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How often have you come across a terrible piece of technology and wondered how it ever made it past the drawing board? Buttons in weird places. Features you’ll never use. Options you need but can’t find. You wonder: who signed this off, and did they ever use it themselves? One thing is for sure – they would’ve benefited from reading product management guru Marty Cagan's influential book Inspired: How to Create Tech Products Customers Love. It focuses on “product teams” – the

More than thirty years ago, Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park captivated audiences with its amber-encased DNA, lab-grown dinosaurs, and a franchise so enduring even Dr. Ian “life, uh… finds a way” Malcolm might not have predicted its staying power. And with the aptly titled Jurassic World Rebirth (yes, there’s another one!) roaring into cinemas this July, it’s the perfect time to ask: how close are we to turning science fiction into fact? These days, with dino DNA long gone

For a few weeks in the summer of 2023, solid-state physics was one of the hottest trending topics on the internet (yes, really !). Social media was flooded with videos of what looked like a small piece of metal levitating above a magnet. Commentators proclaimed that this magical-looking phenomenon was about to change the world in ways we could barely imagine. This floating metal was said to represent a scientific breakthrough more than a century in the making. The “holy gra

Back in the days of cavemen, motivation was as primal as it gets: eat, drink, mate – and try not to get trampled by a woolly mammoth. Jump ahead to the Industrial Revolution, and things changed. Work became more structured, more repetitive, and more hierarchical. A new kind of motivation emerged – external incentives built on the logic of reward and punishment. Or, as it’s more commonly known, “the carrot and the stick.” This extrinsic model still dominates the workplace toda

If you ever land a job interview with Peter Thiel – the tech entrepreneur and billionaire investor behind some of Silicon Valley’s biggest names – brace yourself for one big question: What important truth do very few people agree with you on? It’s a tricky question, no doubt, but it offers an intriguing insight into what Thiel values, as he explains in his 2014 bestseller Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future: This question sounds easy […] actually,

When football fans hear the word “messy”, their minds might leap to the elegance and effortless brilliance of Argentinian superstar Lionel Messi dancing through defences. In most other contexts, though, the connotations aren’t usually positive. A cluttered desk, an untidy house or a chaotic schedule can feel like personal failings we need to fix. We’re conditioned to see tidiness as a virtue and order as the foundation of success. But if you’re feeling bad that your desk look

Does “more” always equal “better”? When it comes to things we enjoy – holidays, money, gadgets, convenience – it seems obvious that the answer must be a resounding “yes.” We equate “more” with progress. Businesses promise more products for their customers and more returns for their shareholders. Charities aim to provide more support to greater numbers of people. Content creators hope for more readers, views and subscribers. Politicians continually promise more economic growt

Did you know ice cream causes drowning? Well, not really – but if you trust statistics blindly then it might appear that way. On hot days, ice cream sales soar, and so do swimming-related accidents. It’s the kind of statistical mischief Darrell Huff warned about more than half a century ago in his best-selling classic How to Lie with Statistics. First published in 1954, Huff’s guide teaches us how to spot some of the numerical nonsense that still fills headlines, social media

What’s the formula for success? Hard work? Talent? Grit? That’s what we’re often told. But what if there’s another important ingredient that we rarely acknowledge? The truth is that luck plays a much greater role in success than we like to admit. Whether we’re talking pop megastars, entrepreneurs or world leaders, random chance can be the difference that helps some people make it to the top. So why do we overlook the role of luck? And, if we’re all at the mercy of random chan

In January 2020, Detroit Police pulled up outside the home of Robert Julian-Borchak Williams and arrested him in front of his wife and two daughters. His crime? Stealing five watches from a shop that he’d never even visited. Despite protesting his innocence, Robert spent nearly 30 hours behind bars before being released on bail. Eventually, the truth emerged – an AI-powered facial recognition system had mistaken him for another Black man. This was the first documented case

Deciding what to eat has never been more complicated – with endless diet plans, conflicting advice and science that seems to change every week. Why has it been so difficult for nutritionists to agree on what makes for a healthy diet? And could advances in wearable technology and personalised testing finally offer a definitive answer? Tuck into my short explainer video to find out more: Is this healthy? Imagine you’ve just woken up to breakfast – a bowl of muesli, eggs on to

Innovation can be a high-stakes tightrope walk. Successful companies must continually refine and enhance their existing products to stay ahead – this is called sustaining innovation . But sometimes, a new and unexpected disruptive innovation will sneak in and rewrite the rules entirely. When this happens, even industry leaders can fall down. It’s a pattern we see play out time and again. Kodak, once the world’s leading photography company, failed to keep pace with the adve

NASA’s Artemis program is about to send humans back to the Moon for the first time in over 50 years. Or is it? Artemis was set to make history by landing the first woman and first person of colour on the lunar surface. It aimed to lay the groundwork for a permanent Moon base, which some see as key to eventually reaching Mars. But amid political upheaval in the US, the future of Artemis now looks precarious. Might NASA be about to take a giant detour and head straight for the

What do Bill Gates, The Beatles and Canadian ice hockey stars have in common? Clue: the answer isn’t just that they are phenomenally successful… We’re often told that success comes down to talent and effort – the most able and hardest working are the ones who achieve wealth, fame and power. But what if there’s another secret ingredient that we’re missing? In the latest iluli video , we explored the critical role of luck in helping those who rise to the top. It’s a theme run

Since Alexander Fleming stumbled upon penicillin nearly a century ago, antibiotics have saved hundreds of millions of lives. They’re so widely used that it’s easy to forget that they’re among the most revolutionary medical breakthroughs in history. But we now face a grave problem: they’re becoming less effective and may soon stop working altogether. This is because bacteria are becoming increasingly resistant. Does this rise of “superbugs” threaten to return us to an era of u

With February fast approaching, how’s that “New Year, New You” transformation shaping up? Every January, the multi-billion-pound diet and fitness industries cash in on our annual resolutions to get healthier. We dive into fad diets and sign up for gym memberships that are billed monthly whether we show up or not. The result? A cycle of optimism, guilt, and auto-renewals. But perhaps the age of best intentions being matched by vague solutions is coming to an end. Enter the sci

“There’s more space in your life than you think!” Next year, NASA will send humans back to the moon for the first time in more than 50 years. And there’s good reason to believe that this new era of space exploration might benefit us in more ways than we realise. In a recent video we looked at NASA’s Artemis program. Should we be excited? Well, if you are someone who gets slightly giddy at the prospect of lunar colonies and humans making it to Mars – absolutely! But you don

From space travel to smartphones, many of today’s groundbreaking inventions first appeared in fiction. But beyond predicting new technologies, science fiction can tell us something much more important. It invites us to imagine not just what’s possible, but the kind of future we want to create. Here’s my short explainer on the subject: Predicting the future I’m going to take an educated guess that your introduction to many of today’s technological marvels came from the film

What does 2025 have in store for us gadget fanatics? A special blend of nostalgia and innovation, it would seem… This year, innovation is shaping up to be less about flashy breakthroughs and more about revisiting and refining what we already know – sometimes with a surprising twist. From breathing new life into old gadgets with AI enhancements to embracing the minimalist charm of less-is-more tech, 2025 promises a captivating blend of the familiar and the futuristic. Think ge

So the moment has finally arrived for AI to receive the Apple treatment. Marketed as “ AI for the rest of us ” and “personal intelligence right where you need it,” Apple Intelligence will roll out in the UK as part of updates for the iPhone, iPad, and Mac starting in December 2024. By partnering with ChatGPT – one of the most recognised AI interfaces – Apple will combine established expertise and computational power with its own innovative AI features. With AI proving transfo