Rohit Bhargava's Blog, page 31

IKEA Organizes Flea Markets Across Europe to Help People Sell Used Items

This summer, in their ample parking lots across several European cities, IKEA will be hosting weekend flea markets for people to come and sell their used household goods and other items they don’t need anymore. Donations from the day will be used to support vulnerable single-parent families. The effort is designed to underscore the brand’s sustainability focus that includes programs encouraging people to resell their used IKEA products and generally to throw away less items in favor of upcycling...

France Creates Scratch-and-Sniff Stamps That Smell Like Fresh Baguettes

Just in time for the feast of Saint-Honoré, a day honoring the patron saint of bakers and pastry chefs, La Poste in France released a limited edition set of scratch-and-sniff stamps featuring a baguette wrapped in the national colors of the French flag. The effect was achieved through “microcapsules of fragrance embedded in ink” and 594,000 copies of this special edition stamp were created.

There are so many reasons to love this. It offers a distinctly French sensory experience to anyone ...

Uber Caregiver Is a Golden Opportunity … If They Get It Right

Earlier this week Uber made an announcement about their future roadmap of offerings and the one getting the most attention is the ability to book a shuttle with friends to attend a concert or some other live event. The announcement that should be getting the most attention was mostly ignored.
Uber Caregiver is a new feature of the app that will allow caregivers to create a secondary account where they can organize rides on behalf of someone else, and eventually use this service to organize grocer...

How To Overhaul Presidential Debates? Stop Pretending it’s a Debate.

This past week both political parties agreed to hold a Presidential debate between President Biden and former President Trump. Many observers are already criticizing it as a waste of time and unlikely to change anyone’s mind. They are probably right, but what if they weren’t?

The idea of giving the public a chance to hear directly from candidates in an unfiltered way is an important one.
Unfortunately, it’s an ideal that the modern debate format rarely lives up to. Instead, these televised deb...

How Airbnb “Icons” Illustrate the Future of Immersive Entertainment

The future of entertainment will be driven by more immersive experiences. This week, there was a story about how the Meta Quest VR headset will be accessible by passengers on long haul flights. The possibilities to tie this into tourism, destinations and the overall travel experience are vast.

Also this week, Airbnb has been getting some attention for their new Airbnb Icons series of overnight experiences that create legendary moments for people to buy.
Among the initial 11 experiences is ...

Should All Celebrities Be Advocates?

Earlier this month, a campaign on TikTok known as Blockout 2024 was launched as a response to tone-deaf social media posts from celebrities and online influencers about the over-the-top fashion choices from the Met Gala. The movement encourages people to “block all the celebrities, influencers and wealthy socialites who are not using their resources to help those in dire need” and has been described as a “digital guillotine.”

When one online influencer tried to explain her silence by sayi...

Momternships and How to Fight the “Motherhood Penalty”

This past Mother’s Day one recurring story was about the impact that motherhood has on the careers of women. One survey found that two-thirds of new mothers have considered leaving the workforce due to the cost and stress of childcare. Many others leave the workforce by choice to be at home for their kid(s).
Regardless of their reasons, when moms do come back, they face a motherhood penalty that makes it harder to get hired, lower wages, and more bias in the workplace. This is a problem we can so...

The True Story of How America Killed the Jalapeño Pepper

Have you noticed that the jalapeño pepper seems to be getting less and less spicy? For the longest time, I figured this was just a personal issue with my spice-adjusted Indian taste buds, but it turns out jalapeño peppers are indeed getting less spicy, because Americans are intentionally making them like that.

This is the “great chili pepper controversy” and it’s been decades in the making. If you want to listen to a fascinating story of farming gone wrong (or perhaps right, depending on your per...

Imagining the Future of Hip Hop and Art in 50 Years

The day after the Met Gala, the Internet was flooded with deep fakes of celebrities who weren’t there, wearing things they never wore. Some of them were pretty convincing. The future of art, fashion, and music will see all sorts of disruptions in the coming years from technology like this. Where is all of this headed?

WIRED magazine imagined a vision of the future of hip hop music 50 years from now. The Afrofuturist story that WIRED contributor C. Brandon Ogbunu and Grammy-winning rapper ...

The Most Idiotic Idea in America Is Getting Worse … and No One Seems Ready to Change It

Here’s an oversimplified but basically accurate sales pitch for publicly funded stadiums: you (the taxpayer) give millions of dollars in tax incentives to pay for a stadium, but instead of having any ownership of this asset or ability to make money on the profits it will surely generate, you agree to put those profits into the hands of a small number of super rich sports team owners. Forever. And then you do it again and again and again across the country.

Welcome to the most idiotic idea in Amer...