come). It’s all intertwined, so what’s happening federally is likely to affect a lot of people in the private sector as well. 5. Alternative to Facebook for discussion groups I am hoping you can put this out to the readers of AAM for some solutions. I work in payroll for the movies and run a couple of Facebook groups for people doing payroll for both film and television. Not to get too political, I would like to move my group off of Facebook, but I have no idea what other options are out there. I’m Gen-X so comfortable with computers but not so much with social media that isn’t mainstream. Could someone direct me to a site where a group can have discussions, share files/documents, and limit access to members only? Basically, FB without the political ramifications. I’m happy to throw it out to suggestions from readers, but take a look at Discord. View the full article

It’s been a year since Intuitive Machines (IM) made history with the first private soft landing and first American spacecraft since the Apollo program to land on the moon, after a nail-biting descent that came perilously close to failing. But this time around, they’re veterans. As they ready their second mission, IM-2, with an updated lunar lander named Athena, the vibe at the startup’s Houston headquarters is decidedly more relaxed and confident. “We’ve made 85 improvements to the vehicle and the process used for building and flying it,” says Trent Martin, IM’s senior VP of space systems. “That includes 10 for landing and determining its location in space, which we struggled with during the first mission. We’re not nearly spending as many late nights as we did getting ready for IM-1.” Not that they don’t still worry. “This is space flight,” he says. “And space flight is hard.” Athena is slated to lift off from Kennedy Space Center atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 at 7:17 p.m. ET on February 26 for a 10-day mission at the Mons Mouton plateau near the lunar south pole. (Click here for ways to watch.) Athena, a 14-foot hexagonal cylinder on six landing legs, will shuttle several NASA and commercial payloads to the lunar surface to test exploration vehicles and the first communications network on the moon; drill and analyze samples of lunar soil (called regolith); and map precious resources, like water ice. The roughly $100 million mission turned a 10% profit, thanks to funding from NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program and Tipping Point Initiative, commercial payloads, and three additional rideshares for satellites that will deploy to other destinations after Athena detaches from the rocket post-launch. Most are to support NASA’s Artemis mission to establish sustainable infrastructure on the moon and in space, rather than rely solely on Earth for materials. In situ resources like oxygen and helium-3 can be used to make rocket fuel, water, and energy, while water can also make fuel and be a source for astronauts. “Water is a building block for just about every chemical process that we would like to use on the moon,” says Martin. [Image: Intuitive Machines] Athena is an upgrade from IM’s first lander, Odysseus, and part of its methalox-propelled Nova-C class of landers. Odysseus might have crashed were it not for some lightning engineering. A missed safety switch prevented the lander’s altimeter lasers from firing to the surface to gauge its altitude and descent speed. Unable to reprogram substitute lasers from a NASA payload, they imaged a crater, estimated its size, and used that to approximate the lander’s altitude. Given the circumstances, they came astonishingly close—Odysseus touched down 4 mph too fast, broke a gear, and tipped over. But it still worked. “The lander showed incredible resilience, but it was a miracle we were able to do it with a measurement we took from 85 kilometers [53 miles] high,” says CEO Steve Altemus. “We were all pretty steady during it. But afterward, it was like, ‘Oh my God, what did we just do?’” For this next mission, the company not only revised its lander engineering but also began diversifying beyond lunar landers. One of the IM-2 payloads, the Intuitive Machines’ Micro Nova Hopper One, is a 29-inch, 77-pound rocket-propelled drone designed to explore areas inaccessible to ground rovers. Last fall, the firm unveiled Moon Racer, a two-passenger prototype Lunar Terrain Vehicle (LTV) that can carry and tow a combined 2,600 pounds, that’s earmarked for a future manned mission. Building the lander [Photo: Susan Karlin] “We’re maturing [from] a startup having these aspirations and initial ideas to where we’re now battle-hardened by mission one,” says Altemus. “We’re providing and building a cis-lunar economy [offering] three pillars of service: the delivery to the moon and ride share, the data transmission and navigation services for communicating around the moon, and infrastructure as a service. That’s the beginning of an economy and everyone can take advantage of that.” Prospecting for resources The Micro-Nova Hopper, nicknamed the Hopper and Grace (after computer science pioneer Grace Hopper), will gauge surface temperatures and water distribution using instruments from Hungary and Germany. Although designed for a 15-mile distance, it will make five shorter parabolic hops and level flights to hard-to-reach areas, including a crater that has never seen sunlight. “It provides you extreme mobility in places that rovers can’t go,” says Martin. “So, if you want to go into a pit or a lava tube—or a permanently shadowed region with steep walls, we can do it with a rocket-propelled drone.” At the landing site, NASA’s Polar Resources Ice Mining Experiment 1 (PRIME-1) will operate a meter-long drill and a mass spectrometer to look for and analyze sub-surface resources that might sustain future human exploration, plus measure forces and temperature. The Regolith and Ice Drill for Exploring New Terrain (TRIDENT), from Blue Origin’s Honeybee Robotics, will bore three feet deep and bring regolith samples to the surface where the spectrometer will measure the compositions of volatile gases escaping from the material. [Photo: NASA/Honeybee Robotics] As it’s done with other landers, NASA is outfitting Athena with a Laser Retroreflector Array (LRA), mirrors that reflect laser light back to an orbiting spacecraft initially emitting the light to determine the lander’s location. LRAs will enable precision landmarks for Artemis sites to guide the arriving landers. Lunar Outpost’s Mobile Autonomous Prospecting Platform (MAPP) is slated to be the first commercial rover on another planetary body. Sporting internal prospecting instruments and an MIT-designed CW Time of Flight camera, the 22-pound solar-powered vehicle will travel about a mile from the lander, 3D mapping the lunar surface and scouting for ice and other valuable resources. Another MIT device, AstroAnt, a .95-ounce micro-rover with magnetic wheels, will roam MAPP’s surface to measure its internal temperature to assess MAPP’s health—a proof of concept for future iterations that might monitor and fix space hardware remotely. “It’s very meta,” laughs Justin Cyrus, Lunar Outpost’s founder and CEO. [Photo: Lunar Outpost] MAPP carries drills and wheels designed to grip the powdery regolith with little excavators to collect and analyze samples that NASA will eventually retrieve. The space agency will pay the Denver company $1 to transfer the sample ownership to set a legal precedent and procedural framework for a private company to own and sell what it mines on a celestial body. NASA has similar contracts with other companies for future samples. Considering the investment cost and potential rewards—helium-3, for example, is among the most expensive substances on Earth due to its scarcity, but abundant on the moon—this step gives companies more confidence they won’t be legally challenged before spending billions to extract resources on a large scale. “If you’re looking at resources not only on the moon but the near-Earth asteroids, it’s significantly more resources than we’ve ever had access to,” says Cyrus. Can you hear me now? In a first step towards a lunar cellular system, Nokia Bell Labs is providing a 4G LTE communications network between MAPP, the Hopper, and a Lunar Surface Communications System (LSCS) on the lander serving as a cell tower. The rovers, carrying antennas and radio equipment, will venture from the lander and beam signals back to the LSCS, which will measure the speeds and bandwidth. This network will also enable the three vehicles to talk to one another. The lander will sport a direct-to-Earth radio connection so mission controllers can receive data and images and remotely operate the probes. “The main goal was to prove to NASA that it can take the cellular technology and adapt it for space, compared to using UHF or proprietary technology,” says Nokia Bell Labs president Thierry Klein. Additionally, some of the data collected from the rovers would transmit over the Nokia network to the lander and relayed back to Earth. Commercial symbiosis Columbia Sportswear continues its symbiotic partnership with IM after IM-1 helped the clothing company perfect its Omni-Heat Infinity insulation—a lightweight, breathable, heal-reflecting foil used in its winter jackets. On the first mission, IM applied it to one panel to buffer Odysseus’ cryogenic propellant tanks from extreme radiation and a 450-degree Fahrenheit temperature range. This time, it’s covering more of the lander packages. Columbia Insulation [Photo: Susan Karlin] “Columbia’s materials enabled a more cost-effective and nuanced method of thermal management than off-the-shelf aerospace materials from the Apollo missions,” says Haskell Beckham, Columbia’s VP of innovation. “We also learned that in space you typically have multilayers of installation. So, we took this information, brought it back to our lab in Portland, and made a jacket where we had the insulating layer, not only on the lining but also on the shelf fabric, which made it much warmer.” But wait, there’s more . . . Other commercial payloads include Dymon’s YAOKI rover, IM’s first Japanese commercial payload, that will capture images of the lunar surface. Lonestar Data Holdings is sending a data center that will test data transmission between Earth and the moon. The Florida start-up wants to establish a server system on the moon for extremely secure data storage for disaster recovery. After proving its software on IM-1, Lonestar will now test its ability to remotely load, store, and retrieve data from the server. Three satellites will hitch rideshares, deploying from Athena for other destinations. Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s Lunar Trailblazer satellite will orbit the moon, mapping the water distribution on its surface. Astroforge’s Odin satellite may become the first commercial satellite in deep space when it sets out to image a near-Earth asteroid. Epic Aerospace Chimera, a chemical propulsion system to help payloads change orbit, will head to low Earth orbit. Creative culture It takes a little whimsy to pull off pioneering engineering. And IM’s self-described “battle-hardened” stance hasn’t disrupted its playful engineering nerd culture. Back at headquarters, cutouts of Star Wars characters grace the ceiling beams, while the Moon Racer LTV sports longhorns, a flourish spearheaded by CTO Tim Crain, a former Texas Longhorn football player. Part of its corporate mantra is serving as a space ambassador, by partnering with academics on science objectives, such as the University of Arizona on Hopper mission science; artists, like Jeff Koons, who flew a payload on IM-1; and STEM aspirants with student internships, such as those at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University (Altemus’ alma mater) and nearby San Jacinto Community College. “Before we flew to the moon, I think we had 20 people apply for our internships,” says Martin. “After we landed on the moon, we had 1,500 people apply. We found incredible young, bright minds to come and work here. Having art projects is a good way to encourage people outside of the aerospace world to imagine what can happen in space.” This mission, MIT has an art tie-in to its payloads, titled To the Moon to Stay. The first, HUMANS (an anagram of Humanity United with MIT Art and Nanotechnology in Space), was inspired by the Voyager Golden Record. It’s a 2-inch silicon wafer flying aboard MAPP that contains an etched recording of voices in numerous languages describing what space means for humanity. The other is a Lunar Mission Control installation at MIT Media Lab that’s a collaboration between the MIT Media Lab Space Exploration Initiative, which designed the 3D camera and AstroAnt aboard MAPP, MIT Architecture students, and Inploration, a Los Angeles space education and design lab. It consists of a lunar-inspired self-supporting half-dome with displays connecting the public to the MIT payloads through a short film, real-time views of the lunar surface and payload operators, and a VR experience that lets visitors interact with the software they use. Of course, it all depends on how you define art. Altemus, who comes from a family of painters, considers the mission itself a creative endeavor. “That’s a piece of art right there,” he says, motioning to the Hopper. “The people who can actually put that together are artists in their own right. It’s important that people understand the art of engineering. And the day I don’t feel that way, it’s time for me to go.” View the full article

As traditional parties decline, vaccine scepticism has become one of the anti-establishment forces filling the vacuumView the full article

Former Goldman Sachs banker Kirill Dmitriev is the Kremlin’s go-between with Gulf countries View the full article

Venture capitalists question who would use system designed to arrest slide of UK capital marketsView the full article

Officials from US, China, Japan, India and Brazil among those who will not attend this week’s meetings in Cape TownView the full article

US tech giant expected to spend as much as $25bn on warehouse automation in broader efficiency driveView the full article

Salesforce and Google have announced a significant expansion of their partnership, integrating Google’s Gemini AI models into Agentforce and strengthening ties between Salesforce Service Cloud and Google Customer Engagement Suite. The move aims to enhance AI-powered customer service capabilities, providing businesses with more flexibility in deploying AI agents. With the integration of Google’s Gemini AI models, Agentforce agents will be able to process images, audio, and video, handle complex tasks using Gemini’s multi-modal capabilities, and leverage real-time insights from Google Search through Vertex AI. “Through our expanded partnership with Google Cloud and deep integrations at the platform, application, and infrastructure layer, we’re giving customers choice in the applications and models they want to use,” said Srini Tallapragada, Salesforce President & Chief Engineering and Customer Success Officer. Salesforce’s selection of Google Cloud as a major infrastructure provider will also allow enterprise customers to deploy Salesforce applications on Google Cloud’s AI-optimized infrastructure, streamlining operations with enhanced security and scalability. The integration between Salesforce Service Cloud and Google Customer Engagement Suite will introduce real-time voice translation, intelligent agent handoffs, personalized recommendations, and AI-driven conversational insights across multiple customer service channels. “Our mutual customers have asked us to be able to work more seamlessly across Salesforce and Google Cloud, and this expanded partnership will help them accelerate their AI transformations with agentic AI, state-of-the-art AI models, data analytics, and more,” said Thomas Kurian, CEO of Google Cloud. Generative AI Expands Business Applications By integrating Gemini into Agentforce, Salesforce users will gain access to: Multi-modal AI capabilities – Agents can process and interpret text, images, and audio, enhancing automation in industries such as insurance and logistics. Expanded contextual memory – A 2-million-token context window allows AI agents to retain and reference extensive information, improving accuracy and efficiency. Real-time automation – AI-powered workflows will enable businesses to streamline complex processes, reducing operational costs. For example, an insurance provider could use Agentforce with Gemini to analyze damage claims, interpret photos, and respond to customer inquiries via text-to-speech, accelerating claim resolutions. The Salesforce Platform, including Agentforce, Data Cloud, and Customer 360, will now operate on Google Cloud’s AI-optimized infrastructure, offering businesses greater flexibility and security. Features such as dynamic grounding, zero data retention, and toxicity detection will be integrated through Salesforce’s Einstein Trust Layer. Additionally, Salesforce customers will soon be able to purchase Salesforce solutions directly from the Google Cloud Marketplace, simplifying procurement processes and expanding deployment options. The partnership reflects the increasing adoption of AI in enterprise solutions, with Salesforce estimating that agentic AI represents a $2 trillion market opportunity. As businesses seek to implement AI-powered automation and customer service improvements, Salesforce and Google’s collaboration aims to provide the tools needed to drive innovation and efficiency. With Salesforce’s AI platform running on Google Cloud, organizations will have access to advanced AI capabilities, secure infrastructure, and an expanded marketplace—positioning them to compete in an increasingly AI-driven business landscape. This article, "Salesforce Expands Google Partnership, Bringing Gemini AI to Agentforce" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

Salesforce and Google have announced a significant expansion of their partnership, integrating Google’s Gemini AI models into Agentforce and strengthening ties between Salesforce Service Cloud and Google Customer Engagement Suite. The move aims to enhance AI-powered customer service capabilities, providing businesses with more flexibility in deploying AI agents. With the integration of Google’s Gemini AI models, Agentforce agents will be able to process images, audio, and video, handle complex tasks using Gemini’s multi-modal capabilities, and leverage real-time insights from Google Search through Vertex AI. “Through our expanded partnership with Google Cloud and deep integrations at the platform, application, and infrastructure layer, we’re giving customers choice in the applications and models they want to use,” said Srini Tallapragada, Salesforce President & Chief Engineering and Customer Success Officer. Salesforce’s selection of Google Cloud as a major infrastructure provider will also allow enterprise customers to deploy Salesforce applications on Google Cloud’s AI-optimized infrastructure, streamlining operations with enhanced security and scalability. The integration between Salesforce Service Cloud and Google Customer Engagement Suite will introduce real-time voice translation, intelligent agent handoffs, personalized recommendations, and AI-driven conversational insights across multiple customer service channels. “Our mutual customers have asked us to be able to work more seamlessly across Salesforce and Google Cloud, and this expanded partnership will help them accelerate their AI transformations with agentic AI, state-of-the-art AI models, data analytics, and more,” said Thomas Kurian, CEO of Google Cloud. Generative AI Expands Business Applications By integrating Gemini into Agentforce, Salesforce users will gain access to: Multi-modal AI capabilities – Agents can process and interpret text, images, and audio, enhancing automation in industries such as insurance and logistics. Expanded contextual memory – A 2-million-token context window allows AI agents to retain and reference extensive information, improving accuracy and efficiency. Real-time automation – AI-powered workflows will enable businesses to streamline complex processes, reducing operational costs. For example, an insurance provider could use Agentforce with Gemini to analyze damage claims, interpret photos, and respond to customer inquiries via text-to-speech, accelerating claim resolutions. The Salesforce Platform, including Agentforce, Data Cloud, and Customer 360, will now operate on Google Cloud’s AI-optimized infrastructure, offering businesses greater flexibility and security. Features such as dynamic grounding, zero data retention, and toxicity detection will be integrated through Salesforce’s Einstein Trust Layer. Additionally, Salesforce customers will soon be able to purchase Salesforce solutions directly from the Google Cloud Marketplace, simplifying procurement processes and expanding deployment options. The partnership reflects the increasing adoption of AI in enterprise solutions, with Salesforce estimating that agentic AI represents a $2 trillion market opportunity. As businesses seek to implement AI-powered automation and customer service improvements, Salesforce and Google’s collaboration aims to provide the tools needed to drive innovation and efficiency. With Salesforce’s AI platform running on Google Cloud, organizations will have access to advanced AI capabilities, secure infrastructure, and an expanded marketplace—positioning them to compete in an increasingly AI-driven business landscape. This article, "Salesforce Expands Google Partnership, Bringing Gemini AI to Agentforce" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

PayPal has announced the launch of PayPal Open, a unified platform designed to streamline payments and financial services for businesses of all sizes. The new platform integrates all of PayPal’s merchant solutions under one system, allowing businesses to access payment processing, financial tools, and AI-driven insights through a single interface. PayPal Open aims to support businesses ranging from small enterprises to multinational corporations by simplifying commerce operations. With access to PayPal’s global network of up to 400 million active accounts, including 92 million active Venmo customers, merchants can leverage a broad consumer base to drive sales. “Our goal in developing PayPal Open is to create one unified commerce platform that supports the evolving needs of today’s merchants,” said Frank Keller, EVP, General Manager, Large Enterprise & Merchant Platforms Group, PayPal. “By partnering with PayPal, small businesses can seamlessly manage their cash flow with financial and payments solutions, while enterprise businesses can build custom solutions based on their unique business needs, PayPal Open will allow them to do so in one streamlined platform.” Key Features of PayPal Open The platform is designed to enhance commerce efficiency by offering: Payments Integration — Businesses can accept payments online and in-store through PayPal, Venmo, Fastlane, and Pay Later, while processing transactions through a single integration. Merchants can accept payments in over 140 currencies across more than 200 global markets. Growth Tools — Businesses can access financial resources, including lending solutions, business debit and credit offerings, and personalized commerce experiences powered by AI to attract and retain customers. AI-Driven Insights — Merchants can leverage AI-powered analytics to assess sales performance, identify trends, and optimize operations. PayPal reports that nearly 25% of global e-commerce transactions run through its platform, providing data-driven insights to enhance business strategies. PayPal Open also integrates with third-party commerce partners, allowing businesses to customize their payment infrastructure while maintaining access to PayPal’s security and fraud protection features. “PayPal Open will enable us to deliver innovation to our customers in the near-term while also preparing them for success in the future,” Keller said. “The platform will act as a framework where not only we, but others will be able to contribute solutions, ultimately providing these offerings to millions of merchants that are a part of the PayPal ecosystem.” PayPal Open will launch in the U.S. first, with expansion planned for the UK and Germany later in 2025. Additional markets will follow in 2026. This article, "PayPal Introduces PayPal Open, a Unified Payments and Growth Platform for Businesses" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

PayPal has announced the launch of PayPal Open, a unified platform designed to streamline payments and financial services for businesses of all sizes. The new platform integrates all of PayPal’s merchant solutions under one system, allowing businesses to access payment processing, financial tools, and AI-driven insights through a single interface. PayPal Open aims to support businesses ranging from small enterprises to multinational corporations by simplifying commerce operations. With access to PayPal’s global network of up to 400 million active accounts, including 92 million active Venmo customers, merchants can leverage a broad consumer base to drive sales. “Our goal in developing PayPal Open is to create one unified commerce platform that supports the evolving needs of today’s merchants,” said Frank Keller, EVP, General Manager, Large Enterprise & Merchant Platforms Group, PayPal. “By partnering with PayPal, small businesses can seamlessly manage their cash flow with financial and payments solutions, while enterprise businesses can build custom solutions based on their unique business needs, PayPal Open will allow them to do so in one streamlined platform.” Key Features of PayPal Open The platform is designed to enhance commerce efficiency by offering: Payments Integration — Businesses can accept payments online and in-store through PayPal, Venmo, Fastlane, and Pay Later, while processing transactions through a single integration. Merchants can accept payments in over 140 currencies across more than 200 global markets. Growth Tools — Businesses can access financial resources, including lending solutions, business debit and credit offerings, and personalized commerce experiences powered by AI to attract and retain customers. AI-Driven Insights — Merchants can leverage AI-powered analytics to assess sales performance, identify trends, and optimize operations. PayPal reports that nearly 25% of global e-commerce transactions run through its platform, providing data-driven insights to enhance business strategies. PayPal Open also integrates with third-party commerce partners, allowing businesses to customize their payment infrastructure while maintaining access to PayPal’s security and fraud protection features. “PayPal Open will enable us to deliver innovation to our customers in the near-term while also preparing them for success in the future,” Keller said. “The platform will act as a framework where not only we, but others will be able to contribute solutions, ultimately providing these offerings to millions of merchants that are a part of the PayPal ecosystem.” PayPal Open will launch in the U.S. first, with expansion planned for the UK and Germany later in 2025. Additional markets will follow in 2026. This article, "PayPal Introduces PayPal Open, a Unified Payments and Growth Platform for Businesses" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

Bill would lead to large increase in government deficit, say independent analystsView the full article

Wealthy foreigners will be able buy ‘route to citizenship’ for $5mn, president says View the full article

The challenges businesses face today are increasingly unpredictable and interdependent. Traditional business structures were built for different times and different challenges. These models helped companies to scale and thrive in a more predictable world, where efficiency, clear hierarchies, and specialization were the keys to success. But as the world has evolved, so too have the conditions for innovation. In today’s fast-paced, globalized, and complex world, these outdated models actively hold teams back. Silos trap expertise—preventing the flow of fresh ideas—rigid hierarchies create bottlenecks that slow down decision making when speed is essential, and a lack of clear vision can drain energy and resources, leaving critical problems unsolved. These traditional models aren’t just inefficient—they actively stifle innovation, making it harder to succeed in this new, rapidly evolving environment. This stagnation is evident in the U.S. economy, where labor productivity growth has significantly slowed since 2005. To break out of this productivity slump, companies need to adopt new models and modes of working that cultivate innovation and can keep pace with the modern rate of change. Build a foundation for innovation At Whipsaw, collaboration is at the core of our ethos and process. It’s built into our very name—a whipsaw requires back-and-forth coordination between two operators to succeed. We know the best results come from continuous collaboration between our team and our clients—as well as the dynamic back-and-forth between design and engineering. For over two decades, we’ve crafted an environment where teams from all disciplines collaborate seamlessly to design beautiful, functional solutions to pressing problems. While speed is often critical, true innovation isn’t always a linear or efficient process. It thrives in the space between exploration and execution—where deep thinking, expansive exploration, and iteration are essential. We’ve learned that to achieve great results, teams need the time and space to experiment, make mistakes, and refine their ideas. We’ve been able to tackle complex challenges for our clients by designing a process that provides the time and creative space necessary for innovation while maintaining the momentum required to stay aligned with client deadlines. This approach ensures both exploration and execution happen at the right pace. We’ve developed a framework—clarity, collaboration, and confidence—to help businesses innovate while navigating today’s world. Here are three practical steps that can elevate your innovation process: 1. Start with clarity: Define the why Clarity is the foundation of any successful innovation effort. It ensures that everyone—internally and externally—understands the problem being solved and why it matters. But often, the only thing clear at the start of a project is the process itself. Navigating ambiguity is a natural part of the innovation journey. We guide our clients through that uncertainty by spending time during our discovery phase to clarify business, customer, market, and technological needs, helping internal and client teams align and move forward with a shared vision. 2. Nurture collaboration: Tap into collective expertise Collaboration is the engine of innovation. But it’s not just about bringing people together—it’s about creating an environment where diverse perspectives can thrive. We’ve learned from our work with clients that the best ideas emerge when cross-functional teams, clients, and end users are involved. We’ve built collaborative practices like co-creation workshops, stakeholder interviews, and design hootenannies—bringing fresh eyes from outside the project team to challenge assumptions and offer new perspectives—into our process to ensure our innovations are relevant and well-informed. It’s about avoiding silos, leveraging collective wisdom, and ensuring that all contributors are aligned toward a common goal. 3. Empower confidence: Give teams autonomy to act Innovation requires confidence—confidence in your team’s expertise, vision, and process. We’ve learned that autonomy is key to maintaining momentum. Teams need the freedom to make decisions and experiment without navigating endless approvals or rigid structures. But empowerment isn’t just about giving the team space to act; it’s about creating an environment where they feel safe to test ideas, fail fast, and adapt quickly. We’ve found success in cultivating a culture of empowerment and growth. While our teams have the autonomy to innovate, they are supported by leaders who know when to encourage exploration and when to provide key insights to drive the next stage of innovation—they guide teams past obstacles and help drive innovation forward, even amidst uncertainty. We’ve seen that this blend of autonomy and strategic guidance fuels creativity and accelerates decision making. Don’t be forced to follow innovation; lead it The businesses that win today aren’t just reacting to change—they’re driving it. Traditional models may have worked in the past, but those old systems will hold you back in today’s fast-moving, tech-driven, complex world. The path forward? Embrace clarity, collaboration, and confidence—three simple principles that have helped Whipsaw define new markets and create products with impact. So, if you’re looking to stay competitive in today’s evolving landscape, it’s time to foster the right culture, trust your teams, and create innovation built to last. Dan Harden is CEO and principal designer at Whipsaw. View the full article

Glitch comes as the iPhone maker is seeking to shore up its relationship with the US president View the full article

The Fast Company Impact Council is a private membership community of influential leaders, experts, executives, and entrepreneurs who share their insights with our audience. Members pay annual membership dues for access to peer learning and thought leadership opportunities, events and more. As an amateur historian, I can say with certainty that technology has never embedded itself into society as rapidly as it has in the last decade. Today’s consumer relationship with technology is complicated and multifaceted—understanding that intersection is at the heart of everything we do as a company, and personally for me as Verizon’s Consumer CEO. Given our focus on the consumer, we publish an annual view of insights and trends that shed light on these relationships and the evolving role of technology in our lives, and this year’s Consumer Connections Report does just that. The report reflects our commitment to understanding and supporting the ways technology shapes our relationships, empowers our families, and enriches our daily experiences. It explores the interplay between digital and physical shopping experiences, and the growing reliance on home connectivity, as people use more and more smart home devices. And for the second year in a row, we look at how NFL fans showed up for their favorite teams, alongside the events and moments from the past year that connected us most as a society. What we learned: Limits reign: Parents and caregivers are using tech to monitor tech Parents are motivated to keep on top of their children’s use of technology. Our report reveals that they’re focused on social media apps like Tumblr, Whisper, and Snapchat the most. They’re also utilizing transitional options, like the Gizmo watch, which averages 3.3 million calls connecting parents and other caregivers with children each month. They can set content controls, block unwanted contacts, view text and call history, set usage limits, and more. That helps kids find their balance—learning to make smart, safe connectivity choices. Connectivity is where the heart is Home data use is on the rise. The average monthly data usage in 2024 across all Verizon Home Internet households was 656 GB, a 6% increase from 2023. People enjoy video and music streaming, gaming, videoconferencing, and smart home technologies that bring convenience, energy savings, and security. We know that to be true given that 18 is the average number of devices per Verizon Internet household. Customer experience is on demand Brick-and-mortar retail is returning to growth after pandemic-era slowdowns, indicating that in-store shopping provides a social and sensory experience that appeals to many consumers. We’re seeing the emergence of the “phygital economy,” which combines online and in-person in a single experience. Sixty-two percent of our customers’ purchases were made in a Verizon retail store. Most Verizon customers who use our in-store pickup service initiate their order online, and a growing number place the order over the phone. Go live from the game—it’s on 5G My company provides the 5G infrastructure for the NFL, which gives us insights into how fans are using their phones at games. Fans are increasingly creating and sharing their own game experience. They’re interacting with fellow fans via text, social media, and voice calls. They’re analyzing fantasy football matchups and checking scores. And they’re embracing AR and VR for on-site entertainment. In fact, average mobility (wireless) usage per game was 3.6 TB this season, a 37% increase over last season. The game with the most mobility usage? Giants at Cowboys. Video accounted for 25% of consumer data usage at NFL stadiums. That’s a lot of footage of the action. Other ways consumers use connectivity During the holidays, Americans are generating an enormous volume of calls, texts, and data to reach out. We studied data use at the airports over the winter holiday season, and found it rose to 17.7 million GB, and 28% of that was video. At the same time, many of us are also focusing more on connecting in person—and on balancing our access to the world around us with our attention to those in front of us. Indeed, on New Year’s Eve, the number of phone calls skyrocketed—it was the top holiday for phone calls—while on Christmas and Hanukkah, the number was muted. And that’s the point. Mobile devices connect us all to a world of opportunity, but don’t replace the world. Recognizing that truth is one of the keys to a healthier life. Sowmyanarayan Sampath is the CEO of Verizon Consumer. View the full article

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The Fast Company Impact Council is a private membership community of influential leaders, experts, executives, and entrepreneurs who share their insights with our audience. Members pay annual membership dues for access to peer learning and thought leadership opportunities, events and more. For the last decade, chief marketing officers (CMOs) haven’t felt as appreciated and necessary as they once were. But that may be changing—I should stress “may.” I’m thinking of the 2024 CMO Tenure Study by marketing consultancy Spencer Stuart. They’ve been issuing this study for two decades. Four years ago, the length of CMO tenure tightened to its smallest interval in more than a decade. In Spencer Stuart’s latest report, the average time spent by Fortune 500 CMOs in that job post in 2023 was 4.2 years, unchanged from 2022. While I wouldn’t say “flat is the new up,” stabilization after years of decline is somewhat positive. A bit more context: Conventional wisdom has suggested that CMOs turn over more often than other C-suite leaders. But Spencer Stuart’s analysis shows that CMO tenure is just under the 4.6-year average for all C-suite leaders such as chief operating officers, chief revenue officers, chief technology officers, etc. Still, CMOs are living in an “era of less,” according to a Gartner Marketing Practice study. Issued in May 2024, around the same time as the Spencer Stuart report, the GMP study notes that “in the four years preceding the pandemic, average marketing budgets were 11% of overall revenue. In the four years since, they’ve dropped to an anemic 8.2%.” The roles of marketing and advertising appear more diminished than ever before. Meanwhile, ad agencies and brand marketing departments are under greater pressure and scrutiny to prove effectiveness. The essential quality of the CMO’s job is akin to an orchestra conductor; but instead of musicians, the role is to make sure companies and individuals act seamlessly and complementary. But it’s not. There are reasons for that, good and bad. Short-sighted efficiency An ethos of efficiency has served as the defining, underlying feature of the advertising business for the last 25 years. The ’60s were about pushing the boundaries of creativity. Advertisers and agencies wanted to impress everybody with the ideas, images, and messages bursting from Madison Avenue. However, that shifted: The 21st century has been about personalization, speed—and above all—cost savings. But it takes a larger advertising team to expertly handle all parts of the marketing funnel from discovery to purchase while simultaneously instilling brand loyalty. The demands are, in fact, too complex for one agency, let alone one individual. As a result, specialists have divided the responsibilities associated with the multiple consumer touchpoints that need to be checked off. So much for efficiency. If only there were a single individual who could organize, synthesize, and prioritize all those crucial tasks. Oh, right. That’s what the CMO does. It’s what the CMO has always done. Marketing’s “ah-ha” moment Companies are increasingly recognizing this. There is solid value in developing marketing leadership from within. In 2023, 74% of CMOs of the top 100 advertisers were serving in their first corporate-level CMO role—the highest percentage since Spencer Stuart began tracking this data in 2016. Moreover, 59% of these CMOs were promoted from inside their companies. This move toward internal promotion signals an “ah-ha” moment as the CMO role is rediscovered as the truly efficient solution to advertising’s largest problems. Institutional knowledge and recognizable authority are virtues worth keeping. We might be witnessing a maturing perspective on marketing leadership. Organizations are investing in succession planning and management development specifically for the CMO role. There’s even a higher opinion for the general marketing and management acumen a CMO possesses, Spencer Stuart data indicates. When external hires are needed, companies are showing greater flexibility, with 43% of CMOs recruited for Fortune 500 companies in 2023 coming from different industries, up from 37% in 2022. Despite facing significant budget constraints—with 64% of CMOs reporting insufficient funds to execute their 2024 strategy per Gartner—there’s optimism about the potential of generative AI to expand marketing’s impact beyond traditional resource limitations. This technological evolution could help CMOs overcome the “era of less” while delivering more value. As companies focus on developing their marketing leadership pipeline, they have an opportunity to increase diversity at the top by identifying high-potential leaders early and creating smoother development paths. Not only would that strengthen the CMO role, it also ensures marketing leadership better reflects the diverse audiences they serve, which helps build brand affection. When consumers associate a brand with trust and other positive qualities, the path to performance and purchases is more immediate and direct. The intersecting lines of technology, branding, advertising, and sales all converge at the CMO’s desk. Perhaps it’s time agencies, platform companies, and the brands themselves showed more trust and value in the CMO role after all. Tim Ringel is global CEO of Meet The People. View the full article

Mullenweg questioned at WordCamp Asia about Automattic's scaled-back contributions to WordPress core The post Mullenweg Rebuffs Plea To Restore Automattic’s WordPress Core Contributions appeared first on Search Engine Journal. View the full article

In a forum Tuesday, Senate Democrats railed against President Trump and Elon Musk's efforts to shutter the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau as anti-consumer and illegal. View the full article

Unilever surprised investors on Tuesday by ousting chief executive Hein Schumacher and replacing him with finance chief Fernando Fernandez, who will focus on speeding up the execution of the consumer group’s turnaround strategy. Unilever’s board, which includes billionaire activist investor Nelson Peltz, was unified in its decision to oust CEO Schumacher, a source familiar with the board’s thinking told Reuters. Schumacher was surprised by the move, but the decision involved “nothing untoward”, the person said. In an email to associates, Schumacher defended his approach and record as CEO and said he regretted leaving the company earlier than anticipated. “The board is eager to step up the pace of our strategy execution and realise swift value creation underscored by a change in leadership,” he said in the email, which was shared with Reuters. The CEO’s sudden departure after less than two years in the job hit Unilever’s shares, which fell as much as 3.4% on Tuesday. They had gained more than 9% since Schumacher took the helm on July 1, 2023. The consumer goods industry has had a difficult time coping with a supply chain crunch triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic, plus sky-high commodity prices and an energy crisis after Russia invaded Ukraine. Profit margins have been squeezed and sales volumes hit by consumers switching to cheaper options. Unilever, which gave no specific reason for the CEO change, is facing pressure from investors to revitalise its fortunes and the top management upheaval comes just weeks after Unilever announced underwhelming full-year earnings. Nestle CEO Mark Schneider was ousted last year after several quarters of weak sales volume growth. Unilever’s management change was made after a board meeting on Monday, another source familiar with the matter told Reuters. The board concluded that Fernandez, who has been with Unilever for nearly 40 years, was the right person to execute the company’s strategy, the source said. Schumacher’s appointment and strategic changes had been welcomed by Peltz, who built a stake in the company in 2022 and sits on Unilever’s board. “We are gobsmacked at the news that Unilever’s very highly regarded CEO Hein Schumacher is to step down,” RBC Capital analyst James Edwardes Jones said in a note. When Schumacher became CEO, analysts and investors had applauded the choice of an external candidate as CEO. Schumacher reset the group’s strategy to address years of underperformance and laid out cost cuts last year, including plans to separate its ice cream division and cut thousands of jobs. The company has tried to step up the pace of asset sales, although some categories, like plant-based meat, are proving hard to exit. Chairman Ian Meakins said the board was impressed by Fernandez’s “decisive and results-oriented approach”, and had given him the task of executing the growth strategy. “There is much further to go to deliver best-in-class results,” Meakins said in a statement. Execution Analysts and investors said the news was unexpected, but Fernandez was a good choice to lead Unilever’s turnaround strategy. “We agree with the board that Fernandez is best placed to accelerate the value unlock,” Barclays analyst Warren Ackerman said in a note. UBS analyst Guillaume Delmas said “execution is key” in the new phase of the company’s strategic journey. Fernandez, 58, has been with Unilever since 1988. Before he became CFO last year, he held a number of roles such as President Latin America and CEO Brazil and President of the Beauty & Wellbeing business. Harsharan Mann in the Global Equities team at Aviva Investors, a Unilever shareholder, said: “We were surprised by the announcement but have a positive view of the CFO … He is a 30-year veteran of the business who ran the Beauty and Wellbeing division very well.” In January, Fernandez took up extra responsibilities including overseeing supply chain and procurement. Unilever, which owns Hellmann’s mayonnaise, Dove soap and Ben & Jerry’s ice cream, said there was no change to its 2025 outlook or medium-term forecast and the board was committed to “further accelerating” Schumacher’s growth plan. Schumacher, 53, will step down as CEO in March and leave the company on May 31. He is leaving by mutual agreement, the company said. He will be treated as a “good leaver” and will continue to get his 1.85 million euros ($1.94 million) fixed pay until he leaves the business, the company said. He will then get an undisclosed payment for the remainder of this notice period, it said. Srinivas Phatak, currently Unilever’s deputy chief financial officer and group controller, will become acting CFO, while the company looks for a permanent replacement. ($1 = 0.9549 euros) —Yadarisa Shabong and Josephine Mason, Reuters View the full article

We may earn a commission from links on this page. We’ve all been there: You find the perfect product, the chair or skin cream that will solve all your problems through the liberal application of capitalism—but it doesn’t fit into your budget. You have three choices: You can spend the next few months (years?) saving diligently toward the glorious day when you can afford to pull the trigger; you can put that purchase on a credit card and deal with the interest charges—or you can find a dupe. Dupes—short for “duplicates”—are having their moment. While knockoffs are nothing new, as anyone who has ever bought a “designer” handbag on the streets of New York City can attest, dupes are a little different. Knockoffs are trying to fool people that they’re the name-brand product, but dupes are their own thing—they’re not pretending to be the expensive item, they just replicate its look and function at a lower price point. Finding dupes can be as easy as a Google image search or a quick trip to Target or Lidl—but it can sometimes be a challenge. Thankfully, there are a variety of apps you can use that make locating dupes a lot easier, and companies that make their own dupes for specific items. How to scour the web for dupesIf you’re looking for duplicate furniture and housewares, you could spend hours digging through subreddits and Facebook pages, but luckily there tools and sites that make it a lot easier. Some of the most useful include: TikTok. The social media behemoth is kind of dupe central these days. You can type the name of what you’re looking for with hashtags like #dupe or #dupefinder to see what’s out there. What’s good about using TikTok is that most of the results will show people actually using and discussing the dupes, which can help you figure out if they’re truly worth buying. Dupe.com has been getting a lot of press of late thanks to the love it gets from social media. Its interface is pretty simple: You paste in the URL of an item (furniture, housewares, or clothing) or drag an image into the search bar, and Dupe searches the internet for lookalikes. For example, if you want an Eames Lounge Chair and Ottoman from Herman Miller—which sells for anywhere from $6,000 to $8,000 new—Dupe.com quickly leads you to Walmart, where you can buy this leather lounge chair with a very similar look and vibe. (There’s also an app.) Spoken.io works very similarly: Paste in a URL or drag/upload a photo, and it will scan the web and point you to a list of discounted dupes. For example, it turned up this $1,899 Eames-like chair—not quite as cheap as the Walmart version, but still a significant savings over the original. Dupeshop focuses on skincare and makeup products, and it doesn’t just point you at purchase links—it pulls together detailed comparisons, reviews, videos, and other information so you can feel confident that the dupe product will perform as expected. SkinSkool distinguishes itself by offering a list of potential dupes organized by a similarity score and labeled with a dollar sign icon indicating how expensive the dupe is. This makes it easy to cross-reference your budget with the available options. The site explicitly states that it bases its choices solely on the publicly available ingredient lists of the products, so it doesn’t offer any kind of hands-on review. A few companies that make their own dupesSome companies have made a name for themselves because they make and sell their own high-quality dupes, so you don’t have to search the entire internet trying to find them. A few examples include: Brandefy was founded to exploit the fact that name-brand beauty and skincare products at every price point are largely manufactured in the same facilities using the same ingredients. It creates “inspired by” products that are often indistinguishable from the pricier versions. Brandefy is more oriented toward its app than the website, however, so it’s a good choice if you want to check something on your phone while you’re out shopping. The Essence Vault and Dossier both offer up perfume dupes. Perfumes are expensive to develop, to manufacture, and to package—but you can’t actually copyright a fragrance, so dupe perfumes tend to be uncannily like the expensive brand they’re copying. That being said, you may notice a quality difference between the good stuff and the dupes. But if your budget is dupe-sized, both The Essence Vault and Dossier offer scents explicitly inspired by designer fragrances (Dossier also sells their own original scents). Element Brooklyn offers soaps, lotions, and other products that dupe brands like Aesop or Le Labo with an environmentally friendly twist: Its products are refillable, so you aren’t dumping plastic bottles into landfills all the time. Quince takes the same approach as Brandefy, but for clothing, claiming to use the same factories and manufacturers as the high-end luxury brands it's replicating. Italic is a Los Angeles-based company that sells clothing, jewelry, and accessories that closely resemble luxury brands. Its prices aren’t as low as literal dupes, but you can still find fashion that looks just like the top-tier brands at a much lower cost. Some caveats to keep in mindKeep in mind that it can be difficult to judge whether a dupe is going to be worth buying even at a drastically lower price point. It can be very difficult to tell from a photo whether a piece of furniture or clothing is going to be anywhere near the quality of the real thing, for example. That’s where apps like TikTok that offer endorsements from folks who have actually used the dupes can be super valuable. Another option for doing your dupe due diligence on beauty and skincare products is SkinSort, which has a useful comparison tool. You can compare a dupe to the brand it’s replicating and SkinSort will show you a list of ingredients in each (along with explanations for what each does) and reviews from people who have actually used the dupe. Finally, if you want to save some money without risking a downgraded experience, you can also look for name-brand items at secondhand places like Poshmark, which sells clothes, skincare, perfume, and beauty products. A lot of sellers on these platforms have access to name-brand stuff (some work for retailers where they get deep discounts, giving them room for resell profits, for example—look for folks who have a lot of a specific product on hand and you’re probably looking at a hustling sales associate) and you can find some real bargains that way. This gives you the main benefit of a dupe (lower prices) without compromising in any way. View the full article