Investment platforms

Ralph Lauren offers several faithful online walk-throughs of its stores; I dropped in on the Beverly Hills location, because I’ve been there and wanted to see how the digital version compared. A much more comprehensive experience than Cost Plus World Market’s World of Joy, it offers a side menu that lists departments, eliminating the need to “walk” through the space to get to a specific department. Unlike the silent World of Joy, it plays music, which adds to the experience. And because it’s an online recreation of an actual store—not just a temporary setup—there’s a richness and depth to the interior. … [Read more...] about These virtual stores are a joyful twist on e-commerce

With public support for active travel growing, we’ve seen a resurgence in interest in urban mobility and the redesigning of our cities for the future, where active travel is deemed as an equal form of transport. Governments around the world are fast coming under pressure to reassess their current infrastructure plans and create sustainable and healthier cities. … [Read more...] about The pandemic created a biking explosion. How can cities make it permanent?

Data science literacy The use of technology at scale over the last several decades has resulted in the collection of vast amounts of data. Governments, nonprofits, and corporations are increasingly interested in “mining” this data for information that increases efficiencies, improves financial returns, and identifies trends. No matter your role, if you are to participate in critical workplace conversations or recommend courses of action based on supporting data, you must understand the basics of data science, including topics like causality, regression analysis, descriptive statistics, and data visualization. … [Read more...] about These are the 3 skills you need to succeed in 2021

Faces like mine I grew up in a community with few other faces like mine. I don’t recall having any Black teachers in school or any Black professors I took classes from in college. Fortunately I had an older brother who looked like me to admire and who blazed a trail, becoming an engineer a few years before me. But for most of my life, I rarely saw Black engineers or scientists in the real world or popular culture except in an occasional article, poster, or TV segment in February, Black History Month. In retrospect those were mostly about George Washington Carver, a science rock star, but it became a bit repetitive. … [Read more...] about How Chadwick Boseman’s Black Panther inspired this Black engineer