Articles by: Hanna Brooks Olsen

It's my culture. It's where I come from.

[caption id="attachment_9959" align="alignnone" width="620"] Photo via Flickr[/caption] This month, thousands of writers will commit to grinding out close to 2,000 words per day as they take part in National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, a writing project-gone-internet obsession now in its 15th year. The point of NaNoWriMo?

[caption id="attachment_9938" align="alignnone" width="620"] Image via Flickr[/caption] Vulnerability, though it's often been historically viewed as weakness in business, has gotten a lot of attention lately. From the confessional nature of many successful CEO's blogs (think Richard Branson and Rand Fishkin) to Dr.

[caption id="attachment_9926" align="alignnone" width="620"] Photo by Ian Sane via Flickr[/caption] In a recently-published paper written in 1959, author Isaac Asimov hit on an idea that now, seems fairly ahead of its time: That, while the act of creating is something most artists and thinkers and makers prefer to do alone,  new ideas and concepts aren't born in a vacuum. "My feeling is that as far as creativity is concerned, isolation is required," he explained.

Creative costumes are pretty much always a Halloween hit -- especially if they're topical, involve a pun, or are otherwise a little outside the box -- but before the days of pop-up Halloween stores and online ordering, costumes were creative because they had to be. Whether it was a crafty mom who was especially adept at the sewing machine, or clever kids who put in the work on found objects and cardboard, the Halloween costumes of previous eras involved a lot of innovative thinking and handiwork.

[caption id="attachment_9812" align="alignnone" width="620"] Photo via Flickr[/caption] According to a recent Gallup poll,"three in 10 Americans say now is a good time to find a quality job. "  That number may seem low -- it's about the same as it was last month -- it's actually one of the highest it's been since the 2008 financial crisis.

[caption id="attachment_9769" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Photo via Joe Goldberg on Flickr.

MailChimp — which is now used by millions to connect with their audiences via email — "began as a sideproject" by its founders, Dan Kurzius, Mark Armstrong, and Ben Chestnut.