Funny thing is, these rebels in runners aren’t doing anything all that daring, unless you count the heinous crimes of having tattoos and relishing in a post-marathon cigarette break. What matters is they’re not adhering to performative fitness norms - you’ll never catch these superstars posting gym selfies in between promos for highly questionable 30-day programmes. They’re an abomination to wellness culture - and boy, are they refreshing!

- Devin Pike, Guest Editor 💜

Once a pop-culture powerhouse whose name alone could carry a campaign, Nicki Minaj’s brand sentiment now feels like a case study in how far star equity can fall. Her public embrace of Donald Trump, like literal embrace, including uncritically celebrating him as “her No. 1 fan” has sparked bewilderment and backlash across music fans, cultural commentators, and even some of her own community (yes, even the Barbz are mad).

What used to be magnetic charisma now reads online like dissonance: a figure once praised for boundary-pushing now tied to polarising politics in a way that seems at odds with her earlier cultural positioning. An angel lost its wings today, just so y’all know. I will be taking 5 business days to mourn.

A growing number of brands are deploying generative AI. Not for the reasons you might think, but to satirise the technology itself.

Campaigns from Almond Breeze, Dollar Shave Club, and Equinox lean into deliberately awkward prompts, uncanny visuals, and overly literal outputs, poking fun at the sameness and weirdness of AI-generated content while still benefiting from its speed and scale. It’s kind of a genius reframing if you think about it: instead of pretending AI is magic, brands are treating it like a cultural object people already distrust and joke about. In the full-blown era of an algorithmic sh*t fight of slop, self-awareness might be the most effective creative direction of all?

Does this signal a new direction for professional identity? LinkedIn is expanding its platform with new generative AI-powered qualifications and skill validation tools that help users highlight AI-related competencies directly on their profiles.

The feature uses AI to suggest credential tags and contextual endorsements, making it easier for professionals to signal fluency in tools like prompt engineering, model governance, data ethics, and more. For recruiters and hiring managers, this could mean an easier filter on AI skill sets that were previously hard to quantify. This move also aligns with the broader trend of platforms embedding generative tools into core identity infrastructure - turning LinkedIn not just into a resume site, but a dynamically updated reflection of evolving professional capability in the age of AI.

-Sophie Randell, Writer

Among the runners dowsing their tired bodies with water and all-natural electrolytes, a subculture is emerging. Some call them "wellness anarchists". Others call them "hybrid athletes". I call them a much-needed antidote to the suffocating perfection of online fitness culture.

Online wellness culture has become unbearably fake. And I know you know exactly what I'm talking about. As a fitness girly myself who actively consumes this content, I have to say it: it’s turned into some bullsh*t.

Influencers selling 30-day programmes while conveniently forgetting to mention the steroids they’re pumped full of. Fitness gurus pushing "one-on-one training" after getting a BBL and pretending their body came from squats alone. The 5am club, the green smoothies, the pristine gym selfies with perfect lighting and zero visible pores.

Bullsh*t.

It's exhausting. And more importantly, it's completely disconnected from reality. Nobody actually lives like that. Nobody wakes up looking like a dewy goddess ready to crush a HIIT workout before photosynthesizing their breakfast to remain in a deficit.

So, when someone crushes a marathon and then immediately lights up a cigarette? It's almost... refreshing. Not because smoking is good (it's objectively terrible for you), but because it's real, and it’s humanising in a way that feels radical right now.

These wellness anarchists are carving out space for a new kind of fitness identity. One that says: I can be strong AND chaotic. Disciplined AND messy. Fit AND flawed.

They're not pretending to be perfect robots who live in the gym and survive on air-fried vegetables. They're showing up tattooed, hungover, smoking, drinking beer after their run, and still absolutely crushing it physically. It's a middle finger to the idea that fitness requires complete lifestyle purity.

And honestly? It's wildly entertaining. Watching someone do pull-ups with a cigarette in their mouth is objectively funny. It shouldn't work, but it does, and that contradiction is kind of the whole point.

People are tired. Tired of impossible standards. Tired of the relentless optimisation culture. Tired of being sold the idea that health requires aesthetic perfection and moral purity.

The wellness industry has spent years telling us that to be fit, you must also be: up at 5am, eating clean, drinking green juice, practicing gratitude, meditating, journaling, tracking macros, optimizing sleep, using only natural products, and documenting all of it beautifully on Instagram.

It's a lot. And for most people, it's completely unsustainable. So, when someone shows up and proves you can be strong without being sanctimonious about it, and that you can care about fitness without making it your entire personality, or that you can run marathons and also have vices? I see it as permission to be human.

What we're watching is the pendulum swinging back from peak wellness culture. We've been soooo deep in the optimisation obsession and “clean-living" performance, that anything remotely outside of that feels like rebellion.

And in a culture drowning in fake wellness influencers selling impossible standards, I can’t say I’m mad about it. Plus it’s very entertaining to watch someone do 20 pullups with a lit cig in their mouth – but maybe that’s just me. 

-Sophie Randell, Writer

This trending audio comes from Chef Ali Zenaldeen (@chefalizenaldeen), a dessert shop owner in Dubai, whose baklawa ice cream jingle went viral for being pure Arab hype. He’s chanting “yalla yalla” (let’s go), “aywa aywa” (yes yes), and saying “ice cream” in a way that very clearly sounds like my uncle's best attempt at ordering the elite frozen dessert “i see cream i see cream.”

And that my friends, is Arab excellence.

TikTok turned it into a trend where people dance, clap, jump around, and fully lean into being unserious, while the on screen text explains why they’re moving like this.

Creators are pairing the sound with moments where the vibe completely outweighs the situation. My fav examples include:

Me and my sibling acting a fool because we take nothing serious

When they think I'm shy but this is how I get when I'm comfortable

POV: You have an iPhone 13 so all your TikToks come out glitchy

Use the sound, sync the claps, move with the rhythm, and add on screen text explaining the situation. The more normal the scenario, the funnier it is.

A few ideas to get you started

- abdel khalil, brand & marketing executive

😲WTF: Man scolds Koala after rescuing it
❤How wholesome: Son surprises dad with championship tickets
😊Soooo satisfying: the perfect domino effect doesn’t exi-
🍝What you should make for dinner tonight: BBQ Cheeseburger sliders

We get it. Creating content that does numbers is harder than it looks. But doing those big numbers is the fastest way to grow your brand. So if you’re tired of throwing sh*t at the wall and seeing what sticks, you’re in luck. Because making our clients go viral is kinda what we do every single day.