There are few experiences in life that contribute more to personal happiness than eating delicious food. Of course, a nation's happiness is not measured on food alone. However, with the release of the 2017 World Happiness Report, we decided to take a look at what people are eating in the countries ranking at the top of the list.

A business plan is at the heart of every business. But instead of just writing down your business plan, your startup’s business model will require proper validation before you start doing business. If you don’t validate it, the investor simply won’t invest. You can validate your business model through three core assumptions: delivering, creating and capturing value.

Have you noticed that more companies beg you to participate in their business today? It started with an email survey on your last stay at their hotel, but now includes requests for online product reviews, to social media input on the design of future products. They do it because engaged customers become loyal advocates and buyers. Welcome to the “Participation Age” of marketing.

Nearly two years after its launch, Johnson & Johnson’s crowdfunding website for global public health projects inunderserved communities has raised almost $500,000 for 51 projects to date.

The percentage of projects posted on the website that are funded has increased from 33 percent one year ago to 65 percent this year, according to an email from Fetzer.

Image: http://medcitynews.com

In 2012, Google Fiber’s arrival in Kansas City lit a fire under the backside of many community leaders and aspiring entrepreneurs.

To say that the city has matured would be an understatement. Many leaders say that if you lived in Kansas City in the early 2000s and were to return now, you may not even recognize the place.

For Startland News and Think Big’s ninth Innovation Exchange event, we took the time to reflect on Kansas City’s entrepreneurial ecosystem — looking at its past, present and future.

Image: Photo by Hannah Arredondo - http://www.startlandnews.com

Entrepreneurs are usually highly creative and innovative, but many innovative people are not entrepreneurs. Since it takes a team of people to build a great company, the challenge is to find that small percentage of innovative people, and then nurture the tendency, rather than stifle it.

A few years ago I read a classic book “The Rudolph Factor,” by Cyndi Laurin and Craig Morningstar, which is all about finding the bright lights that can drive innovation in your business. The story most specifically targets big companies, like Boeing, but the concepts are just as applicable to a startup with one or more employees.

Over the past few years, brewers have been concocting beers with some exceptionally strange ingredients, and the trend doesn't show any sign of stopping. From Icelandic beer infused with whale testicles to a saison brewed with prehistoric, fossilized yeast DNA—oh, and a pilsner made with human pee—there’s never been weirder ways to enjoy America's favorite beverage. So, whether you’re looking to test your palate or prank a squeamish friend, these are the 13 weirdest brews you could possibly do it with. Cheers!—Hillary Eaton

America has a vacation problem. Or a not-taking-vacation problem, to be more precise.

Last year, 54 percent of U.S. workers left an astounding 662 million vacation days unused, according to The State of American Vacation study from Project: Time Off. The reason why all of those days were left on the table? “American workers hold fast to the belief that the path to career success requires sacrificing vacation and embracing work martyrdom,” according to the report, which also suggests that if those workers used just one more day off, it would drive $33 billion in economic impact.

Finding an edge is hard. Keeping it is harder. For decades, Gillette had what looked like a stranglehold on the razor market. Then Dollar Shave Club made a catchy marketing video, a few other startups caught on, and things changed, seemingly overnight. Gillette’s U.S. market share has declined from 70% in 2010 to 54% last year.

Today, it’s a couple of vacant buildings in the heart of Research Triangle Park.

But in September? First Flight Venture Center hopes bandsaws, drills and laser cutters will be crafting the next-generation of innovation on Davis Drive at a new advanced protyping facility it’s calling Hangar6.

Revolution LLC CEO Steve Case has laid out plans for his next “Rise of the Rest” bus tour, where he will invest $500,000 in startups from outside of traditional entrepreneurial centers.

Case’s upcoming tour will touch down in the Pennsylvania towns of Harrisburg, Lancaster and York all on Oct. 10, then head to Ann Arbor, Michigan, on Oct. 11, Indianapolis on Oct. 12, Columbus, Ohio, on Oct. 13 and finish up in Green Bay, Wisconsin, on Oct. 17.

In this interview, Hone Capital managing partner Veronica Wu describes how her team uses a data-analytics model to make better investment decisions in early-stage start-ups.

Veronica Wu has been in on the ground floor for many of the dramatic technology shifts that have defined the past 20 years. Beijing-born and US-educated, Wu has worked in top strategy roles at a string of major US tech companies—Apple, Motorola, and Tesla—in their Chinese operations.

Leaders of some of the world’s biggest organizations share which books will keep them occupied in the weeks ahead.

Whether you’re heading to a Northern-hemisphere beach or hunkering down for a Southern-hemisphere winter, take inspiration from this eclectic and inspiring mix of fiction and nonfiction books, dog-eared and new. Find picks from Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, the Dow Chemical Company’s Andrew Liveris, Maria Ramos of Barclays Africa Group, and General Sir Nick Carter, head of the British Army, among others.

Entrepreneurship has long been lauded as an idyllic escape from structure for born-geniuses. It’s time to dispel the mystery clouding entrepreneurship and replace it with sound data. And who better to bring the truth than Guy Kawasaki.

This is the guy whose name is synonymous with big. He helped market the first Apple Mac line in 1984. He’s the father of evangelism marketing. He acted as advisor to the Motorola business unit of Google, served as Apple’s chief evangelist for four years, and is now chief evangelist of Canva.

Every year IoT brings new things to biotechnology, manufacturing, home living and every aspect of our daily lives. We’ve seen it disrupt traditional industries, transform our cities and contribute to the autonomous transport of the future.

It sits in an ecosystem where machine learning, AI and data analytics help us understand our world more than ever before. At the beginning of each year, it’s tempting to make expansive predictions for the 12 months ahead.

CLEVELAND, Ohio - Startup money in Cleveland is finally beginning to circulate.

A new financial-technology (fintech) startup is about to make a national "splash." Tech powerhouse Park Place Technologies strengthens its European operations with an acquisition. And JumpStart continues to power the entrepreneurial ecosystem with a new fund.

The Old Line's flag laid board-flat against the marbled gray sky as crisply as if it had been pressed by a hot iron. I double checked my lifejacket, clipped the boat's kill switch onto its nylon strap and eased the 25-foot center console beyond the breakwaters of Matapeake. White caps that had rolled past Point Lookout three hours earlier continued to barrel northward toward Rock Hall. I took a quick look around, briefly questioned my decision-making faculties and then punched the throttle to get on top of the rumbling three footers.

Image: Sam Bright, right, shows off his 25-inch black crab caught on a peeler crab. He was fishing one of Maryland’s artificial reefs in the lower Chesapeake Bay with his dad Jim. (Courtesy Photo/Capital Gazette)

There is a lot of discussion about the “gig economy” in business circles today, usually focusing on the plight of those at the low end of the pay spectrum: Uber drivers, Deliveroo bikers, Handy cleaners.

But the biggest share of the gig economy is actually professional and white-collar workers, who according to the RSA make up 59% of the 1.1 million gig workers in the UK (compared to 33% in trades and only 19% offering driving and delivery services). These professionals include consultants, lawyers, executive coaches, designers and IT specialists.

While nothing beats a good cookbook, more and more home cooks are turning to Pinterest to collect and discover recipes. But tastes and trends can take on a certain regionality, which is why Pinterest has released its Foodnited States of America list, featuring the recipes and ingredients that rank higher in a certain state than they do anywhere else. Compared to the other 49, each state has a keen interest in one particular product or dish that sets them apart. Here’s a look at what your friends, neighbors and fellow Americans are pinning and prepping.

I recently appeared as a guest on Wharton Professor David Robertson's radio show, Innovation Navigation. David is an old pro and recently published an excellent new book on innovation, The Power of Little Ideas, so it was an interesting, wide ranging discussion that covered a lot of ground.

One of the subjects we touched on was the new era of innovation. For the past few decades, firms have innovated within well understood paradigms, Moore's Law being the most famous, but by no means the only one. This made innovation relatively simple, because we were fairly sure of where technology was going.