Rohit Bhargava's Blog, page 40

How Chewable Beverages Could Make a Comeback … and Be the Future

The 90s were a decade for grunge music and inventive beverages. The Orbitz was a soft drink described rather unappetizingly as “a lava lamp you could drink” and featured floating sugary chunks of tapioca in a more disgusting precursor to the Boba tea craze. While this concept of floating chunks of something in a drink is still dated, there is some precedent for experimentation in this area.

One Indian chef a few years ago, for example, went viral with her recipe for Masala Coke — a  drink that ba...

Mean Girls Fans Outraged to Discover the Movie Is a Musical

There was a time in my life when I would experience a movie in a theater without ever having seen a trailer for it. I was living in Australia and that time introduced me to seeing a film without any preconceptions. Movie trailers have always been notorious for giving away the entire plot of a film in their quest to sell it. But they are harder and harder to avoid thanks to YouTube. 

This week, some moviegoers had an inverted experience of this … seeing a movie that didn’t seem to match the traile...

Why “Made in Dubai” Will Be the Next Global Brand

Dubai has an ambitious plan to become a global brand, and it starts with hospitality. The emirate already brings in nearly twice the tourist spending of London, hosts world-class events and is home to what many consider the world’s best airline in Emirates. Dubai’s ruling sheikh, Mohammed bin Rashid, also launched his Dubai Economic Agenda which aims to double the size of the economy over the next ten years. All of this in a place that is rapidly running out of space. 

The Dubai brand, therefore,...

What Really Happens When ChatGPT Writes Your Sales Copy …

Introducing Glüxkind Rosa: The Future of Parenting. Rosa is not just a stroller; it’s a revolutionary AI-powered companion designed to make parenting effortless and enjoyable. Rosa is essentially a “Fractional Nanny.” Its lightweight design, premium materials, and affordability make it an essential tool for enhancing family adventures. Experience the next generation of parenting with Glüxkind Rosa.

When you find a piece of hyperbolic nonsense this lazy, it’s hard not to share it. Yes, this is the...

The Truth About Airplane Safety

Airplane micro-disasters have been in the news lately. I call them micro because loss of life was avoided, but collisions and a door blowing out of a plane is enough to worry any regular traveler. So it was heartening to read a piece this week by Princeton professor Zeynep Tufekci about the broader view that every accident and the response to it might be an unheralded example of things going right.

As she goes on to explain, the “no blame” process of investigating accidents encourages people to b...

Welcome to the Industrial Metaverse … It Might Actually Change Everything

Most of us know the metaverse as a science-fiction imagined place where might create an avatar and GO to do virtual things. Siemens’ vision for the metaverse is much different, as CEO Dr. Roland Busch noted in a standing-room-only keynote presentation to open CES where he promoted the industrial metaverse as the key to bridging the gap between the virtual world and the real one. The presentation brought examples from racing to factory design in order to bring to life the idea of “digital twins” ...

Will 2024 Be the Year Cities Finally Ditch Parking Minimums?

What if the one of the biggest reasons for poverty and homelessness in cities wasn’t a lack of money or ballooning health care costs, but rather the longstanding real estate mandate for ample parking spaces? One of the most eye-opening books I considered for our book awards program this year was Paved Paradise, which suggested that unnecessarily high zoning requirements for parking were the single biggest factor preventing more affordable housing.

This week an NPR article suggested that perhaps t...

Mickey Mouse Enters the Public Domain … Here’s What It Means

The first big meme of the year is Mickey Mouse finally entering the public domain, which means creators can use the iconic Disney character to create their own projects. Or does it? As this video explains, there is a difference between a character that is copyrighted and one that has a trademark.

Not to mention there is a difference between the original Steamboat Willie cartoon that inspired Mickey Mouse (which is public domain) and all the stories featuring Mickey Mouse or the movies or anything...

A Rare Roundup of African Startups and Countries to Watch in 2024

In the process of curating this newsletter every week, I read a lot of stories about startups and innovation. Hardly any feature case studies from the continent of Africa. The fact that African innovation is widely ignored probably isn’t much of a surprise to anyone who comes from that ecosystem … but it’s a fact that we all need to try and help change in this new year.

To that end, this week I want to share an article from one of my favorite African tech sources: TechSafari written by Caleb Maru...

The World’s Biggest Tech Trade Show: CES 2024

Coming back to work last week, my inbox was filled with pitches about products, technologies, and innovations that are launching at CES this week. I was honored to be invited as an Innovation Award Judge this year and I’m here covering the show and working on my usual recap of the most non-obvious stories I find.

Already some of the early reports from the show are focusing on AI, generational shifts, and accessibility. I am also joining a panel along with my son to talk about Gen Z media habits a...