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2025-10-10 19:18:59| Fast Company

Syria’s former President Bashar al-Assad, whose notoriously brutal rule over the country earned him the nickname The Butcher, was deposed in 2024 after years of bloody civil war.  Now, in a surreal cyberpunk twist, according to a report in German newsweekly Die Zeit, the former dictator is largely holed up in a luxury high-rise in Moscow, where he routinely spends hours playing online video games.   Assad, who practiced as a physician and was reportedly thought of as geeky during his medical training years, also appears to enjoy stunning views of Moscow landmarks from his apartment, and has access to a villa outside the city. He also reportedly makes occasional visits to a shopping mall below his apartment. Assad apparently resides in Russia under President Vladimir Putins protection, according to Die Zeit.  Assad succeeded his father, Hafez al-Assad, as president of Syria in 2000. Despite there being initial hopes for reform, Bashar al-Assad ultimately presided over a brutal crackdown on dissent and a 13-year civil war, in which his Russian-backed forces were accused of deploying chemical weapons and bombarding the civilian population with so-called barrel bombs.   The German publication didnt specify what video games the former Syrian leader enjoys, nor whether he plays against online opponents who might be unaware of his identity.

Category: E-Commerce
 

2025-10-10 19:00:00| Fast Company

Michelle, a 42-year-old marketing executive, was scrolling through her grocery app when she saw the total: $87. A year ago, her weekly cart never dipped below $200. Chips, late-night snacks, and bottles of wine had given way to produce, yogurt, and lean proteins. But that same morning, a $900 charge for her GLP-1 prescription landed on her credit card. Whatever she was saving at the supermarket felt dwarfed by the cost of her medication. Drugs like Ozempic, Wegovy, Mounjaro, and Zepbound are being hailed as medical breakthroughs. Theyre not just changing waistlinestheyre changing household budgets. And as these shifts ripple through everyday spending, the financial industry has an important role to play in helping people rethink, rebalance, and plan for this new reality. THE PRICE TAG OF TRANSFORMATION GLP-1s arent cheap. Out-of-pocket, they run $500 to $1,300 a month. Thats as much as a car payment, or a mortgage in some parts of the country. People using them are often reshuffling their budgets to afford the drugs. Many think about it like another utility bill: essential, non-negotiable, and something they can plan their whole month around. Still, users often find savings elsewhere: fewer restaurant meals, less alcohol, smaller grocery runs. Some even report that the math comes closer to breaking even than expected. WHERE THE MONEY GOES NOW Losing weight changes more than the number on a scale. People cycle through three or four clothing sizes in a single year. Gym memberships and boutique fitness classes suddenly feel worth the money. Trips once avoided now get booked. GLP-1s arent just about shrinking waistlines. They open doors people may have kept shut for years, and with that comes a new set of financial decisions. Affluent households can absorb both the prescriptions and the lifestyle upgrades that follow. But for families living paycheck to paycheck, these medications arent just expensive. Theyre simply out of reach. THE EMOTIONAL ECONOMICS With new health often comes new confidence. People may invest more in savings accounts, 401(k)s, or long-delayed experiences. But the flip side is anxietythe fear of relapse or losing access if coverage changes. That can drive spending on coaches, supplements, or nutrition programs to try to lock in results. This duality is real. Weve seen people feel free enough to book the beach trip theyve dreamed about, and weve seen others overspend chasing every add-on that promises to make results last. When health changes this dramatically, peoples money habits have to change too. Thats where financial education comes in, helping people build financial resilience so the gains arent just physical, theyre sustainable. WHEN HEALTH EQUITY MEETS FINANCIAL EQUITY The GLP-1 boom highlights a blunt truth: Wealth buys health. GLP-1s have created a new form of inequity. Those that can afford them have a better chance of living healthier and perhaps longer. Those that cant afford them, nothing changes. Access to health shouldnt depend on access to wealth. Theres a role for financial institutions here. Banks and credit unions can make innovation work for people looking to live a healthier life. Budgeting tools, fair loans, more transparent buy-now-pay-later programs, even text alerts for prescription rebatesthese are the kinds of things that can close the gap, and allow for better health. Financial institutions cant make the drugs cheaper, but we can give people more room to breathe financially. RIPPLE EFFECTS ACROSS INDUSTRIES Food companies are already adjusting as grocery carts shrink. Fashion retailers are expanding sizing in both directions. Resale sites are buzzing with transitional wardrobes. Wellness clinics and med spas are seeing record demand. The open question is whether financial institutions will adapt in the same way, stepping in as partners in resilience. They can, if health and finance leaders are willing to work together. GLP-1s dont just change bodies. They change what shows up on a credit card statement. For some, thats empowering. For others, its destabilizing. If GLP-1s are the health revolution of our time, then financial literacy and inclusion have to be the companion revolution. Edwin Endlich is president of the National Association for Financial Literacy and Inclusion (NAFLI). Ana Reisdorf, MS, RD is founder of GLP-1 Hub.

Category: E-Commerce
 

2025-10-10 18:46:00| Fast Company

To survive in todays market, enterprises must deliver experiences that feel instant and intelligent. Customers expect brands to anticipate their needs and guide them through interactions that are seamless and personal. Its the promise of having the right conversation at exactly the right moment. But heres the reality check: While real time dominates boardroom conversations, most data ecosystems are anything but. MOVING BEYOND NEXT BEST ACTION For years, the next best action model has been the playbook for customer engagement. It takes available data, analyzes it, and delivers a single, data-driven response, like recommending a product or sending an offer. The problem is this approach operates in isolation. It focuses on the moment, but not the journey. The next best experience takes this much further. Instead of one-off actions, it orchestrates the entire customer journey in real time, across every channel and touchpoint. It doesnt just react; it anticipates. Imagine a customer browsing a product on your website. Within seconds, that behavior could update their profile across your entire tech stack; informing a proactive support chat if intent signals show frustration, triggering a perfectly timed in-store notification if theyre nearby, or refining the next AI-driven recommendation at checkout. This isn’t a campaign running on static segments. It’s a living, adaptive experience that learns and optimizes as more customer data is collected, powered by data that moves as fast as your customers do. REAL-TIME PROFILE SYNDICATION: THE MISSING PIECE Heres where technology matters. Modern data warehouses excel at storage, analytics, and batch processing, and theyve become the center of gravity for many enterprises data strategies. But they werent built for the low-latency demands of real-time customer engagement. Data often moves through a series of handoffs: warehouse to CDP, CDP to marketing automation, marketing automation to personalization engine. Each hop adds friction. By the time the data lands where its needed, the moment to act has already passed. Real-time profile syndication solves this by treating the customer profile as a single, continuously updated asset, not a file copied across systems in batches. Every time a customer clicks, browses, or buys, their profile is enriched and made available instantly across the tech stack. No waiting for overnight processes. No discrepancies between tools. Just one unified, real-time version of the truth powering every decision. Think of it as the heartbeat of your data infrastructure by pumping fresh signals into every system, every second, without delay. WHY THIS MATTERS FOR AI AI models are only as good as the data they consume. If your model runs on profiles that are even an hour old, your so-called real-time decisions are already outdated. Instead of guessing what customers might want, AI-powered experiences adapt in real time, learning and evolving with every interaction. This is only possible when brands collect and control their data at the edge, which is the critical moment when customers engage. By having this real-time, first-hand data, companies can ensure their AI models are fueled by the freshest, most trustworthy information available, which turns predictive analytics into prescriptive actions. The result? Enterprises move from static campaigns to living, learning systems that deliver truly personalized experiences at scale. I believe every interaction is a moment of truth. By transforming disconnected tools into a single, real-time experience engine, enterprises can turn those moments into meaningful, AI-powered journeys. And in a world where milliseconds can make or break customer loyalty, the companies that master this will define the next era of customer engagement. Mike Anderson is CTO of Tealium.

Category: E-Commerce
 

2025-10-10 18:27:00| Fast Company

When we first started Little Spoon, our mission was clear: Make fresh, healthy food accessible at every age and stage of early childhood. But we quickly realized checking the proverbial boxes alone (nutritious: check, convenient: check) wasnt enough. After all, parents are inundated with optionsthe decision fatigue surrounding parenting choices is overwhelming. What makes a brand stand apart isnt utility; its the ability to understand and affirm who your customer is (and hopes to be). Parents want to feel emotionally supported, seen, and confident in their decisions, particularly within the vast excess of parenting advice in 2025: chock full of dated narratives. So for my brand, its critical for us to show, not tell, our customers that were a partner in this complex and dynamic life stage. This lesson isnt specific to parenting brands, either. Look at Olipop, which bucked an influencer-first approach early and sent product PR mailers to their customers rather than to recognizable faces. Or rhode skin, which innovates by simplifying via a streamlined product collection that makes complex skincare nonintimidating. Or Athletic Brewing Company, which sponsors events (runs, meetups) to deepen its ties to their customers, who crave alcohol-free social engagement. Its not about flooding the market; its about creating trust and showingnot tellingcustomers that you understand their acute emotional-need states. BUILD AN INNOVATIVE BRAND Here are four things Ive learned about building a brand with emotional resonance and true product innovation: Design products that acknowledge emotion. Products should not just solve a logical problem, but an emotional one. For Little Spoon, that means removing stress and adding joy, a combination parents desperately crave. Take our Lunchers. They echo the nostalgic ritual of lunch kits from our own childhoods, but with fresh, nutritious ingredients todays parents can feel good about. That stark contrast evokes the fun and familiarity kids want, while eliminating the guilt and decision fatigue parents often feel. It provide a visceral sense of relief. The product doesnt just solve the whats for lunch problem; it affirms parents as the capable, caring, and present people they are. Zoom out beyond your category. Whoever your customer, their life is multi-faceted. At Little Spoon, we know parenting is a key part of a parents identity, but not all of it. Thats why its essential to borrow cues from outside your core category. For me, that means lifestyle, wellness, and home. These days, youre never just selling a product; youre affirming who your customer is and who they want to be. Thats why we lean into collaborations with a variety of brands that matter to the parent, like Dusen Dusen, Rachel Antonoff, Siete, Sauz, and Graza. That cross-brand synergy sparks excitement and reminds parents were part of their lifestyle, not just their grocery list. Prioritize consumer feedback. From onboarding to pricing, packaging, and new product launches, every Little Spoon touchpoint is a chance for us to listen and learn. We dont shy away from feedbackwe lean into it. That transparency and responsiveness not only drive fast iteration, but also show families theyre true cocreators of our brand. In a category long dominated by legacy players, this sense of agency builds trust, loyalty, and lasting community. And perhaps most importantly Build a culture, not just a product. Customers might come for a specific product, but they stay because they feel heard, connected, and part of something bigger. That sense of belonging is what creates loyalty in a crowded market, and what turns a brand into a trusted partner in someones life. We dont think of ourselves as a transactional business; we think of ourselves as an entire ecosystem. When a product goes beyond solving a problem and starts affirming identity, it transcends utility; it becomes indispensable. Thats the opportunity for every founder today: Stop designing only for function, and start designing for feeling. Angela Vranich is cofounder and chief producer officer of Little Spoon.

Category: E-Commerce
 

2025-10-10 17:54:32| Fast Company

The teaching profession requires a certain degree of patience. Particularly when students discover a new trend to latch onto and repeat at every given opportunity. The latest so-called brain rot phrase to flood the classroom: 6-7. If you dont have any Gen Alphas in your life and have no idea what Im talking about, count yourself lucky. Some teachers have taken to social media to share their exasperation with the trend that has recently overrun classrooms, with schools outright banning it in some instances. “Say ‘6-7’ one more time,” one teacher posted on TikTok, pretending to address a student in her class. “Were gonna call your mom in about 6-7 minutes, let her know how you interrupt my class 6-7 times a day, and then maybe shell take your phone away for 6-7 days.”  Teachers are going to extreme lengths to avoid saying the numberson the pages of textbooks or in answers to math equationsfor fear of triggering a commotion in the classroom. Meanwhile, some have adopted an if you cant beat em, join em” approach, turning the trend into a classroom management strategy or a learning tool.  Others have taken a simpler line of attack. I choose 6 and 7 and 67 every time I need random numbers right now, which also seems to be killing the joke for the kidsbut I think its very funny, one teacher responded to a Reddit thread on r/Teachers. “I did it with a class earlier this week, and they didnt do it again, another one suggested. Nothing like a teacher doing a trend to make something uncool. Like much of Generation Alpha slang, the 6-7 trend originated on TikTok, spawning over a million related videos, before making its way into schools, basketball courts, and sports interviews.  So what does “6-7” actually mean? To many parents, confusion.  The numbers can be traced back to a song called Doot Doot, released by hip-hop artist Skrilla in late 2024, in which he raps: 6-7, I just bipped right on the highway (bip, bip). From there, a video of a boy yelling “6-7” into the camera at a basketball game went viral; thus was born a new meme.  Its important to note that the “6-7” meme is pronounced “six, seven”not “sixty-seven or “six to seven,” as some may assume, having only seen it in writing. Its often accompanied by the hand gesture you would use to tell someone that youre weighing two options (both palms facing up, hands moving slightly up and down). Searches for Gen Alpha translator have surged 790% in the past year, making it the fastest-growing translator query, Jenny Lee, lead data analyst at Google Trends, told Axios. Meanwhile, 6-7 has emerged as the most popular search for both how to use [slang] and why do middle schools say in 2025.

Category: E-Commerce
 

2025-10-10 15:27:29| Fast Company

The other day, a friend confessed her new nightly routine: hiding in the bathroom for 10 minutes after putting her kids to bed. The reason wasnt to scroll TikTok, but to breathe. Its either that or cry into the mac and cheese, she laughed. It struck me: parenting in 2025 often looks like quietly triaging our own stress while juggling work deadlines, permission slips, Slack pings, and dinner prep. Headlines scream about the youth mental health crisis, but what rarely makes the front page is the state of the people raising those kids. Working parents are running on fumes. And heres the part we cant gloss over: our kids emotional health is directly tied to ours. As psychiatrist and neuroscientist Dr. Raghu Appasani explained to me, emotional regulation is contagious. Both the calm and the chaos are felt by children. When parents experience chronic stress or burnout, it doesnt just live in their nervous system. It shapes the familys emotional climate, he said. Even babies, before they can speak, sense our tension. Over time, parental stress can erode a childrens sense of safety, making the world feel less predictable than it is. Neuroscience backs it up. A childs developing brain learns to self-regulate by co-regulating with their parents nervous system. In other words, if were running on fumes, so are they. {"blockType":"creator-network-promo","data":{"mediaUrl":"https:\/\/images.fastcompany.com\/image\/upload\/f_webp,q_auto,c_fit\/wp-cms-2\/2015\/08\/erikaaslogo.png","headline":"Girl, Listen: A Guide to What Really Matters","description":"Ericka dives into the heat of modern motherhood, challenging the notion that personal identity must be sacrificed at the altar of parenting. ","substackDomain":"https:\/\/erickasouter.substack.com\/","colorTheme":"blue","redirectUrl":""}} The good news is, there are practical ways to flip the script, and we dont need a three-day meditation retreat to do it. A few ideas: Micro-pauses matter. Before you rush from Zoom call to carpool, take 60 seconds in the driveway to breathe. Literally. These moments act like emotional shock absorbers, resetting your nervous system so you show up calmer and more present. Leverage digital tools as check-ins, not crutches. Dr. Raghu, chief medical officer for the child-centered wellness app Ginko, recommends InsightTimer and Calm to help adults regulate stress through guided mindfulness. Other platforms, like Wysa, provide exercises to track mood and offer coping strategies. Hes also a fan of journaling tools like Daylio or Stoic, which offer quick check-ins that can help you notice when you are sliding into burnout. Pair parenting with prevention. If therapy apps like BetterHelp make it easier to fit sessions into a packed schedule, think of it as mental fitness, not just as a crisis hotline. The reality is that self-care isnt indulgence. Its infrastructure. Just like we maintain the Wi-Fi so homework can get done, we need to maintain our mental bandwidth so our kids can feel steady. Shielding them from every stressor isnt possible. But modeling how to downshift, recover, and stay connected? Thats a parenting lesson with lifelong returns. {"blockType":"creator-network-promo","data":{"mediaUrl":"https:\/\/images.fastcompany.com\/image\/upload\/f_webp,q_auto,c_fit\/wp-cms-2\/2015\/08\/erikaaslogo.png","headline":"Girl, Listen: A Guide to What Really Matters","description":"Ericka dives into the heat of modern motherhood, challenging the notion that personal identity must be sacrificed at the altar of parenting. ","substackDomain":"https:\/\/erickasouter.substack.com\/","colorTheme":"blue","redirectUrl":""}}

Category: E-Commerce
 

2025-10-10 14:53:33| Fast Company

A potentially worrisome trend is emerging among young adults. Instead of landing a job and moving to the big city after graduation, many are moving back into their childhood homes instead. About 1.5 million more adults under 35 live with their parents today than a decade ago. Thats a 6.3% jump, more than double the rate of growth for the young adult population overall. The issue is affordability. Over the past decade, urban rents have climbed about 4% per year, while wages for full-time workers have increased by only 0.6% annually. That means its harder than ever to live in a big city on the typical salaryespecially if youre a new graduate without much work experience. The situation is even more challenging for aspiring homeowners: The median house price in the U.S. has risen about 90% in just 10 years, or more than 6% each year. And as prices risethe median home sells for more than $400,000 nowso too do the ages of homebuyers. The median first-time U.S. homebuyer is 38 years old, up from 31 about a decade ago. Why is the rent so high? Put simply, there isnt enough housing. As an economist, I know that when demand rises faster than supply, prices have to increase. And supply is severely limited in the places where people most want to live: big cities such as New York and San Francisco. In most of these cities, planning and zoning laws prevent developers from building enough to meet demand. For example, rezoning a plot of land from commercial to residential often requires mountains of paperwork. And in many cities, objections from neighbors can stall a proposed development. These are just two of many obstacles local governments throw in homebuilders way. One city that has tried something different is Austin, Texas. After deliberately relaxing its zoning laws a few years ago, Austin has seen a boom in home construction. Rents fell by 10% in one year and by as much as 22% in two years after that change. By making it easier to build, Austin has made it cheaper to live there. I dont think its a coincidence that Austin has a far lower share of its young adults living with their parents than many other cities do. Just 6% of working adults in the Austin metro area live with their parents, one analysis found, versus nearly 14% in Greater San Antonio and 20% in Greater Los Angeles. The pros and cons of living with the rents One obvious advantage of living with parents is that they tend to charge below-market rents, or nothing at all. That makes it easier to save for a deposit on a house, helping young adults get on the property ladder sooner than they would otherwise. Indeed, homeownership rates among those 25 to 34 have risen slightly since 2016. There are also potential disadvantages, however, particularly when it comes to socializing. Living at home with parents can make it much more challenging to meet new people. This, in turn, could partly help explain why Americans are getting married and having children later in life. These delays might not seem important, but they can leave people feeling like theyre behind in life, which can affect their health and well-being. I also wonder whether living with parents is indirectly making young adults unhappier at work. Thats because older adults often live far from the urban centers where young people are most likely to find jobs directly related to their degrees. Job satisfaction rates are substantially lower among 18- to 29-year-olds than among the rest of the working population. A problem for the entire U.S. The housing shortage isnt just an issue for young adults. A recent analysis I found insightful was headlined The housing theory of everything. It argued that the issue helps explain at least part of the current malaise in the U.S. economy. For example, when people cant live and work where they want, theyre unable to use their talents fully. That contributes to the relatively slow productivity growth the U.S. has experienced in recent years. Similarly, if people cant live in areas where they might meet and work with like-minded individuals, they have fewer opportunities to share ideas, which can hinder innovation. And if the housing shortage is indeed encouraging young adults to delay having children, it could make it harder for the U.S. to fund Social Security and other government programs in the future. Making it easier to build new homes in places people want to live and work could go a long way to easing these problems. Its possible high rents translate into high barriers to adulthood, too. Rohan Shah is assistan professor of economics at the University of Mississippi; Institute for Humane Studies This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Category: E-Commerce
 

2025-10-10 14:31:00| Fast Company

Yet another food retailer has joined the growing list of companies that have recalled pasta-related products over the last few weeks. Sprouts Farmers Market, a supermarket chain headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona, with stores across more than two dozen states, has voluntarily recalled select lots of Sprouts Smoked Mozzarella Pasta Salad due to a risk of contamination with Listeria monocytogenes.  On October 9, a recall notice was published to the website of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). To date, no illnesses have been reported in connection with this recalled product.  According to the notice, the recall is in response to Sprouts being alerted by its supplier, Fresh Creative Foods, that the pasta within the pasta salad could potentially be contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes. Fast Company has reached out to Fresh Creative Foods for comment. Which products are impacted by the recall? The affected lots of Sprouts Smoked Mozzarella Pasta Salad were packaged in plastic containers and sold from the “grab and go” section of stores or packaged directly from in-store deli service counters.  Here are the specific product details:  Grab and go: Sprouts Smoked Mozzarella Pasta Salad (UPC 2-15786-00000): Best use by dates from October 10, 2025, to October 29, 2025.  Deli service counter: Sprouts Smoked Mozzarella Pasta Salad (UPC 2-15587-00000): Best use by dates from October 10, 2025, to October 29, 2025.  The affected items were sold in the following states: Alabama Arizona California Colorado Delaware Florida Georgia Kansas Louisiana Maryland Missouri North Carolina New Jersey New Mexico Nevada Oklahoma Pennsylvania South Carolina Tennessee Texas Utah Virginia Washington Wyoming Dont eat the affected product If you purchased the affected product, you should throw it away or return it to your local store for a full refund. To reduce the risk of cross-contamination, the FDA recommends taking extra care to clean and sanitize any surfaces or containers that have come into contact with the product.  If you have any questions about the recall, call Sprouts Customer Relations at 480-814-8016 or submit a form at the Sprouts website. The list of retailers recalling pasta products is growing  Last month, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued a food safety alert regarding a Listeria outbreak linked to prepared pasta meals. According to the CDC, the outbreak has hit 15 states. It has sickened 20 people, with 19 requiring hospitalization. Four people have died due to the outbreak, which dates back to last year. Sprouts is one of many retailers that have voluntarily recalled ready-to-eat pasta products in the weeks following the CDC’s alert, although the notice does not mention the outbreak. Here are some other recent pasta-related recalls to be aware of:  Ready-to-eat pasta meals from Trader Joes, Kroger, and Walmart  More pasta meals sold at Albertsons and Trader Joes Kroger pasta salads What is Listeria and who is at risk of infection?  Listeria is a disease-causing bacteria that can be spread to and from foods.  Listeria infection is caused by eating food contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes.  As the Mayo Clinic notes, healthy people rarely become very ill from Listeria infection. However, the disease can turn deadly for some. Pregnant women, adults 65 and older, and people with weakened immune systems are more at risk for infection.

Category: E-Commerce
 

2025-10-10 14:17:52| Fast Company

Abu Dhabi carrier Etihad said Friday it is launching flights to Kabul, making it the latest airline to offer direct routes to the Afghan capital.Etihad, which announced a record $476 million profit in 2024, said the new service responded to “growing demand” for travel between the United Arab Emirates and Afghanistan and that the three weekly flights starting in December would support “trade, travel, and community ties.”“The UAE hosts one of the largest Afghan communities in the Gulf, with around 300,000 Afghans living and working in the country, according to the Afghan Business Council,” the airline said in a statement. “The new flights will further strengthen these economic and social ties while enhancing connectivity through Abu Dhabi.”Other international carriers flying direct to Kabul include Turkish Airlines and FlyDubai.The oil-rich UAE has forged close ties with the Taliban-led government of Afghanistan in recent years.In June 2024, the Emirati leader, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, met a top official and Cabinet member, Sirajuddin Haqqani, who had a U.S. bounty on his head over his involvement in an attack that killed an American citizen and other assaults.A few months later, the UAE accepted the credentials of a Taliban government ambassador.Even though the Taliban are largely isolated from the West, due to their restrictions on women and girls, they have successfully established bilateral relations with regional powers.In July, Russia became the first country to recognize them as the legitimate government of Afghanistan. And, on Friday, India said it was upgrading its technical mission in Kabul to a full embassy. Associated Press

Category: E-Commerce
 

2025-10-10 13:56:12| Fast Company

Pope Leo XIV encouraged international news agencies on Thursday to stand firm as a bulwark against the “ancient art of lying” and manipulation, as he strongly backed a free, independent and objective press.History’s first American pope called for imprisoned journalists to be released and said the work of journalists must never be considered a crime. Rather, journalism is a right and a pillar upholding “the edifice of our societies” that must be protected and defended, he said.“If today we know what is happening in Gaza, Ukraine and every other land bloodied by bombs, we largely owe it to them,” Leo said of journalists. “These extraordinary eyewitness accounts are the culmination of the daily efforts of countless people who work to ensure that information is not manipulated for ends that are contrary to truth and human dignity.”Leo’s comments came in a speech to executives of international news agencies belonging to MINDS International, a consortium of leading agencies including The Associated Press.In his five months as pope, the Chicago-born Leo has spoken out strongly on the need to protect freedom of expression and the rights of journalists. In his first meeting with reporters right after his election, Leo called for the release of imprisoned journalists and affirmed the “precious gift of free speech and the press.”More recently, he insisted that journalism was “not only an act of justice, but a duty of all those who long for a solid and participatory democracy.” In a letter to a crusading Peruvian journalist repeatedly sued for her work, Leo affirmed the freedom of the press was an “inalienable common good.”On Thursday, he strongly encouraged news agencies amid a double crisis they are facing, with economic pressures threatening their survival and consumers increasingly unable to distinguish truth from lies.“I urge you: Never sell out your authority!” Leo said.He quoted Hannah Arendt’s “The Origins of Totalitarianism” in asserting that the world needs free and objective information. He cited her warning that “the ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced Communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction and the distinction between true and false no longer exist.”Leo said even with the challenges posed today by artificial intelligence, news agencies must stand firm.“With your patient and rigorous work, you can act as a barrier against those who, through the ancient art of lying, seek to create divisions in order to rule by dividing,” he said. “You can also be a bulwark of civility against the quicksand of approximation and post-truth.” Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. Nicole Winfield, Associated Press

Category: E-Commerce
 

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