Posts by Swedan Margen
The Race to Give Every Child a Toy
Actually, they did want to be. There is a reason Morris Michtom moved his family from the Lower East Side to the row houses of Brooklyn as soon as he could. (When his youngest son was born, in the back of his Tompkins Avenue candy store, he named him Benjamin Franklin; he might as well…
Read MoreBad Bunny’s All-American Super Bowl Halftime Show
Bad Bunny arrived on the Super Bowl stage wearing a silver trenchcoat and a matching do-rag. He delivered a perfectly incendiary verse in which he declared, “Viva la raza!,” and then he disappeared—and no one really seemed to mind. The year was 2020, and Bad Bunny was appearing as a special guest of Shakira, who…
Read MoreThe Eighty-Six Wants You to Want In
Exclusivity, like any product, gets more valuable the more people want it; it is both the cruellest and the most honest thing that a restaurant can sell. The Eighty-Six, a mega-swank steak house that opened in the West Village last fall, was, from Day One, clubby, celeb-packed, and impossible to get into—no surprise, as it’s…
Read MoreWhat Do We Want from a Protest Song?
He is also sitting in front of a screen. “Am I the only one willin’ to bleed / Or take a bullet for bein’ free / Screamin’ ‘What the fuck?’ at my TV?” Lewis bellows. This oscillation between rage at one’s own powerlessness and fantasies of violence is the song’s motive force. It could be…
Read MorePhotographs of Mali on the Cusp of Independence
We see this, for example, in an untitled portrait sometimes called “Two Ladies of Bamako.” Here, Keïta captures a pair of women—holding each other at the shoulders and the hands—dressed in traditional Malian robe-like garments called boubou. Behind them is a printed-fabric backdrop, and at their feet, a woven rug tessellated with oval patterns. Enveloped…
Read MoreAI’s latest 20-something billionaire got his start at L.A. garage sales
The man set to become one of the world’s youngest artificial intelligence billionaires started his entrepreneurial journey as a bored preteen living in Los Angeles. When Ali Ansari was 12, living with his family in a single room at his aunt’s house in Woodland Hills, his immigrant mother told him to stop wasting time staring…
Read MoreEurope: Stoxx 600 rebounds in broad based gains; Stellantis plunge drags auto stocks
Published Sat, Feb 7, 2026 · 08:52 AM [BENGALURU] Europe’s benchmark share index rose on Friday (Feb 6) in a largely broad-based rebound from the prior session’s losses, as investors assessed a mixed bag of earnings from companies including carmaker Stellantis and defence firm Kongsberg. The pan-European Stoxx 600 was up 0.9 per cent at…
Read More7 ways to run small scale paid tests to validate marketing channels
If you are early-stage and bootstrapped or close to it, every dollar you spend on marketing feels heavier than it should. You know you need distribution, but you also know that betting big on the wrong channel can quietly kill your runway. Most founders do not fail at marketing because they lack creativity. They fail…
Read MoreAmericans in line for more beef from Argentina
President Trump is allowing Argentina to send an additional 80,000 tons of beef to U.S. markets in an attempt to reduce sky-high consumer prices. Source link
Read MoreVirginia’s Clownish Redistricting Scheme | National Review
None of this is worthy of a state with one of the finest political traditions in America. Source link
Read More7 reasons raising too much money too soon makes you weaker
There is a moment many founders quietly fantasize about. The big check clears. The bank balance looks real. You finally feel like you can breathe. In the startup world, raising capital is treated like validation, momentum, and safety all wrapped into one. But here is the uncomfortable truth most people only learn after the wire…
Read MoreGOP Rep. Mark Amodei to retire from Congress
Nevada’s sole Republican in Congress, Rep. Mark Amodei, will be retiring after eight terms. Source link
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