Word. Daily.

LYSOL YOUR DESK, PLEASE: A lovely gross new study says your office building is basically made of diseases. This message is not sponsored by HR, but Alex and Jody would prefer if you sign up for flu shots. I would too.

  DATA DATA DATA: Meet the data scientist behind the OkCupid matches. He lives in Williamsburg and has never been on an online date.

  DON’T MAKE A CRAIGLIST AD FOR A FALL BOYFRIEND: In other exciting dating/data news, half of our country’s adult population is single for the first time in history. Yay for the Bureau of Labor Statistics!

  CONGRATULATIONS BABY YOU’RE ENGAGED: How one woman gamed Facebook to get her posts to the top of the newsfeed for four days straight. (See what I did there? Get it?)

VOLUNTEERING AND VINYASAS: New York City gyms are beginning to offer work-trade programs, where you can exchange volunteer work for workout sessions. If you’re down to pack away equipment and take all of the dumbbells people left in the squat racks, you could take spin classes or hot yoga for free. It’s happening right in our hood – Revolve Fitness in Union Square is one of the gyms participating. [LINK]

FOUR MORE YEARS FOUR MORE BEERS: Graduate Hotels is piloting a $500 million project in college towns across the country, where the boutique hotels resemble a distinct collegiate aesthetic. Unfortunately, the early mockup that include a red Solo cup portrait won’t make it to the final rooms. [LINK]

A ROSE IS STILL A ROSE: University of Chicago researchers found that liberal parents tend to pick more feminine, softer-sounding names; conservatives choose masculine, tougher-sounding titles for their babes. We could have guessed that strict conservative families weren’t going to name their children Apple or Meadow, but this is a new phenomenon that started after the 1950s and 60s, when names were much blander. [LINK]

Let’s go Halfsies: Initiative Halfsies, let’s you donate half of your food before it is even served to you.  A bunch of restaurants in Austin and New York are signed up for the program where diners have the choice to pay for a full meal but receive half the portion size – the other half goes to people in the city who don’t have money to get their own food.  

Need a Personal Bouncer? No problem! SF-based startup Bannerman is a new service that provides professional private security for any event or venue...on demand. What’s next in service sector that can be disrupted with app-enabled, super-quick turnarounds like this?

Emoji Tracker: For those of you whom I have exchanged text messages with, you know that I am a huge fan (read: chronic overuser) of emojis. So naturally, this makes me say “word.” It’s a real-time tracker of emojis being used on Twitter. No surprise here, but it seems the most frequently used emojis are the faces and the hearts. “Suspension railway” is used the least. 

INSTALAPSE: Instagram launched Hyperlapse this week – an app that turns your footage into time-lapse videos. Only available for iOS, which means I can’t download it.

THE SOUNDTRACK TO YOUR LIFE: A new photo-sharing platform is in town. Ubersnap lets you add “mood-matching” music to your pictures.

AND BECAUSE: Who doesn't love Ukulele Karaoke? Download Ukeoke.

BRANDS CONTINUE TO BEHAVE BADLY: My love for Zara is limitless, but the brand made a serious fashion faux pas this week with a “sheriff-themed” children’s shirt that resembles a concentration camp uniform. After serious social media backlash, Zara pulled the shirt from stores today. Oof.

BATTLE OF THE SEXES: Designer Yang Liu tackles gender clichés in her new book “Man Meets Woman” by reducing stereotypes to pictograms. The illustrations are top-notch and thought-provoking.

REAL OR NOT REAL: Three engineering students in Chile have designed a bicycle frame that effectively locks itself around a pole. Could the unstealable bike exist? Could it?

ADVERTISING GENDER SWAPS: Apparently stereotypes are on my mind today. TakePart contributors took a series of advertising photos and photoshopped men in place of all of the women in them. Did your favorite sexist ad get some Photoshop magic?

BRAND PARTNERS: AirBnB and IKEA and teaming up to offer some lucky Aussies lodging for one night in an… you guessed it.. IKEA store. I’d be down if there was Lingonberry tea for me in the morning.

AN AGENCY THAT ONLY HAS ONE JOB: To turn your ugly craigslist ad into a beautiful, smart ad that will help you sell.

FEEL GOOD NEWS: Jimmy Fallon thinks the real news has been too sad lately, and asked  NBC anchors from across the country to read fake news stories to make people happy. 

FOR TRAVELERS: Country by country scams highlighted in this  “What to Avoid if You’re a Tourist” guide.

FOR MEDIOCRE PICTURE TAKERS: I know you have photos on your phone that you’ll never post because they were just “ok.” How do I know this? Please, if my “laugh off into the distance face” isn’t at the perfect angle, that puppy will never see the light of day. Wow, I am being so open today. ANYWAYS. New Castle Brown Ale wants your mediocre pictures so they can photoshop one of their bottles into your pics. The campaign’s premise is that they’ve spent too much on celebs in the past, and are now relying on us for their ads.  They are creating ads as the go, see some on their Facebook page here.

FOR ME: A better butter knife. That definitely makes me say “word.”

FOR KIPPER: NYC bodega cats tell their stories. 

Pay attention, Spirits Team: Here’s what alcohol bottle labels would say if they were being brutally honest. CLICK ME

In Sports-related Tech News: So that Kobe Bryan could bestow his basketball awesomeness on young players, Nike created a full-sized basketball court with motion-tracking and reactive LED visualization technology built into the floor. CLICK ME

Mood Lighting: The smart people at Netflix have integrated their app with Hue connected light bulbs from Philips to change the colors of your living room light based on the movie you’re watching. CLICK ME

And… just because: CLICK ME … AND ME

[is this really necessary] bryant park is testing solar-powered smartphone charging stations, so you can juice your iphone after yoga in the park. meh. LINK

[status updates] what do your facebook posts say about your personality? there are word clouds. LINK

[god bless targeting] mashable shares the sixteen creepiest facebook ads LINK

[#shotsfired] good ole s-bucks is beginning to experiment with cold brew coffee in its boston stores. LINK

HAGGLING IS BACK AND IT FEELS SO GOOD: ATTN: GILLIAN KLINE: Recent MIT grads created an app where you can essentially “name your own price” for clothing and accessories from high end designers. Yes, it’s true and you’re able to snag pieces for at least 50 percent off.

FADE TO BLACK: To promote its new dark roast, Tim Hortons made one of their stores completely black. The outside was painted black and the inside… you couldn’t see anything unless you were wearing night vision googles (which no one had).

CANCEL ALL YOUR PLANS: & go to Point Break Live. Which is exactly what it sounds like – a live parody of Point Break.

SECOND HAND FLOWERS: What happens to flowers after events? Most of the time, they get thrown out. Rebloom is looking to change this though. This company work with events to take their floral arrangements after the party and then makes these arrangements available for purchase (at a discounted price) and delivers them to your home or office.

BANNER AD REVAMP: One company takes a new SPIN on banner ads. The ad is a turntable that you can scratch.

KENTUCKY IS BRINGING SEXY BACK: With this 14K gold fried chicken bone necklace.

I CAN’T PAINT MY OWN NAILS: It’s a tragedy, really. I get more polish on my skin than I do my nail beds. And I’m not alone. Cosmetics company, Julep saw women complaining on social about this and developed a new nail polish applicator that will hopefully make it easier to paint your own nails. 

THE EMOJI WHISPERER:  Tweet this man your name, age, and screenshot of your recently used emojis and he will tell you what it means about you. (via Michael E)

CHOKING POSTER GETS A MAKEOVER: Can you recall those Department of Health choking posters that are required to hang in restaurants? If you can’t, here’s an example. Not surprisingly, some NYC restaurants are saying those don’t fit with their overall look and they are commissioning hand-crafted versions.

THE NEW CAR RADIO? To promote Toyota’s Yaris Hybrid, the brand turned the Prague streets into a playlist. They replaced street signs with names of nostalgic pop songs, then connected Yaris Hybrid car stereos to a GPS system and every time a test driver turned a corner, the radio would change the music based on what street they were on. 

How To Go Viral 101: Buy a fake engagement ring at Walmart and propose to some Disney princesses. Belle must be so heartbroken. [LINKSIES]

How To Scare Francesca 101: Put her in a windowless jet. Oh like this one.

How To Partner Like a Boss 101: Estee Lauder + Momofuku Milk Bar.

How To Make Life Easier While Confusing Lots of People 101: A startup in SF called Shift Payments is developing a debit card that lets you spend digital currency, loyalty points AND regular money

[WHAT THIS BRAND WHO USED TO BEHAVE BADLY DID THAT WILL SURPRISE YOU AND MAKE YOU FEEL WARM AND FUZZY ON THE INSIDE ONCE YOU CLICK THE LINK] a carryover from today’s we-vibe news: axe is now celibate and will forgo sex in ad for its new scent. middle schools everywhere rejoice. LINK

[AHI TARTARE IS SO 2012] actual #data behind when certain foods were trending, courtesy of the NYT Upshot. this one’s for you, specs. LINK

[MOAR IN FOOD TRENDZ!] which hipster trends are actually good for you? celebrity cage match includes: chia, almond milk, kombucha and of course, kale. LINK

[SHARK WEEK IS BULLSHIT] no, really. discovery channel takes creativity liberties with their weeklong program. can we all agree that shark week …. has jumped the shark? LINK

SMALL EDITION: Jeff Koons made a giant metal sculpture to look like Play Doh (Obviously need to go. Who is in?) currently on display at the Whitney. Playing on this, artist Jon Burgerman used real play doh to make small versions of Koons’ sculpture and sold them outside the museum.

THE PURPLE STRAW: The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf is turning their iconic purple straw into the latest Instagram filter.

CONVERSATION STARTERS: Love this project coming out of SVA (ok, so I might be a little partial…) -- The Ticker is a smart object designed to help promote conversation among strangers. Multiple people can sync their social profiles to The Ticker and it will scan all of them and find common things they all talk about – then present a relevant word to use as a conversation starter. 

ICE CASE: Russian World Cup Fans in Brazil are not used to the heat down there, so Skol, the most popular beer of the host country, gave out six-packs to Russian fans, in an ice case so they could cool down.

MORE BEER: The Dogfish Head Brewery opens the Dogfish Inn. Road trip anyone?

STRATEGY DECK: Check out this deck of cards that you can’t play Gin Rummy with, but they may help your business. It’s a deck with tips on communication strategies.  You can download them here.

WHAT IS BEAUTIFUL?: Human interest reporter, Esther Honig, wanted to examine Photoshop and the standards of beauty across cultures globally. So, she uploaded a photo of herself and got people in over 40 countries to make that photo of her “beautiful” using Photoshop. The results are wild! (via Frani)

#LIKEAGIRL: Always knocks it out of the park with their ode to what it means to do something “like a girl.”

TEN TEDS EVERY WOMEN SHOULD WATCH: Glamour compiled a list of inspiring TED talks for women. One of my favorites is Brene Brown on the Power of Vulnerability.

HOW TO RESPOND TO A DBAG: With the lyrics to “All Star.”