This article is about one of the honorees of Fast Company’s first Next Big Things in Tech awards. Read about all the winners here. A woman named Hepburn is on my screen speaking my words, warmly, professionally, smiling in a sharp blue blazer, like a TV reporter or one of those improbably clear-skinned creators who make their living on YouTube. Then there’s a small clue: she mispronounces COVID like Ovid. The truth is, Hepburn lives in the cloud, and had been summoned just a few mi
On her first full day as the mayor of Boston, Michelle Wu asked the Boston City Council for $8 million in order to make three city bus lines free for two years. The idea of fare-free public transit may sound surprising, particularly for those used to swiping or tapping their transit cards as part of their daily routine, or people who have noticed fares steadily ticking up over the years as transit lines struggle with their operational budgets (a trend that has only worsened during the pandemic,
The creator economy’s growth has spawned a patchwork of services aimed at becoming key assets in a creator’s tool kit. Various website builders, merchandise stores, membership platforms, and so forth are stitched together to create a comprehensive strategy for generating social commerce, which, according to market-research company eMarketer, is expected to rise nearly 36% this year to hit $36.6 billion. Clearly, there’s no shortage of creators who have made cobbling services
For folks who want to protect their privacy, using an Android phone can feel like a compromise. While Apple has been aggressive about building anti-tracking tools into iOS, Google is still working on a way to let Android users opt out of being tracked across apps. And unlike Apple, Google—whose whole business is based on keeping tabs on users to target advertising—won’t require app makers to get opt-in permission if they want to track you in the first place. So now, privacy-
Elon Musk is almost ready to light SpaceX’s biggest candle yet. In a video appearance at a space-science conference on Wednesday, he predicted the two-stage, fully reusable Starship rocket could make its first orbital launch early next year. “The first orbital flight, we’re hoping to do in January,” “We’ll be complete with the launch pad and launch tower later this month,” the SpaceX founder and Tesla CEO said at the fall meeting of the Natio
Earlier this week, Spotify dropped some culture-rattling news: J.J. Abrams’s production company Bad Robot will now be creating podcasts for the streaming platform in an exclusive, first-look deal. It’s the kind of announcement observers have come to expect from Spotify, whose foray into podcasting has been defined by splashy content deals with the likes of Joe Rogan, Dax Shepard (via his popular Armchair Expert podcast), Michelle Obama, and The Ringer, Bill Simmons’s sports
As ever-more aspects of our personal and professional lives go virtual, there’s boundless opportunity for technologists to rethink how we communicate with each other. At the same time, content creators are getting powerful new tools for producing Hollywood-quality media without a Hollywood budget. These Experiences winners and honorable mentions in Fast Company’s inaugural Next Big Things in Tech awards cover both types of innovations and are transforming homes, workplaces, cars, a
If you’ve been following the news in 2021, you can be forgiven for harboring deep skepticism about the technology industry’s use of artificial intelligence and big data—which, in worst-case scenarios, poses a threat a threat to everything from our privacy to public health. But all the news is not bad. These products, services, and technologies leverage AI and data to address an array of very real problems, including bias at work, online fraud, and the challenge of keeping vo
With the planet in crisis, some of the most impactful technological advancements today are focused on lessening humanity’s impact on the planet. The Sustainability winners of Fast Company’s inaugural Next Big Things in Tech awards are creating batteries that can power a renewable future. They’re reducing food waste (or turning it into fertilizer), making our appliances more efficient, and recycling everything from wood scraps and shingles to lithium-ion batteries. See a full
As the past few years have demonstrated, the world of finance is ripe for disruption. And it’s not just cryptocurrencies that are upending this space. Among the winners of Fast Company‘s inaugural Next Big Things in Tech awards are companies that are finding new ways to eliminate age-old problems, such as Zest AI, which is tackling discrimination in lending. Others are taking on decidedly more 21st-century problems, like Mastercard, which is layering on protections for credit card