First things first: Roman GianArthur styles ‘I’s’ as colons, so the title of this song is ‘All I Need’, not ‘All Need’. Details out of the way, you’re now free to have a smooth Monday morning: RGA is an R&B artist signed to Janelle Monáe’s Wondaland, and you’ve heard his sultry singing on her pre-Dirty-Computer albums and also on Jidenna’s ‘Classic Man’. ‘All I Need’ opens gently and progresses to an aggressive electric guitar solo, which might be more than anyone needs, but while you’re skipping over that guitar bit, dive into his Tumblr (words I thought I wouldn’t say again), which is full of some delightful #visualcontent. Then look at who else is signed to Wondaland and see if they get a boost from Janelle’s rise.
You know how every so often at the end of a catered event, people are like, ‘What are they gonna do with these leftovers?’ And the answer is that donating them is too much of a hassle, so they’re going to the trash. Finally someone made a platform that makes that food easy to donate to people who need it. Goodr, an Atlanta-based service, made an app that lets food providers signal when they have overstock, which Goodr then picks up and brings to the places that need it most, logging everything on a blockchain-powered tracker showing providers where their food ended up. Also shared with providers are testimonials from recipients, environmental impact stats on waste diverted, and reports on savings accrued through lower trash-disposal cost (companies pay to use the service, and they end up saving way more than they spend). Through bootstrapping and some small prize money from incubators, founder Jasmine Crowe, who was once food-insecure herself, has productized her earlier work of manually delivering leftovers to shelters. Goodr is currently making revenue, and is about to expand to its first city outside Atlanta. This is business.
But for every socially-responsible hero, there’s some dude trying to retire early. Take a second and learn about the FIRE movement, which stands for “Financial Independence, Retire Early.” Populated by– no surprise– mostly tech bros, the FIRE community aims for living extreme austerity while you collect your healthy coding paycheck, and then retiring in your 30s and living off dividends. There are some figureheads in this group like Mr. Money Mustache (clearly practicing what he preaches on web design: spend minimally) and The Mad Fientist (wow), espousing wisdom like, “Safety Is An Expensive Illusion” and “Luxury Is Just Another Weakness.” These things are easy to believe if you only care for yourself; notably, no couples or even seemingly partnered people were interviewed for the linked article about this, and the interviewees didn’t seem too focused on having children. More just on *plans*: says one FIREr, “I’ll hit $800k by 2022, I’ll retire, and then I’ll relocate to cheaper city — maybe Minneapolis — and just live on the interest. Prince was born there, so it can’t be too bad.”
TOMS just released a new line: Clare V. x TOMS, a limited edition collection supporting MADE by DWC, a Los Angeles-based social enterprise helping formerly homeless women with job training and transitional employment. So if you’re gonna get some, pick these ones.
