Benjamin Butz-Weidner

Transforming the world: Product Engineering meets Generative AI

How to accelerate time to value in digital product engineering

What is Blockchain Technology? | UST

Blockchain is a distributed ledger technology that can be used to record transactions and track assets. Learn more about this technology and its benefits here.

Our Nostalgic Collective: Why Instagram Dwells on a Bygone Era

The classic ride parked in the carport of a mid-century home at the top of a well-watered green hill. A rundown gas station, desolate, neon glowing in the mist of night. A laundromat full of chrome, empty except for a handsome young man in a white T-shirt, jeans, and red Converse high-tops.

Citizen of the Week: Donte Fassett

Donte Fassett is a classically trained chef and caterer, who has operated everything from food trucks to fish markets. So he knows a thing or two about food. And what Fassett knew, in 2015, was that the processed and prepackaged food his son, Mason, was being served at his West Oak Lane daycare was not up to par.

What can your business do to still help people in the time of Corona?

It would be an understatement to say these are interesting times; after all, it isn't everyday you live through a rampant, incurable viral pandemic. While shops and public spaces have shuttered their doors to decrease potential for the coronavirus (Covid-19) to spread, people everywhere are trying to figure out how to go about business as ...

How Amazon's HQ2 Presents an Opportunity for the Democratic Socialist Movement to Prove Itself

Co-opting Amazon's corporate privilege to get a high-speed rail system for everyone else. This month, Amazon, a multi-billion dollar company best known for its e-commerce platform, Web Services, and video streaming service, announced that it would be opening at least two new locations as part of its HQ2 initiative.

Four Essential Tips For Marketing Your Ecommerce Businesses in 2020

Online shopping statistics show that while the majority of consumer spending is still made at brick and mortar stores, independent ecommerce stores that are direct to consumer are indeed on the rise.

Rural towns are leaning into remote work, and it might save them

Cities have resurged to the forefront of American culture and capitalism in the past few decades. The tech and finance industries have brought untold wealth to elite cities like New York and San Francisco, while vanishing manufacturing and coal jobs have devastated rural communities. The sharpening economic urban-rural divide this ...

10 Coachella Looks That Fancy Troubles Can't Get Over

If you're looking to make a statement with an outfit, take a page out of this girl's book. @jamienkidd danced with butterflies, bringing a whimsical spin to the staple white festival dress with a long, flowing back to resemble wings.

Interviews with Da Hongfei & Li Jun

My meetings with the founder of NEO and Onchain's CEO, and the chief architect of Onchain's newest project, the Ontology Network. This Monday I had the pleasure of attending the launch of the Ontology Network, a new ecosystem designed to interlink blockchains and enhance trust and speed across the Internet.

Bellesa is the "Unapologetically Bold" Company Making Inroads in the Adult Entertainment Industry...

CONTENT WARNING: THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS GRAPHIC AND ADULT CONTENT, DISCUSSES PORNOGRAPHY, MISOGYNY, THEMES OF GENDERED VIOLENCE IN ADULT ENTERTAINMENT, AND SEXUAL VIOLENCE.***** By Benjamin Butz-Weidner Interview By Benjamin Butz-Weidner and Molly Harris Pictures and Video by Ameer Alba Have you ever been in the mood but alone?

Ontology Network Launched In New York

I took the photo and wrote the copy as a ghostwriter, based on piece I'd published days prior.

The Top 10 Cities To Move To from New York Or San Francisco

In San Francisco, the median cost of a house is now $1.38m. Renting isn't much better: the average rent for a one-bedroom apartment clocks in at $3,448. In New York City, you can get that one-bedroom for $2,895 a month, while the average Manhattan apartment sets you back $999,000 if ...

A Place We Can All Call Home

In the late 1800s my great-great grandparents emigrated from Germany to the United States. They settled in West Virginia and middle Pennsylvania, eventually finding permanence in North Philadelphia, which until the 1950s was by an unspoken law divided into ethnic enclaves.

Meet Grandson: The McGill Drop-Out Making it in the Music Business, Involved with the Recent...

McGill is frustratingly yet simultaneously a launching pad below you and the force of gravity above you. McGill's name and academic rigor can produce some stellar candidates for jobs in all fields, but breaking the exosphere is a tall order: sometimes the obstacles themselves amount to a force of gravity so great that you simply cannot elevate yourself.

What's wrong with the gig economy?

Attracted to the freedom of project work, whether it is writing, coding, or driving, people of all backgrounds and professions are participating in the gig economy. The exponential growth of companies like Uber, Upwork, and Expert360 suggests the gig economy is only continuing to expand, with upwards of 46% of ...

Carvana: Too Easy To Come Good

Examining the business model and history of novel auto-sales company Carvana, made famous for its car vending machines.

Fancy Troubles Pop Up NYC

It's hard to describe this feeling I've been having. Something between a relative boredom and a deep sense of relief. As some of you may know, recently my amazing team and I ran a Fancy Troubles pop up shop in the Nolita neighborhood of Manhattan.

The Midterms Should Have Been a Lesson The Media Had Already Learned

Roughly two years ago my family home was the scene of political strife. Not protest in the street à la Charlottesville, but the private ways our political turmoil touches us: the awkward Thanksgivings, the squabbles and unfriending cousins on Facebook - and in my case, an argument about the predictions made in The New York Times that morning about the outcome of that election.

How to make remote work work

Remote work has rapidly expanded in the last decade, and only continues to grow. There are many benefits to remote work for both employees and companies. Savings on office space, the ability to access a deeper talent pool, and increased employee satisfaction all make remote work attractive. While more companies ...

Postcards from Rachelle

Rachelle Cunningham is an incredibly talented Irish artist based out of Paris. As she's mentioned on her Instagram repeatedly during AMAs, Rachelle grew up all over, from the UK, Norway, New York and Paris. She's fully bilingual in French and English as a result.

Some of my inspirations

While, yes, I am the "self proclaimed sunglasses queen", I did not get my crown in a vacuum. Rather, I am so thankful to find inspiration in so many incredible people, places, and things. I want to share some of my passions with you, and show you where some of my inspiration for Fancy Troubles came from.

How to write a resume to get past HR tech

Searching for a job is not something that most of us enjoy. It can often feel like we're sending applications into a digital abyss. In fact, that's not just a feeling. An average of 250 people apply to every corporate job opening, and only four to six applicants will be ...

The struggle career-focused parents face raising a child with autism

When someone thinks of what the American workplace looks like, most likely, a traditional office with a bullpen, cubicles, and a routine 9 to 5 schedule comes to mind. It wasn't simply a creative decision that the hit television series "The Office" depicted a workplace with all those trappings. But ...

Leadership in a changing workplace

That countless Americans have less than cordial feelings toward their bosses is no secret. So omnipresent is this sentiment that many films and television shows center on terrible bosses, from Office Space to the aptly named Horrible Bosses. In our culture, management is often portrayed as bumbling, arrogant, hypocritical, or ...

Face time in the office is the only way to career success ... right?

Though the cultural significance of face time varies from workplace to workplace, employers and employees alike have turned being the first into and the last one out of the office into a badge of honor. Industries like finance, consulting, corporate law, and high tech can be especially brutal in their ...

Millennial burnout not required: my story of finding flexible work

The rat race is nothing new to business, but for millennials and the oldest Gen Zs just entering into the workforce, social media has changed the way the rat race looks. Whereas in the past workers were left to struggle on independently, able to focus more on their own tasks, ...

Young Female Designer Launches Fancy Troubles, a Sunglasses Brand for the Unique and Free Spirited

Press release to announce new company