These specialty-made purses double as a mobile DJ kit.
That’s because Nik Bentel Studio‘s newest purse, called the Tati Fte Bag, is actually wearable tech. The bag comes in two models: The $350 Speaker Bag, which pairs with bluetooth, and the $400 Mixer Bag, which has four input channels and is compatible with CD players, computers, phones, and amps.
The bags started as a thought experiment, Nik Bentel tells Fast Company. “What if your everyday bag looked and felt like a piece of audio gear?”
[Photos: Nik Bentel Studio]
The resulting bags have room to hold your phone, chapstick, and mints, but they also have about three hours of play time each. Made from an acrylic shell, the material was chosen because it “allowed us to fully lean into the language of tech objects,” Bentel says. “It has this glossy, rigid, futuristic feel that instantly evokes gadgetry and display cases.”
[Photo: Nik Bentel Studio]
This is a purse meant to look like a gadget, not the other way around. “We wanted the bags to feel like they were pulled directly from a DJ booth,” Bentel says. Using fabric or leather would have softened the concept too much while acrylic gave the bags a “clean, synthetic, almost sci-fi finish.” The biggest challenges were precision, since acrylic has to be cut perfectly, and scale.
[Photo: Nik Bentel Studio]
“We wanted them to feel bold and graphic, but still functional as bags,” he says. “And of course, getting the buttons, knobs, and laser-etched details just right took a lot of back-and-forth to make sure they captured that playful realism.”
Bentel has made clever, whimsical bags before like one made out of electrical cords and another for a single slice of pizza. The Tati Fte Bag brings that same sense of humor to sound. The rise of digital music and streaming has put a premium on physical music experiences like LPs and helped bring back the turntable. A boom box that’s a purse takes that impulse and makes it wearable.
After two years of reducing its overall carbon footprint, Amazon now reports that its emissions increased in 2024. The companys surge in data center construction and electricity use to support an increased use of AI helped fuel that rise, as did expanded delivery operations.
Amazons total carbon emissions in 2024 reached 68.25 million metric tons, according to the companys latest sustainability report. Thats a 6% increase from the year priorand a 33% increase from 2019, when the company launched its Climate Pledge commitment to reach net-zero emissions across its operations by 2040.
Amazon breaks down its carbon footprint into direct emissions, indirect emissions from purchased electricity, and indirect emissions from other sources. All three of these categories saw an increase in 2024. Direct emissions, primarily from its delivery services, grew 6% compared to 2023; the company cites supply constraints for EVs and low-carbon fuels. Direct emissions in total account for 15.13 million metric tons of carbon.
Indirect emissions from purchased energy grew 1%, in part due to the higher electricity usage required to support advanced technologies like AI, according to the report. These emissions account for the smallest slice of Amazons overall footprint at 2.8 million metric tons.
Indirect emissions from other sources also grew 6%, and these emissions make up 74% of Amazons total carbon footprint. That increase was driven primarily from data center construction and fuel consumption by third-party delivery service providers, per the report, which states that the company is using generative AI in virtually every corner of its business.
Amazon says it’s continuing to work toward its 2040 net-zero goal, and that its progress will not be linear. It also claims it continues to match 100% of its electricity consumed in data center regions with renewable energy sources.
But Amazon Employees for Climate Justice, an organization of workers at the tech giant pushing for more climate action, argues the numbers are misleading. The group says that in areas of the U.S. that are home to more than 70% of Amazon data centers, electricity comes primarily from gas or coal. Utility companies are also building out new fossil fuel infrastructure to support these data centers.
To match its electricity consumption with renewables, Amazon uses mostly renewable energy creditswhich have faced criticisms of greenwashing. In some cases, Amazon Employees for Climate Justice says, the company has simply purchased the credit for existing renewables, which would have been used anyway. Bloomberg reported that if these credits werent counted, Amazons 2022 emissions would have actually been three times higher than what the company disclosed.
Amazon isn’t the only tech company building out data centers to support AI. A Meta data center in Louisiana will require three new gas plants for power. Google’s 2023 emissions grew 13% compared to the year prior because of AI and data center growth. Microsoft’s emissions are up 23% since 2020 for the same reason. But Business Insider recently reported that Amazon’s data centers “are on pace to command the highest electricity demand” from all the tech companies it examined.
Im frustrated that nobody talks about what AI is doing to the environment, an Amazon software engineer said in a statement from Amazon Employees for Climate Justice. They want people to think that AI is this magical tool that lives in the cloud, but what they dont tell us is that AI literally uses coal and fracked gas for its power. Our CEOs want to dupe us into focusing on how efficient shiny new AI features are, as if we dont know well be killing the planet with the few hours were saving on code. And in a year, I might not even have a job.
If youve ever walked into a meeting expecting support, and instead found yourself under fire, youre not alone.
Amid rising pressure to deliver more with less, leaders often find themselves defending critical initiatives, budgets, or even their own credibility in front of skeptical peers and executives. And while thoughtful debate can sharpen decisions, some meetings turn into something more damaging: an ambush.
Its a uniquely disorienting moment, one where your pulse quickens, your prepared remarks fall flat, and the room feels suddenly less like a meeting and more like a trial.
For Cora, the head of product at a fast-growing tech company, her annual budget presentation was supposed to be a formality. She had aligned her proposal with the companys growth strategy, benchmarked costs against those of her peers, and prepared a detailed slide deck. But when she began her presentation, everything shifted.
One colleague questioned her departments ROI in the first five minutes. Another proposed reallocating her budget to fund their own priorities. Soon, a chorus of voices piled on, pointing out minor flaws and casting doubt on her entire proposal. It became clear they had compared notes beforehand. Caught off guard and on the defensive, Cora struggled to regain control and left with her credibility bruised and her budget slashed.
Coras story is all too common. High-stakes meetings where influence, resources, or reputations are on the line are often battlegrounds for competing agendas. Without the right preparation, even the most capable leaders can be outmaneuvered and unprepared to handle resistance.
Through our work advising dozens of companies facing similar dynamicsKathryn, as an executive coach and keynote speaker, and Jenny, as an executive advisor and Learning & Development expertweve identified six core strategies that help senior leaders show up prepared, persuasive, and grounded, even when others are working against them.
1. Clarify the Stakes
Before you can persuade others, you need clarity for yourself. Start by defining whats truly at risk for you, your team, and the organization, along with what you want to achieve. Is this about getting a yes on a specific proposal? Strengthening your position? Building support for a long-term initiative?
Ask yourself:
What is the desired outcome of this meeting?
Who are the key decision-makers and influencers? What do they care about?
What happens if I win, and what happens if I dont?
Pro tip: Write down the one sentence you want them to say after you leave the room: We should move forward with her proposal, or He made a strong case. Lets back him. Holding that sentence in mind helps you stay focused if others try to derail the conversation.
2. Research Your Audience
Coras biggest mistake wasnt her numbers. It was not anticipating her colleagues competing agendas. In high-stakes meetings, knowing your audience is just as important as knowing your content.
Do your homework:
Understand their priorities, pain points, and pressures.
Identify possible objections and who is likely to raise them.
Map out the room: who is likely to support you, who is skeptical, and who might stay silent.
As Sun Tzu wrote: If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.
3. Prepare Your Content
Once you have mapped the dynamics, craft your case accordingly. Start with your key message and back it up with 23 compelling, business-aligned points. Support your position with data, examples, and even stories that make your message memorable.
We recommend the SUCCESs framework to structure your message: make it Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credible, Emotional, and Story-driven.
And dont forget to end with a clear ask. Ambiguity creates space for dissent.
4. Rehearse and Refine
Cora had the facts, but she wasnt ready for the friction. Rehearsing isnt just about polishing your presentation. Its about building resilience for tough questions and interruptions.
Consider these steps:
Practice your opening and closing lines out loudthey stick most due to recency and primacy bias.
Anticipate tough questions and rehearse concise, confident responses.
Role-play with a trusted colleague who can throw curveballs and help you adjust.
Pro tip: Prepare a short pause phrase to give yourself a moment: Thats a great point. Let me address that specifically.
5. Build Support Before You Walk In
And even with strong content, your meeting can fall flat without political groundwork. The most effective meeting performance often begins well before you step into the room. Smart leaders dont just prepare content; they build coalitions.
Pre-aligning with key stakeholders to identify and address objections and build support.
Socialize your idea informally to shape how your message is received.
Securing a meeting sponsor, someone influential who can help frame your proposal positively and reinforce its credibility in the room
Influence starts in the quiet conversations, not just the formal ones.
In hindsight, Cora realized she had focused so much on refining her proposal that she hadnt spoken with peers in advance or gauged where their support stood. A few informal touchpoints might have revealed the coordinated pushback, or even helped prevent it.
6. Manage Your Mindset
Once your strategy is solid, the final variable is you. Your mindset, not your slide deck, determines how effectively you show up. High-stakes settings amplify stress, which is why composure is your secret advantage.
Visualize a positive outcome and anchor yourself in your credibility.
Arrive grounded and focused; small rituals, such as deep breathing, can help.
Prepare a few confident, neutral phrases if things get heated:
Let me clarfy that . . . or Thats a fair point; heres how were addressing it . . .
If power dynamics make direct confrontation risky, consider influencing laterally or enlisting a trusted intermediary. Preparation doesnt mean going it aloneit means understanding your leverage points and using them wisely.
Too often, leaders over-index on content and underprepare for resistance. But in high-stakes meetings, your ability to anticipate dynamics, tailor your message, and manage your mindset is what sets you apart. You may not control the room, but with the right preparation, you can control how you show up in it.
After her experience, Cora changed how she approached every high-stakes meeting. She now pre-aligns with key stakeholders, rehearses tough questions with a trusted peer, and walks in knowing not just her content, but the political terrain. She still faces resistance sometimes, but shes no longer surprised by it. And that shift has helped her win more buy-in, not just battles. Because real leadership presence isnt forged in easy moments. Its revealed when the room turns against you, and you stay steady anyway.
Imagine that you own a small, 20-acre farm in Californias Central Valley. You and your family have cultivated this land for decades, but drought, increasing costs, and decreasing water availability are making each year more difficult.
Now imagine that a solar-electricity developer approaches you and presents three options:
You can lease the developer 10 acres of otherwise productive cropland, on which the developer will build an array of solar panels and sell electricity to the local power company.
You can select 1 or 2 acres of your land on which to build and operate your own solar array, using some electricity for your farm and selling the rest to the utility.
Or you can keep going as you have been, hoping your farm can somehow survive.
Thousands of farmers across the country, including in Californias Central Valley, are choosing one of the first two options. A 2022 survey by the U.S. Department of Agriculture found that roughly 117,000 U.S. farm operations have some type of solar device. Our own work has identified more than 6,500 solar arrays currently located on U.S. farmland.
Our study of nearly 1,000 solar arrays built on 10,000 acres of the Central Valley over the past two decades found that solar power and farming are complementing each other in farmers business operations. As a result, farmers are making and saving more money while using less waterhelping them keep their land and livelihood.
A hotter, drier, and more built-up future
Perhaps nowhere in the U.S. is farmland more valuable or more productive than Californias Central Valley. The region grows a vast array of crops, including nearly all of the nations production of almonds, olives, and sweet rice. Using less than 1% of all farmland in the country, the Central Valley supplies a quarter of the nations food, including 40% of its fruits, nuts, and other fresh foods.
The food, fuel, and fiber that these farms produce are a bedrock of the nations economy, food system, and way of life.
But decades of intense cultivation, urban development, and climate change are squeezing farmers. Water is limited, and getting more so: A state law passed in 2014 requires farmers to further reduce their water usage by the mid-2040s.
The trade-offs of installing solar on agricultural land
When the solar arrays we studied were installed, California state solar energy policy and incentives gave farm landowners new ways to diversify their income by either leasing their land for solar arrays or building their own.
There was an obvious trade-off: Turning land used for crops to land used for solar usually means losing agricultural production. We estimated that over the 25-year life of the solar arrays, this land would have produced enough food to feed 86,000 people a year, assuming they eat 2,000 calories a day.
There was an obvious benefit, too, of clean energy: These arrays produced enough renewable electricity to power 470,000 U.S. households every year.
But the result we were hoping to identify and measure was the economic effect of shifting that land from agricultural farming to solar farming. We found that farmers who installed solar were dramatically better off than those who did not.
They were better off in two ways, the first being financially. All the farmers, whether they owned their own arrays or leased their land to others, saved money on seeds, fertilizer, and other costs associated with growing and harvesting crops. They also earned money from leasing the land, offsetting farm energy bills, and selling their excess electricity.
Farmers who owned their own arrays had to pay for the panels, equipment and installation, and maintenance. But even after covering those costs, their savings and earnings added up to $50,000 per acre of profits every year, 25 times the amount they would have earned by planting that acre.
Farmers who leased their land made much less money but still avoided costs for irrigation water and operations on that part of their farm, gaining $1,100 per acre per yearwith no up-front costs.
The farmers also conserved water, which in turn supported compliance with the states Sustainable Groundwater Management Act water use reduction requirements. Most of the solar arrays were installed on land that had previously been irrigated. We calculated that turning off irrigation on this land saved enough water every year to supply about 27 million people with drinking water or irrigate 7,500 acres of orchards. Following solar array installation, some farmers also followed surrounding land, perhaps enabled by the new stable income stream, which further reduced water use.
Changes to food and energy production
Farmers in the Central Valley and elsewhere are now cultivating both food and energy. This shift can offer long-term security for farmland owners, particularly for those who install and run their own arrays.
Recent estimates suggest that converting between 1.1% and 2.4% of the countrys farmland to solar arrays would, along with other clean energy sources, generate enough electricity to eliminate the nations need for fossil fuel power plants.
Though many crops are part of a global market that can adjust to changes in supply, losing this farmland could affect the availability of some crops. Fortunately, farmers and landowners are finding new ways to protect farmland and food security while supporting clean energy.
One such approach is agrivoltaics, where farmers install solar designed for grazing livestock or growing crops beneath the panels. Solar can also be sited on less-productive farmland or on farmland that is used for biofuels rather than food production.
Even in these areas, arrays can be designed and managed to benefit local agriculture and natural ecosystems. With thoughtful design, siting, and management, solar can give back to the land and the ecosystems it touches.
Farms are much more than the land they occupy and the goods they produce. Farms are run by people with families, whose well-being depends on essential and variable resources such as water, fertilizer, fuel, electricity, and crop sales. Farmers often borrow money during the planting season in hopes of making enough at harvest time to pay off the debt and keep a little profit.
Installing solar on their land can give farmers a diversified income, help them save water, and reduce the risk of bad years. That can make solar an asset to farming, not a threat to the food supply.
Jacob Stid is a PhD student in hydrogeology at Michigan State University.
Annick Anctil is an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at Michigan State University.
Anthony Kendall is a professor of Earth and environmental sciences at Michigan State University.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
For years, Cynthia Robertson had a particular morning routine: Every day, she would display a flag on her front porch in Sulphur, Louisiana, the color of which corresponded to the current air quality. On one far end of the spectrum, a purple flag meant there was hazardous air filled with particulate matter, and everyones health effects were increased; on the other end, a green flag meant the air quality was satisfactory, with air pollution posing little or no risk. In between were red, orange, and yellow flags.
Residents already know there’s pollution in their neighborhood, thanks primarily to the 16-plus industrial plants that surround their city. “We can smell it,” Robertson says. But the flags helped to quantify just how bad the air was on any particular day.
Robertson is the executive director of Micah 6:8 Mission, an environmental nonprofit in Southwest Louisiana. The front porch where she would display flags was actually the nonprofits property, where theres also a community garden, an orchard, a pond, goats, chickens, and educational programs open to the community. Micah 6:8 Mission would also post a picture of the days flag, and the color chart explaining its meaning, to its Facebook pagedetails that helped residents gauge whether they should be spending time outdoors, or wait it out inside.
“Particulate matter is a killer,” Robertson says, referring to particles that are 2.5 micrometers or less in size, and which can come from all sorts of pollution, from vehicle exhaust to burning fuels. “That tells you, ‘Don’t go out and garden this morning. Wait until the air calms down after the overnight releases from the plants.
We didnt want to be the poster child for heres what happens if you defy the CAMRA law
But last year, Robertson stopped displaying the flags and making those Facebook posts. In 2024, Louisiana passed a law (the Community Air Monitoring Reliability Act, or CAMRA) that seems to prohibit community groups from using their own air sensors and sharing air quality dataparticularly if the data points to bad air qualityor risk hefty fines.
Any sharing of such data has to include clear explanations, context, and all relevant uncertainties around the data, but community groups say the state hasnt made clear what that all means, exactly, or what they could do to make their air quality comments acceptable.
CAMRA also prohibits groups from sharing information for the purposes of enforcement actions or to allege violations of clean air laws. Environmental lawyers say this means that sharing air monitoring data is allowed if it shows that the air quality is good, but that data can’t be shared if it shows the air quality is bad.
Because there wasnt any clarity on what they considered [relevant uncertainties and so on], we said okay, we cant afford to run afoul of this, Robertson says. (Fines begin at $32,500 per day.) We didnt want to be the poster child for heres what happens if you defy the CAMRA law.
That uncertainty, experts say, essentially means the law not only discourages air quality monitoring but also discourages community groups from talking about their own air quality dataconstraints that potentially run afoul of the First Amendment.
Though the Louisiana law may be particularly strict, its not the only law that has recently been passed or considered by state legislatures around the publics ability to monitor and use air quality data. Thats a trend environmentalists find concerning as the Trump administration rolls back environmental protections, gives coal plants free rein to pollute, and restricts access to environmental data.
The importance of low-cost community air monitoring
Sulphur, Louisiana, sits downwind of petrochemical sites, and the region has experienced a disproportionate level of health impacts from pollution, including rates of cancer higher than the national average. Micah 6:8 Missions air quality alertsfirst, thanks to a low-cost sensor from air quality monitor startup PurpleAir, and then from a sensor the nonprofit received as part of an Environmental Protection Agency granthelped residents control their pollution exposure. People paid attention to the alerts: If the days flag was orange, Robertson says shed hear people say, Well, I guess Im not going to garden this morning.
The EPA does have its own air quality monitors, but they dont give a full picture of air pollution. The EPAs monitors are expensive and there are only a few of them in any given city. That leaves bigs gaps in the data. What we know about air pollution, and particularly about air pollutants that vary in space and time, is that what people are actually exposed to doesn’t necessarily correspond with what’s measured at the EPA sensor, says Noelle Selin, an atmospheric chemist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Air pollution can be an extremely local issue, differing from one city block to the next. The EPAs sensors may miss all the pollution from car exhaust happening on one particular traffic-heavy street, or all the downwind pollution from factories if the agencys monitor is placed upwind.
Low-cost sensors like those from PurpleAirwhose sensors start at under $200, and which purports to have the worlds largest air quality datasethave helped fill some of those data gaps. The government network is monitoring background levels [of air pollution], says PurpleAir CEO Adrian Dybwad. Its not meant to tell you your kids school has wildfire smoke around it right now, or to bring your kids inside because the air quality is looking poor.
PurpleAir can provide a more hyperlocal picture. Dybwad hears from users often about how they use PurpleAirs data: It helps parents manage their kids asthma by choosing when to let them play outside, and athletes use it to plan their exercise schedules. In one instance, in Arkansas, a mass of buried tree stumps caught fire, sending smoke up from the ground and out into the streets. No one was paying attention to that, Dybwad recalls hearing, until PurpleAir sensors near the site spurred local news coverage that led to an EPA response.
Even scientists have come to rely on low-cost community air monitors. And though a low-cost sensor may come with a little less accuracy and a few more uncertainties than a $10,000 model, it still provides useful, real-time, and vital informationparticularly, Selin says, around pollution exposure for certain populations that aren’t well covered by EPA sensors.
“No one is using PurpleAirs data to enforce regulations on polluters
Micah 6:8 Mission is now part of a federal lawsuit, alongside six other community group, alleging that Louisianas CAMRA law violates their constitutional rightsprimarily, the right to free speech. That lawsuit was filed in May, and the lawyers involved expect a response to their complaint from the state this week.
Community air monitoring has been growing across the country because people are simply more aware of bad air quality events, like intense wildfires or pollution that they can see or smell for themselves.
It’s also grown thanks to the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, which included $117 million in grants for community air pollution monitoring and supported the purchase of air quality sensors. The CAMRA law came about as a way to standardize such community programsand was backed by industrial groups like the Louisiana Chemical Association.
Kentucky also passed a law this year preventing low-cost air sensors from being used as the basis for regulatory enforcement of environmental laws. Ohio considered legislation that would restrict community air monitoring data from being used for the enforcement of environmental laws, though that language was ultimately removed. And in West Virginia, proposed statutes would have restricted community air monitoring data from being used for fines or any regulatory- or rule-creation actions, though those statutes have so far failed.
Dybwad warns that there have always been limitations on how people can use data from low-cost sensors like those from PurpleAir. For something like a court case, to enforce environmental regulations, or to take a polluter to task, you need certified data, he says, noting, Thats always been the case. No one is using PurpleAirs data to enforce regulations on polluters.
The fight to keep monitoring the air
So these bills may not materially change how individuals or community groups use low-cost sensors. But according to David Bookbinder, the director of law and policy at the Environmental Integrity Projectwhich, along with Public Citizen Litigation Group, filed that lawsuit on behalf of the community groupstheyre still part of a disconcerting trend. (The Environmental Integrity Project also publishes Oil & Gas Watch News, which has reported on this wave of bills.)
That’s why we thought it was important to go challenge the Louisiana statute and say, You can’t tell people what they’re allowed to say, Bookbinder says. To him, the law is designed to discourage monitoring, and to absolutely gag people from talking about it.
The fact that Trump is now president adds even more concern, Bookbinder says. Trump has already repeatedly rolled back environmental protections, including giving the worst-polluting coal power plants exemptions from toxic pollution limits. That individuals and community groups can access low-cost sensors to monitor whether the air theyre breathing is healthy is incredibly important, Bookbinder says, especially when the EPA is clearly going out of the business of protecting public health.
Community air sensors have helped put pollution data into anyone’s hands, and any threat to that would hurt Americans. Selin, the MIT professor, doesn’t have specific knowledge of the Louisiana lawsuit, but she emphasizes how crucial such sensors are, saying, “It’s really important to encourage people to understand their environment and to democratize access to measurements and science.”
In 2001, social theorist bell hooks warned about the dangers of a loveless zeitgeist. In All About Love: New Visions, she lamented the lack of an ongoing public discussion . . . about the practice of love in our culture and in our lives.
Back then, the internet was at a crossroads. The dot-com crash had bankrupted many early internet companies, and people wondered if the technology was long for this world.
The doubts were unfounded. In only a few decades, the internet has merged with our bodies as smartphones and mined our personalities via algorithms that know us more intimately than some of our closest friends. It has even constructed a secondary social world.
Yet as the internet has become more integrated in our daily lives, few would describe it as a place of love, compassion, and cooperation. Study after study describe how social media platforms promote alienation and disconnectionin part because many algorithms reward behaviors like trolling, cyberbullying, and outrage.
Is the internets place in human history cemented as a harbinger of despair? Or is there still hope for an internet that supports collective flourishing?
Algorithms and alienation
I explore these questions in my new book, Attention and Alienation.
In it, I explain how social media companies profits depend on users investing their time, creativity, and emotions. Whether its spending hours filming content for TikTok or a few minutes crafting a thoughtful Reddit comment, participating on these platforms takes work. And it can be exhausting.
Even passive engagement, like scrolling through feeds and lurking in forums, consumes time. It might feel like free entertainmentuntil people recognize they are the product, with their data being harvested and their emotions being manipulated.
Blogger, journalist, and science fiction writer Cory Doctorow coined the term enshittification to describe how experiences on online platforms gradually deteriorate as companies increasingly exploit users data and tweak their algorithms to maximize profits.
For these reasons, much of peoples time spent online involves dealing with toxic interactions or mindlessly doomscrolling, immersed in dopamine-driven feedback loops.
This cycle is neither an accident nor a novel insight. Hate and mental illness fester in this culture because love and healing seem to be incompatible with profits.
Care hiding in plain sight
In his 2009 book Envisioning Real Utopias, the late sociologist Erik Olin Wright discusses places in the world that prioritize cooperation, care and egalitarianism.
Wright mainly focused on offline systems like worker-owned cooperatives. But one of his examples lived on the internet: Wikipedia. He argued that Wikipedia demonstrates the ethos from each according to ability, to each according to needa utopian ideal popularized by Karl Marx.
Wikipedia still thrives as a nonprofit, volunteer-run bureaucracy. The website is a form of media that is deeply social, in the literal sense: People voluntarily curate and share knowledge, collectively and democratically, for free. Unlike social media, the rewards are only collective.
There are no visible likes, comments, or rage emojis for participants to hoard and chase. Nobody loses and everyone wins, including the vast majority of people who use Wikipedia without contributing work or money to keep it operational.
Building a new digital world
Wikipedia is evidence of care, cooperation, and love hiding in plain sight.
In recent years, there have been more efforts to create nonprofit apps and websites that are committed to protecting user data. Popular examples include Signal, a free and open source instant messaging service, and Proton Mail, an encrypted email service.
These are all laudable developments. But how can the internet actively promote collective flourishing?
In Viral Justice: How We Grow the World We Want, sociologist Ruha Benjamin points to a way forward. She tells the story of Black TikTok creators who led a successful cultural labor strike in 2021. Many viral TikTok dances had originally been created by Black artists, whose accounts, they claimed, were suppressed by a biased algorithm that favored white influencers.
TikTok responded to the viral #BlackTikTokStrike movement by formally apologizing and making commitments to better represent and compensate the work of Black creators. These creators demonstrated how social media engagement is workand that workers have the power to demand equitable conditions and fair pay.
This landmark strike showed how anyone who uses social media companies that profit off the work, emotions, and personal data of their userswhether its TikTok, X, Facebook, Instagram, or Redditcan become organized.
Meanwhile, there are organizations devoted to designing an internet that promotes collective flourishing. Sociologist Firuzeh Shokooh Valle provides examples of worker-owned technology cooperatives in her 2023 book, In Defense of Solidarity and Pleasure: Feminist Technopolitics in the Global South. She highlights the Sulá Batsú co-op in Costa Rica, which promotes policies that seek to break the stranglehold that negativity and exploitation have over internet culture.
Digital spaces are increasingly powered by hate and discrimination, the group writes, adding that it hopes to create an online world where women and people of diverse sexualities and genders are able to access and enjoy a free and open internet to exercise agency and autonomy, build collective power, strengthen movements, and transform power relations.
In Los Angeles, theres Chani Inc., a technology company that describes itself as proudly not funded by venture capitalists. The Chani app blends mindfulness practices and astrology with the goal of simply helping people. The app is not designed for compulsive user engagement, the company never sells user data, and there are no comments sections.
No comments
What would social media look like if Wikipedia were the norm instead of an exception?
To me, a big problem in internet culture is the way peoples humanity is obscured. People are free to speak their minds in text-based public discussion forums, but the words arent always attached to someones identity. Real people hide behind the anonymity of user names. It isnt true human interaction.
In Attention and Alienation, I argue that the ability to meet and interact with others online as fully realized, three-dimensional human beings would go a long way toward creating a more empathetic, cooperative internet.
When I was 8 years old, my parents lived abroad for work. Sometimes we talked on the phone. Often I would cry late into the night, praying for the ability to see them through the phone. It felt like a miraculous possibilitylike magic.
I told this story to my students in a moment of shared vulnerability. This was in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic, so the class was taking place over videoconferencing. In these online classes, one person talked at a time. Others listened.
It wasnt perfect, but I think a better internet would promote this form of discussion: people getting together from across the world to share the fullness of their humanity.
Efforts like Clubhouse have tapped into this vision by creating voice-based discussion forums. The company, however, has been criticized for predatory data privacy policies.
What if the next iteration of public social media platforms could build on Clubhouse? What if they brought people together and showcased not just their voices, but also live video feeds of their faces without harvesting their data or promoting conflict and outrage?
Raised eyebrows. Grins. Frowns. Theyre what make humans distinct from increasingly sophisticated large language models and artificial intelligence chatbots like ChatGPT.
After all, is anything you cant say while looking at another human being in the eye worth saying in the first place?
Aarushi Bhandari is an assistant professor of sociology at Davidson College.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Mom guilt is such a familiar phrase that we rarely stop to ask what it really meansor why its so persistent. It describes that quiet, gnawing feeling that many mothers carry: that were not doing enough, not present enough, not loving, patient, or creative enough. That were falling short, even when were doing our best.
But what if that guilt isnt just about personal choices? What if its not a private emotional shortcoming, but a reflection of something much largercultural messages, historical expectations, and systemic gaps that shape how mothers live and feel today?
This essay offers a different way to think about mom guilt: not as a flaw in individual women, but as a symptom of a society that demands too much, offers too little, and then asks mothers to feel bad about the gap.
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A guilt with no off switch
Psychologically, guilt is often defined as a moral emotiona response to doing something wrong and wanting to make it right. But mom guilt rarely stems from a specific mistake. Instead, it often shows up as a vague, persistent sense of inadequacy. It lingers, shapeless but heavy.
Because its so diffuse and constant, mom guilt may be less a personal emotion and more a shared emotional patterna kind of cultural atmosphere. Cultural theorist Raymond Williams called this a structure of feeling: not a formal rule, but a common way of feeling shaped by a particular time and place. In this view, mom guilt isnt just something mothers feelits something weve been taught to feel.
Where did these expectations come from?
To understand how this emotional pattern developed, we need to look at the historical construction of the good mother in American culture.
After World War II, the ideal mother was cast as a full-time homemaker: white, middle-class, married to a breadwinner, and entirely devoted to her children. Her work was invisible but essential, and her worth came from self-sacrifice.
By the 1990s and early 2000s, that ideal had morphed into what sociologist Sharon Hays called intensive mothering: mothers were now expected to be constantly emotionally attuned, manage every detail of their childs development, follow expert advice, and sacrifice their own needs to do it all. And even as more women entered the workforce, this new model still assumed unlimited time, energy, and emotional bandwidth.
The result? Many mothers felt stretched thin, torn between competing demands: be selfless but successful, always available but independent. Mom guilt wasnt a sign of failureit was a natural outcome of being asked to do the impossible.
The role of systemsand their silence
These expectations dont exist in a vacuum. Theyre intensified by how little structural support American families receive. Unlike many wealthy countries, the U.S. offers no guaranteed paid parental leave. Childcare is expensive and hard to access. Most workplaces still operate as if someone else is handling everything at home.
When mothers feel exhausted or overwhelmed, the message they receive is: Try harder. Be more grateful. Find balance. This reflects a deeper cultural logicone that blames individuals for structural problems. In this model, the solution to burnout is self-help, not social change.
Mom guilt thrives in this space. It turns systemic failure into personal shame. It keeps women striving, quiet, and inwardly focusedwondering if theyre doing enough, instead of asking whether society is.
Guilt is gendered
Its also important to say this clearly: mom guilt is not evenly distributed. Fathers, especially in heterosexual partnerships, are rarely expected to feel guilty for long work hours or needing rest. When they show up for parenting, theyre often praised for helping.
Mothers, by contrast, are expected to organize their livesand emotionsaround their childrens needs. Sociologist Arlie Hochschild called this emotional labor: the often invisible work of managing others feelings. In families, mothers are expected to carry the emotional weight. When they fall short, they feel guiltnot just about actions, but about presence, patience, and even joy.
So what do we do with it?
Rather than telling mothers to get over their guilt, we might ask: what is this guilt doing? Who benefits from it?
Mom guilt isnt just a feelingits a social mechanism. It keeps women pushing toward unattainable ideals, keeps them quiet about their needs, and keeps attention focused inward instead of outward. It makes it harder to question the systems that are, in fact, failing us.
Theres no quick fix. But theres power in naming it. When guilt creeps in, we can pause and ask:
Where did this should come from?
Whose expectations am I trying to meet?
What would I needpersonally and structurallyto feel less torn?
These questions wont erase guilt, but they can loosen its grip. They shift the storyfrom one of individual failure to one of cultural clarity and collective care.
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For search and rescue, AI is not more accurate than humans, but it is far faster.
Recent successes in applying computer vision and machine learning to drone imagery for rapidly determining building and road damage after hurricanes or shifting wildfire lines suggest that artificial intelligence could be valuable in searching for missing persons after a flood.
Machine learning systems typically take less than one second to scan a high-resolution image from a drone, versus one to three minutes for a person. Plus, drones often produce more imagery to view than is humanly possible during the critical first hours of a search, when survivors may still be alive.
Unfortunately, todays AI systems are not up to the task.
We are robotics researchers who study the use of drones in disasters. Our experiences searching for victims of flooding and numerous other events show that current implementations of AI fall short.
However, the technology can play a role in searching for flood victims. The key is AI-human collaboration.
AIs potential
Searching for flood victims is a type of wilderness search and rescue that presents unique challenges. The goal for machine learning scientists is to rank which images have signs of victims and to indicate where in those images search-and-rescue personnel should focus. If the responder sees signs of a victim, they pass the GPS location in the image to search teams in the field to check.
The ranking is done by a classifier, which is an algorithm that learns to identify similar instances of objectscats, cars, treesfrom training data in order to recognize those objects in new images. For example, in a search-and-rescue context, a classifier would spot instances of human activity, such as garbage or backpacks, to pass on to wilderness search-and-rescue teams, or even identify the missing person themselves.
A classifier is needed because of the sheer volume of imagery that drones can produce. For example, a single 20-minute flight can produce over 800 high-resolution images. If there are 10 flightsa small numberthere would be over 8,000 images. If a responder spends only 10 seconds looking at each image, it would take over 22 hours of effort. Even if the task is divided among a group of squinters, humans tend to miss areas of images and show cognitive fatigue.
The ideal solution is an AI system that scans the entire image, prioritizes images that have the strongest signs of victims, and highlights the area of the image for a responder to inspect. It could also decide whether the location should be flagged for special attention by search-and-rescue crews.
Where AI falls short
While this seems to be a perfect opportunity for computer vision and machine learning, modern systems have a high error rate. If the system is programmed to overestimate the number of candidate locations in hopes of not missing any victims, it will likely produce too many false candidates. That would mean overloading squinters or, worse, the search-and-rescue teams, which would have to navigate through debris and muck to check the candidate locations.
Developing computer vision and machine learning systems for finding flood victims is difficult for three reasons.
One is that while existing computer vision systems are certainly capable of identifying people visible in aerial imagery, the visual indicators of a flood victim are often very different compared with those for a lost hiker or fugitive. Flood victims are often obscured, camouflaged, entangled in debris, or submerged in water. These visual challenges increase the possibility that existing classifiers will miss victims.
Second, machine learning requires training data, but there are no datasets of aerial imagery where humans are tangled in debris, covered in mud, and not in normal postures. This lack also increases the possibility of errors in classification.
Third, many of the drone images often captured by searchers are oblique views, rather than looking straight down. This means the GPS location of a candidate area is not the same as the GPS location of the drone. It is possible to compute the GPS location if the drones altitude and camera angle are known, but unfortunately, those attributes rarely are. The imprecise GPS location means teams have to spend extra time searching.
How AI can help
Fortunately, with humans and AI working together, search-and-rescue teams can successfully use existing systems to help narrow down and prioritize imagery for further inspection.
In the case of flooding, human remains may be tangled among vegetation and debris. Therefore, a system could identify clumps of debris big enough to contain remains. A common search strategy is to identify the GPS locations of where flotsam has gathered, because victims may be part of these same deposits.
An AI classifier could find debris commonly associated with remains, such as artificial colors and construction debris with straight lines or 90-degree corners. Responders find these signs as they systematically walk the riverbanks and flood plains, but a classifier could help prioritize areas in the first few hours and days, when there may be survivors, and later could confirm that teams didnt miss any areas of interest as they navigated the difficult landscape on foot.
Robin R. Murphy is a professor of computer science and engineering at Texas A&M University.
Thomas Manzini is a PhD student in robotics at Texas A&M University.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Americans are not happy these days. Some of this angst is caused by the state of the world. Americans feel lonely, angry, cynical, and polarized. How are we supposed to do our best work considering all that is going on?
But the problem actually goes deeper. We get distracted, seduced, and sabotaged by internal conversations and stories that skew our perceptions and hijack our emotions, ultimately getting in the way of living a happy and fulfilling life and a career that makes us proud. We are carrying around baggage that trips us up, drags us down, and wears us out.
Fortunately, our minds have incredible potential to reprogram and rewire themselves. By expanding our self-awareness, looking directly at our pain, putting life in perspective, and distinguishing what we can and cannot control, we can create the opportunity for change.
As a psychologist who has advised hundreds of top executives and organizations in 55 countries, Ive observed several attachments that keep people stuck, intensifying their anxiety, anger, and sadness and undermining their peace of mind. We are attached to:
Stability
We believe we can create stability and safety in our lives and careers. But there is no such thing. Every time we breathe, the world changes. By fearing change, we risk becoming too attached to stability. Research has shown that having a negative attitude toward uncertainty is associated with heightened anxiety and poor mental health. Theres also a strong association between feeling a sense of gratitude and favorable markers of cardiovascular health. Remember: uncertainty is reality and stability is an illusion. So, confront your fear of the unknown. Step out your comfort zone and embrace new challenges and opportunities. And be grateful for what you have in your life. Its likely you have everything you need right now.
Past
Many of us are living in the past. We idealize or demonize our memories and become immobilized by old emotional scars, relationships that didnt work, or business deals that went sour. Unresolved trauma, self-blame, or nostalgia for happier times are often the cause of our psychological pain. By not facing the truth and practicing forgiveness, we risk becoming too attached to the past. Forgiveness is linked to positive mental health and fewer physical health symptoms. Here we must challenge our limiting beliefs, let go of our grudges, shift the focus to the present moment, and build new connections with colleagues.
Future
Others of us are preoccupied with the future. We obsess over what is missing in our careers. We are never satisfied with who we are or what we have accomplished. By worrying about the future, we diminish our confidence and peace of mind. Here, we miss out on the present moment and believe that happiness exists in the future. Excessive future-oriented thoughts have consistently been linked to higher anxiety and depression. Try letting go of future expectations, stop comparing yourself with others, and relish the small everyday moments.
Control
From early childhood we are taught to shape our environment. We take charge and cleverly influence people to get what we want. Determined to control the uncontrollable, we hide our vulnerabilities and risk becoming too attached to control. Mistrusting others and our own anxiety are often the culprit. Embracing vulnerability can lead to healthier relationships and less emotional and physical pain. So, stop micromanaging your team.
Perfection
We are imperfect by nature. Yet how many of us are ruled by the need to be perfect. Then we impose our perfection on the people around us. By fearing rejection and mistakes and ignoring our need for approval, we risk becoming too attached to perfection. A 2022 study of 16- to 25-year olds found that 85% of participants identified having perfectionist traits that affected their physical and mental well-being. Balancing our work/family/personal lives is never easy. So, do your best, allow room for flexibility, and fall in love with your imperfections.
Success
Many of us get this need met at work. But when our desire for success turns into a compulsive need for achievement, weve got another problem. We define success from the outside in, based on other peoples expectations and not our own. This is driven by our fear of failure and not being good enough. People with an abundant, rather than a scarcity, mindset, are more creative, optimistic, and more unfazed by adverse circumstances. So, prioritize your well-being and happiness, practice self-compassion, and create space for rest and relaxation.
Only when we confront our attachments head on can we drive true change. The result is more joy and freedom, and better performance.
Keep in mind being detached does not mean being uninvolved or disconnected. Quite the opposite. By ridding our attachments, we free ourselves to embrace life fully and stay engaged in what matters.
The new must-have pet accessory? A concrete slab.
On #CatTok, videos are racking up views as cat owners bring slabs into their homes, set them down, and watch their beloved pets sniff, lick, roll, and rub against their new favorite toys. Bonus points if they’re placed in a sunny spot.
@mrmilothechonk I should have bought 3 #foryou #foryoupage #cats #catsoftiktok #viral Almost forgot that this was the whole point – Take my Hand Instrumental – AntonioVivald
The trend appears to have started with an orange tabby named Kurt and his owner, Abram Engle. Kurt loves rolling around on the concrete outside, so Im bringing the concrete to him, Engle explains in a video posted back in May. That video has since gained 4.7 million views and inspired other cat owners to try the DIY enrichment hack for themselves. Some are even taking their cats to Home Depot to pick out their own slabs.
@abrameng Kurt was conking the crete original sound – Abram Engle
Several cat owners have speculated whether their pampered pets former life might have something to do with the attraction. Since Minnow was originally a street cat, I was wondering if she missed being outside on the pavement, one owner theorized. Its safe to say she loved it, and now Im stuck with this new piece of furniture. Or, as one commenter put it, the toe stubber 3000.
@shecatcalls PART 2 | Cat enrichment ideas. The way she sits more on this $7 brick than any of the actual cat beds and huts I buy her Can anyone else relate? Video idea inspired by Kurt the Cat @Abram Engle @The Home Depot #creatorsearchinsights #cats #cattok #sillycat #funny #meow Cute – In Music
If its not nostalgia for a life once spent sleeping rough on the streets, what explains the attachment to what is, after all, just a block of concrete?
While there havent been any formal studies on the phenomenon, Purina pet behaviorist and TikTok user Dr. Annie, aka Annie Valuska, PhD, has a few theories. For one, they’re new and kind of out of place, she explains. Due to cats’ territorial and predatory nature, they really like new stuff.
The material itself may also play a role. Concretes porous surface holds onto scenta major way cats can communicate that a space belongs to them. It also offers a satisfying texture for scratching. And if you park it in the sun? Even better.
It warms up really nicely when its placed in a sunny spot,” Valuska says in one video. “Cats like warmth because they have a higher body temperature than humans do, and they evolved from a species adapted to a warm environment.”
Best of all? Its cheaper than most cat trees or towers.
