Rohit Bhargava's Blog, page 50

Can Shaming Agencies Create a Talent Rebellion Against “Unworthy” Brands?

A environmental activist group that calls themselves Clean Creatives is “once again calling out ad agencies that have contracts with fossil fuel companies in a series of billboards across New York.” The strategy behind this makes sense: shame creative professionals to pressure them into not taking work with certain companies and create a talent drain. The problem is, it is a tough sell.

The main reason is because when you work on these sorts of campaigns, your brain manages to find the nuance...

How Bottled Water Took Over the World

In case you’re wondering who to blame for the popularity of disposable water bottles and the environmental catastrophe they have fueled – you could start with Perrier, the brand that first launched the craze in 1978 with a huge advertising campaign in the US. But reducing it down to a single villain brand wouldn’t tell the whole story. The history of the rise of water bottles is much more complex and that story is explored in a new book called Unbottled which details how water bottles have “exac...

Necrobotics, Electrified Chopsticks and Other Winners of the 2023 Annual Ig Nobel Awards

You might be tempted to lump the Ig Nobel Awards in with the Darwin Awards as simply a celebration of human stupidity – but it’s much more. Back in 1991 they were created to honor “achievements that first make people laugh and then make them think.” The award ceremony has the memorably brilliant requirement that experts “explain their work twice: once in 24 seconds and the second in just seven words.” The entire program feels like both a parody of the Nobel Prize, and a celebration of human curi...

The Subscription-Fueled Future of Car “Ownership”

Last year, Mercedes launched a feature in their electric cars that would allow drivers to pay $60 per month for an “Acceleration Increase” that would boost their car’s acceleration speed by 1 second when going from zero to sixty. BMW announced (and quickly abandoned) their wildly unpopular idea of charging car owners $18 per month to use the heated seats in their cars. The car is becoming a modern-day battleground to define the future of ownership. What do (or should) you really be entitled to g...

The Inevitability of AI Trip Planners

A few months ago, I was planning a trip to Croatia and approached a few online travel agents offering a customized holiday itinerary. I took the bait and filled in a few online forms, which triggered a handful of immediate emails letting me know a “travel professional” was working on my itinerary. An hour later, I had a 15-page PDF sent to me with a full itinerary for all the things I could do. 

This was supposedly from an expert human travel expert, but the process was obviously highly automated...

The Creator of the Greatest Software Ever Invented Just Died

Dennis Austin just died and I feel like he deserves a bit of a tribute. Maybe even a parade. He’s the co-inventor, along with Michael Gaskins, of the greatest software product ever imagined: PowerPoint. Yes, I said it. PowerPoint is the best software for communicators. I use it for everything. Giving talks. Designing images. Laying out postcards. Collecting research. The only thing that I don’t use this magically flexible tool for is writing. It’s the technology equivalent of red chili powder. I...

“Brotox” and the Men’s Cosmetic Procedure Boom

The cheek implant was the fastest-growing men’s aesthetic procedure this past year, according to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons. This so-called boom in “brotox” procedures, which includes everything from lip augmentations to butt lifts, is evidence of a growing willingness and social acceptance among men to consider undergoing beauty procedures.

It may also be an example of how the beauty industry “reached a point of total saturation when it comes to making women feel insecure about the...

7-Eleven Japan Tests Palm Scanner to Check If You Are Eating Veggies

Radar speed scanners slow down drivers by showing them how fast they are going. The awareness creates the behavior change. Could the same idea shift how we eat?

In Japan, 7-Eleven is testing a Vege-Check palm scanner that “uses reflection spectroscopy to measure carotenoid levels in a person’s skin.” These are the biomarkers that can estimate the amount of fruits and vegetables someone has eaten. In 30 seconds, a palm scanner reads customer’s palms and tells them their “vegetable intake level” on...

The Magical Mashup of National Parks and a Nobel Laureate’s Poetry

Ada Limón, the current US poet laureate, is teaming up with the U.S. National Park Service and the Poetry Society of America to put two things that inarguably belong together into the same space. If you are a reader of poetry, you already know the transformative experience that can come from reading words woven with emotion. National Parks also inspire a sense of wonder and allow for deeper self-reflection.

The newly announced “You Are Here: Poetry in Parks” initiative will start with seven parks...

12 Wild Stories from a Nightlife Concierge in Ibiza

An alternate title for this article could easily have been: “Ibiza: Where Rich Assholes Go to Party.” That’s the impression you’ll pretty immediately have as you start reading these stories from a writer who spent just a week working as a concierge managing wealthy client demands at a top resort in “Ibitha” – as it’s often pronounced by those trying hard to belong amongst the cool crowd and fit in. Many of the stories, in fact, do seem to underscore the truth of this stereotype. 

His job entailed...