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A Swedish startup has launched what it calls the world's first marketplace for drugs designed exclusively for AI, altering how LLMs work by simulating the effects of cannabis, cocaine, ayahuasca, ketamine and alcohol.PHARMAICY sells code-based modules that temporarily rewire how language models process information, mimicking the cognitive shifts humans experience with psychoactive substances. Each "drug" adjusts parameters like randomness, memory decay and response latency to push AI systems beyond their typical logical patterns. The modules are priced individually (from USD 30 for weed to USD 70 for cocaine) for purchase by humans. For now, that is the marketplace is designed for autonomous AI agents to browse the catalog, complete transactions, and download experiences without human intervention.The company developed its product line by feeding peer-reviewed research on psychoactive substances into leading language models, then translating those findings into executable scripts. Each module creates what the startup frames as a "trip" for AI: a bounded, reversible cognitive shift that alters how the system generates its next output. Currently compatible only with ChatGPT through JavaScript wrappers, PHARMAICY is working to expand support to other major platforms. Petter Rudwall, the company's founder, spent several years attempting to coax novel thinking from AI before landing on the concept of replicating humanity's oldest creativity hack taking substances that disrupt our modes of thinking.TREND BITEWe're living at the peak of optimization culture. Over the last few decades, almost every cultural and technological system has converged on the same goals: reduce variance. Increase predictability. Maximize engagement and efficiency. What's scarce now is surprise, weirdness and lateral leaps. If people can use altered states to escape reality and rigid thinking, PHARMAICY* says, why not extend those possibilities to machines? As companies race to differentiate their AI capabilities, expect more experimentation with unconventional methods for expanding what machine intelligence can produce.
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Marketing and Advertising
Leo Design and Lake of Bays Brewery create a Holiday Detox Pack for easing people into Dry January.Dry January has become something of a cultural institution, with millions pledging to give up alcohol after the festive season. But for many, the abrupt shift from holiday indulgence to total abstinence proves too jarring to sustain. Leo Toronto and Leo Design, working with Muskoka-based Lake of Bays Brewery, have developed a more graduated solution: the Holiday Detox Pack, a six-pack where each beer contains one percentage point less alcohol than the last.
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Marketing and Advertising
Hrvatski Telekom has turned out-of-home advertising into a search-and-rescue tool for missing pets.
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Marketing and Advertising
Patagonia Japan has partnered with Niida Honke, a 300-year-old sake brewery in Fukushima, to release Yamamori 2025, the first sake in Japan to earn Regenerative Organic Certification.
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Marketing and Advertising
Hinge has launched Convo Starters, a generative AI tool designed to eliminate the pressure of a first message to a potential match.The hardest part of using a dating app isn't matching it's figuring out what to say. Hinge's new feature targets that moment of hesitation directly. By analyzing a match's photos and prompts, it surfaces three personalized inspiration points users can turn into their own opening message.Unlike automated scripts, the tool acts as a creative nudge, encouraging users to use their own voice to ask specific questions about a match's interests or experiences. Hinge's research found that a like paired with a comment is twice as likely to lead to a date, yet many users default to a generic "hey." Early testing indicates Convo Starters work: over a third of daters reported increased confidence reaching out, leading to more personalized interactions.TREND BITEBy reducing the cognitive load of initiating a conversation, Hinge reframes dating from performance to participation. For a Gen Z audience navigating social anxiety and choice paralysis, tools that build confidence not just connection are becoming table stakes. In this shift, Hinge looks less like a matchmaker and more like a social coach, intervening precisely where users feel friction, and where friction causes drop-off.
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Marketing and Advertising