'Best of’ lists and summaries of the past year… Twitter is full of them. Instagram is full of them. Even the news is full of them. To keep up with the trend, it’s only fair that the first TFiF of 2020 is a look back at of some the best blog posts written by Fathomites in 2019. Let’s start with social media. In ‘Social media, and fear of failing to ‘keep up with the Joneses’’, Joanna Davies talked about how

Elevating my chair and peering around Fathom HQ, I am greeted by a display of the latest audio headwear, far more extensive than the range available in my local John Lewis department store. Two thoughts spring to mind. First, I should have asked my colleagues’ advice prior to buying my new noise-cancelling headphones. (Toby’s must be good, or perhaps it’s the guttural screams and blast beats of the black metal he chooses to listen to that divert his attention away

Today sees two consequential events. One, the Conservative Party has won the general election with a landslide majority, making it more or less inevitable that the UK leaves the EU, as planned, on 31 January. And second, it’s Fathom’s Christmas party. While many believe the former will lead to a prolonged (economic) hangover, the headache caused by the latter will hopefully be limited to Saturday morning. But we don’t only indulge in delicious food and wine, we also have a

Next week, millions of UK voters will head back to the polls and cast their ballots in a general election. To those interested in politics, elections provide weeks of head-to-head debates, battle buses and the opportunity to dissect party manifestos. To others ― such as Brenda from Bristol ― the response is far less enthusiastic. While a third general election in a little over four years may seem a tad excessive, and cause many to sympathise with Brenda, turnout is

Readers like myself who have a healthy dose of cynicism about the holiday season will be relieved that today’s blog doesn’t revolve around Christmas (yet). Instead, I’ll be embracing my North American heritage and exploring Thanksgiving and the ensuing phenomenon of Black Friday. Thanksgiving, which in the US falls on the fourth Thursday of November, is a secular holiday celebrated by families gathering for a long weekend and enjoying an indulgent meal of roast turkey together. It’s quite a wholesome

Young people in Europe and the US are showing signs of turning against the generation born after World War II . This move can be seen in the meme ‘OK boomer’, which has become a popular online retort to those who are on the wrong side of 50, or who don’t know what a meme is. It’s typically used to dismiss what are perceived to be outdated views on issues such as climate and gender. And while this intergenerational strife

We’ve all done it. Endured the chaotic cesspool that is the Tube, inevitably encountering that person who refuses to move down the aisle when the train is busy, leaves their backpack on, and blocks the doors when you finally decide you can’t take listening to their awful taste in music anymore. So, are we thinking rationally when we opt to use the Tube? Rationality is one of the key assumptions underlying neoclassical economic theory. The theory contends that economic agents

I’m not planning to glue myself to a tube carriage. And I’m not planning to wheel a pink boat down Oxford Street. But I did recently take an incredibly eco-friendly action: I said on Facebook that I am committed to doing something for the climate. Of course, actually doing something would be good too, so I made a private commitment to do that and set out to take a holiday without getting on a plane; not a Greta-Thunberg-sail-across-the-Atlantic-style effort, but

A few years ago, Fathom introduced a sabbatical scheme to reward its staff for long service. As a young and growing company, few members of staff have built up sufficient credits to reap the benefits in full. However, as someone fortunate enough to have joined in the early days, I have. For a while I’ve been entitled, as a one-off, to take an additional ten weeks of paid leave. No strings attached. But what to do with all this time?

In the interests of transparency, I’ll start this blog post by admitting that I failed my driving test. Twice. This happened in the United States, where my task was to navigate a four-block area of North East Washington DC, before parallel parking. In neither attempt did I reach the parking portion of the test, hitting the curb on the first turn of my inaugural attempt, and switching lanes without signalling on the second. I didn’t think I had the mental