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How Obesity Drugs Are Creating a “Seismic” Shift in the Travel Industry

How Obesity Drugs Are Creating a Seismic Shift in the Travel Industry

As more people are taking GLP-1 drugs to lose dramatic amounts of weight, the implications for travel are definitely more than what you’re imagining … or what the industry is ready for. Yes, restaurants will be impacted as people eat and order less food. But TSA may run into challenges as people no longer look like their … Read more

Doritos Creates AI That Silences the Sounds of Crunching While Gaming

Doritos crunch-canceling technology

Listening to someone crunchily eating Doritos is probably high on many lists of annoying behavior but imagine how much worse it must be to listen to the crunching in a headset while playing against a Dorito-eating opponent in a video game. In a beautiful example of knowing their audience, Doritos commissioned an AI company to quantify … Read more

The Blue Pumpkin Debate

Blue pumpkin debate

If you see a child carrying a blue pumpkin this Halloween, consider that they may have autism and be nonverbal or have difficulty communicating or may not be dressed up like other kids. If you have school age kids, teach them what the blue pumpkin means and how to respect any peers they see carrying one. And if you have a child come to your door this Halloween holding one, you’ll know what it means so you can interact with empathy.

Self-Checkout Is a Failed Experiment

self-checkout

Self-checkout is not a delightful experience. Goods don’t always scan properly. The system stalls if you don’t put a scanned item in the right place. Double scanning an item, or buying something that requires validation, or getting an error requires waiting for a human employee to help you anyway. Self-checkout, in other words, usually sucks. A growing … Read more

The Search for the Realest Person on Earth Starts with … Social Media?

BeReal

Social media today is often the home of negative emotions and addictive outrage. It’s no wonder many surveys are showing a mass exodus with shrinking usage on the top platforms alongside observations that “social media is falling apart.” One platform trying to shift this perception is BeReal, a popular app that sends users prompts once a day … Read more

Is AI Creating More Monoculturalism?

Is AI Creating More Monoculturalism

The opposite of multiculturalism is monoculturalism – a society in which there is only one acceptable religion, mindset or system of behavior. Academic researchers around the world have warned against the dangers of monoculturalism for years, from the “thick” national identity of Bulgarians to political shifts in Malaysia. In the world of agriculture, monoculture (also … Read more

Necrobotics, Electrified Chopsticks and Other Winners of the 2023 Annual Ig Nobel Awards

You might be tempted to lump the Ig Nobel Awards in with the Darwin Awards as simply a celebration of human stupidity – but it’s much more. Back in 1991 they were created to honor “achievements that first make people laugh and then make them think.” The award ceremony has the memorably brilliant requirement that … Read more

The Subscription-Fueled Future of Car “Ownership”

Last year, Mercedes launched a feature in their electric cars that would allow drivers to pay $60 per month for an “Acceleration Increase” that would boost their car’s acceleration speed by 1 second when going from zero to sixty. BMW announced (and quickly abandoned) their wildly unpopular idea of charging car owners $18 per month to … Read more

“Brotox” and the Men’s Cosmetic Procedure Boom

The cheek implant was the fastest-growing men’s aesthetic procedure this past year, according to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons. This so-called boom in “brotox” procedures, which includes everything from lip augmentations to butt lifts, is evidence of a growing willingness and social acceptance among men to consider undergoing beauty procedures. It may also be an … Read more

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