After all those years, my fascination with the night as a separate, habitable world became a research project as a Mellon Fellow at McGill University. Then it became an opportunity to work with local governments and communities on nightlife policies.

From June 2020 to November 2022, I was a member of the MTL 24/24s first Night Council in Montreal, where I contributed to data research and policies for nighttime governance.

While trying to understand nocturnal life, two main questions emerged: Why should cities govern themselves after dark? How can they responsibly do so?

The recent calls for a science of the night and evidence-based nighttime policymaking are taking place, as over 50 cities around the world have developed new forms of nighttime governance.

A complex ecosystem

Often, when people think about the nighttime in cities, a core set of impressions come to mind.

Theres fear of the dark, safety concerns and noise disturbances. Its a period thats ripe for partying, illicit activities and recklessness. And then there are the traditional notions of night: silence, sleep and rejuvenation.

Much work has gone into figuring out how to alleviate some of these fears and facilitate quietude, such as building out a public lighting infrastructure and passing noise codes with special hotlines for noise complaints.

However, the nightlife of any given city is far more complex.

In my research, I mapped people, activities, organizations and communities that operate primarily during the night, forming a nightlife ecosystem.

Some cultural spaces and institutions operate at night, like museums, college libraries and cafes. Media outlets dont stop reporting about the world at night, while some restaurants and convenience stores serve up food, drinks and cigarettes 24/7. If an accident happens at night, people need access to health care. Childbirth doesnt wait for the sun to rise.

Waste management and roadwork often take place after dark to avoid interrupting traffic, and many formal and informal laborers do the work of keeping cities running efficiently while other people sleep. In many cities around the world, public transit runs late or overnight, and various communities make use of the city after dark to congregate, learn and explore, whether its at Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, night school or open mic nights.

Governing and studying the night

Fortunately, policymakers and scholars have recently made a push to prioritize the hours when cities are supposedly asleep.

Amsterdam was the first city to formally recognize the night as a space and time that requires special attention from elected officials, citizens and civil servants.

Following more than 10 years of appointing unofficial night mayors, Amsterdam formally institutionalized the position in 2014, which set the stage for a bureaucracy of councils, departments and commissions dedicated to governing the city after dark.

Perhaps not surprisingly, New York the largest city in the U.S. was at the forefront of this movement in the country.

In September 2017, the city established its Office of Nightlife with the appointment of Ariel Palitz as its founding director the equivalent of a night mayor or night czar. With Palitz stepping down from the role in early 2023, the city is looking for a new nightlife mayor. This office is tasked with the routine regulation of after-hours businesses and issuing licenses, as well as confronting abstract challenges like the ways in which gentrification leads to rising rent prices, which threaten cultural and community spaces that operate at night.

Since then, Washington has established an office for nocturnal governance, Boston recently created the position of night czar, and Atlanta formed a Nightlife Division.

Night governance is more institutionalized in the higher-income parts of the world, but experiments and studies also exist in lower-income countries. In 2022, Bogotá joined the 24-Hour Cities Network, following the publication of an extensive report commissioned by the local government in 2019, to help city leaders understand the nocturnal needs of the Colombian capital.

Other cities in Latin America, such as San Luis Potosí in Mexico, have self-appointed night ambassadors. Cali, the third-largest city in Colombia, launched an initiative that mapped the nighttime priorities of its residents.

In academia, theres also been a push to better understand the night. As the authors of a 2022 nighttime manifesto wrote, Nightlife inspires individuals, forms communities, and ignites cities. Rather than serving as an escape from the present, nightlife provides us with a window into different realities.

Encompassing disciplines like geography and history, an interdisciplinary field called night studies has emerged, bringing together scholars from various backgrounds to better understand the urban night from a range of perspectives. There have been studies on light pollution and its effects on humans and wildlife, how the shuttering of LGBTQ nightclubs has weakened communities and how late-night venues and businesses spur higher rents.

Responsible tech adoption

As cities formally adopt systems to govern the night, one of my key concerns centers on the rise of surveillance technology and the deployment of big data.

Even if technology isnt one of the main pillars of nighttime governance just yet, municipal governments have already been investing in smart technologies, often without proper frameworks in place to safeguard human rights. One of the most controversial examples is the deployment of facial recognition technologies in public spaces, which has happened in cities such as New York, Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Aires. The use of facial recognition at music festivals in 2019 led to campaigns for its ban.

In my view, the urge to make the night safer should not simply mean more surveillance.

The use of surveillance technologies has also been shown to increase racial and gender discrimination because they often incorporate biased data sets and disregard historical inequalities. Theres a long history of night regulations and policing that has disproportionately targeted minorities.

With responsible, careful deployment, however, certain data can be a useful tool for night governance. For example, responsibly tracking movement at night can help cities understand where more nighttime public transit might be useful.

Expanding safety and a sense of belonging is essential. While consulting with residents of Montreal, I learned about the ways in which they wanted the night to be safer for LGBTQ communities and free from racial and ethnic discrimination. The citys nightlife was also entangled with the fight against gentrification and more reasonable noise mitigation policies issues that affect many places in North America.

As more American cities adopt nighttime governance mechanisms, lessons learned from cities like Montreal are valuable and can help families like my own, who dont operate on the traditional 9-to-5 clock, thrive.

Thats according to Jaspreet Singh, a money expert behind the Minority Mindset brand. Singh, a first-generation American, licensed attorney, and serial entrepreneur, is also CEO of Briefs Media, which publishes daily business and markets newsletters. Growing up, Singh said his parents, who were Indian immigrants, didnt instill him with guidance about investing or saving. But what they did do was impart a set of values. 

I saw how hard my parents worked, and I wanted to take care of them, Singh said in a TikTok last year. So I went on my own quest to become financially educated. After a good deal of trial and error (including countless pivots, opening and shuttering a business, and even getting scammed), Singh figured out his method of success (mainly real estate investing), and has made creating and spreading financial guidance his raison dêtre. The Minority Mindset was born to teach others how not to make the same mistakes he made, centered around thinking differently than the majority of people about money.

Singhs guidancewhich he dispenses in spades on TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram to over 2.5 million total subscribers and followersis aimed at those without generational wealth or much prior financial knowledge to rely on. But becoming wealthy is surprisingly easy, Singh insists. He outlined a three-step plan for anyone, in any financial situation, to build wealth in a recent interview with GOBankingRates.   

Step one: Spend less than you make.

Spending all the money in your bank accountmuch less going into debtall but guarantees youll never be able to rise above your station. This is where most Americans fail, he says. Most Americans work to buy nice things like fast cars, nice vacations, and luxury clothes, he told GOBankingRates. But if you spend all your money, you will never become wealthy.

That could be harder than it sounds. Lifestyle creep is a difficult-to-avoid part of climbing the social ladder; in order to keep pace with peers, people often end up in debtor close to itwhile attempting to spend in line with their salary. But living below ones means is critical to building wealth, regardless of income. 

Some easy ways to do that include moving money straight from your paycheck into your savings as soon as your paycheck hits, logging each of your purchases and bills as they come, and keeping a close eye on small, day-to-day charges that can add up rapidly. 

Step two: Work to earn more money.

In other words, dont get comfortable. Regardless of how frugal you are, there will always be a limit to how many expenses you can cut, Singh pointed out. But, if you keep your nose to the grindstone, theres no limit to how much money you can earn. Thats your sign to ask for a raiseeven in this shaky economy. 

If youre only making $40,000 a year, there [are] only so many costs you can cut before youre truly just living a miserable life, Vivian Tu, a Wall Street trader-turned finance TikToker and self-made millionaire known as Your Rich BFF, told Fortune. Its a lot easier to job hop every two years and get a 25% raise, and then have that additional $10,000 when its in your salary, than it is to try and get there by cutting out every penny off of your Netflix subscription, off of that avocado toast, or that Starbucks.

And if the salary negotiation falls flat, taking the time to read up on side hustles and maximizing earning power can be the gift that keeps giving. Lucrative side hustles like web programming, graphic designing, and data analysis can rake in over $50 an hour. 

Step three: Invest what you dont spend.

Investing is an imperative not just for building wealth, but for retirement. Just like how you cant get rich by spending all your money, you also wont become wealthy by saving all your money, Singh said. Where and how to invest varies widely based on income, debt, and expenses, but Singh broadly encourages stocks, rental properties, businesses, and ones own education as lucrative areas. 

Generally, experts recommend making routine investmentsideally of around 15% to 25%of after-tax income. If you need to start smaller and work your way up to that goal, thats fine, Mark Henry, founder and CEO of Alloy Wealth Management, told Fortune. The important part is that you actually start.

Wealth advisors to the super-richand even industry titans like Warren Buffettconfirm that investing isnt just for people with bottomless resources. I can say unequivocally that the best strategies for managing money are equally applicable to all levels of wealth, Jonathan Shenkman, advisor at Shenkman Wealth Management, told Fortune.

A 2022 Harvard Business Review article encourages people who dont come from generational wealth to, before they touch their bank account, make a mental shift by letting go of limiting beliefs. 

When you grow up lacking money or the resources to make enough of it, thinking that there is a shortage of resources, or watching people around you live paycheck to paycheck, you may be more likely to believe that wealth is reserved for a select few, personal finance educator Anne-Lyse Wealth wrote. Overcoming this mindset calls for practicing thought work, or is the consciously paying attention to your thoughts and choosing to entertain different ones instead.

Diving into the world of finance and investing can sound daunting, Singh acknowledged, especially for those living paycheck to paycheck or without much wiggle room. But even so, he says, you just have to get started!

A state judge in San Francisco criminal court granted Paula Cannys request Tuesday to withdraw from representing Nima Momeni in the high-profile case. 

Lee was the chief product officer at cryptocurrency startup MobileCoin and previously created Cash App. Momeni, who has pleaded not guilty to murder, is accused of stabbing Lee to death on a dark downtown street early in the morning of April 4.

Cannys departure, while not uncommon in criminal cases, follows simmering tension between her and Momeni. Last week, at a news conference following a court appearance in the case, the lawyer acknowledged that she was frustrated by Momenis unwillingness to take her advice.

She explained that she was reviewing video footage from the Millennium Tower, the San Francisco apartment building where Lee had been hanging out with Momeni and his sister. Momeni and Lee left the building together shortly before Lee was killed.

At the news conference, Canny said she wanted to delay Momenis preliminary hearing, which requires prosecutors to show they have enough evidence to move forward with a criminal trial. 

Canny said she was inclined to take more time to digest the evidence, including the video footage, to better challenge prosecutors. But Momeni wanted to push forward with the hearing set for Tuesday.

Theres a strong argument that the voluminous amount of discovery that has recently been provided to me would be good cause to continue the case, Canny said.

She had described her approach to Momenis defense as a combination of an accident and self-defense there was no premeditation, deliberation.

Its super-complicated because from his perspective, or from any criminal defendants perspective, theyre in custody, Canny said at the news conference. Who wants to be in jail? Most people want their cases to proceed quickly but most good lawyers want to look at everything.

Canny said Momeni hired Saam Zangeneh, a criminal defense lawyer based in Miami. Zangeneh represented a man convicted and sentenced to life in prison in 2019 for the slaying of a Florida State University law professor in a murder-for-hire scheme five years earlier, according to the Associated Press. 

Zangeneh told Bloomberg News Tuesday he was recruited for Momenis case last week and has spoken to the defendant, but is still reviewing evidence and doesnt know enough yet to comment on the merits of the case. He said hes hoping to add Tony Brass, a San Francisco-based lawyer, to the defense team.

Canny is well known among criminal defense lawyers in San Francisco, who agreed it is generally a good strategy to delay preliminary hearings in order to collect and process all possible evidence.

Adam Gasner, a criminal defense lawyer in the city, said Momeni should defer to Cannys vast and longtime experience in serious and violent cases in the Bay-Area. Echoing the opinion of others in the field, he said Momenis desire to proceed quickly may not be in his best interest.

The tech giant is in the drivers seat during a pivotal moment for the tech industry, analyst Wedbush Dan Ives wrote in a note to clients on Monday. He cited Microsofts partnership with OpenAI creator ChatGPT, which Microsoft is using to power its cloud apps and services, and upcoming releases of A.I.-powered products. 

Based on the positive trajectory, Ives increased his price target for Microsofts shares this year to $375 from $340, which would raise the companys market cap by over $300 billion. In mid-day trading on Tuesday, the companys shares were at $331, translating into a market value of around $2.5 trillion.

ChatGPT will be the next leg of the growth stool for Microsoft, Ives wrote, adding that the company is just starting to hit its next gear of growth, with ChatGPT and other A.I. technology. Microsofts stock has already gained nearly 40% this year after a $10 billion investment in OpenAI in January.

Ives pointed to jaw-dropping guidance recently announced by chip manufacturer Nvidia as one of the reasons for optimism about tech companies and A.I. Nvidia became the fifth companyafter Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, and Amazonto reach $1 trillion in market cap on Tuesday. The companys stock has soared since a first quarter earnings report last week that showed higher-than-expected revenues.

But it was Nvidias forecasted sales of $11 billion in the coming quarter, 50% higher than what analysts had predicted, that really shook markets. The exceptional guidance boosted the companys valuation by almost $190 billion overnight, while Bank of America analysts called the projected sales the largest raise they had ever seen, calling the company a top stock pick on the back of major data center investments in generative A.I. and large language models. 

Nvidia CEO Jenson Huang, who is positioning his company to be at the center of the A.I. boom, unveiled a wave of new A.I. products and services over the weekend during a presentation in Taiwan. The announcements included a supercomputing platform that companies can use to create A.I. chatbots similar to ChatGPT.

Nvidias massive raise to its guidance shows that companies are ready to spend big on expanding their A.I. capabilities, and those that are fastest to monetize their A.I. products will reap the biggest rewards, Ives wrote.

Microsoft is well-positioned in this respect because of its plans to use ChatGPT in more of its new cloud services, he said. While the companys A.I.-powered Bing search engine has provided information that is riddled with mistakes since its release earlier this year, he suggested that the bigger source of Microsofts revenue growth will be the successful integration of A.I. with its cloud offerings, operated under its cloud computing platform Azure.

It has become crystal clear to us that the monetization opportunities around deploying A.I. and ChatGPT in the cloud is a transformational opportunity across the industry, Ives wrote, and Microsoft is the potential leader. In March, the company began using ChatGPT as a conversational assistant in its cloud apps, and it is being added to Microsofts office apps as well, including Word, Excel, and Outlook.

While new Microsoft A.I. products that substantially lift revenue will not be built overnight as the company tests new features in the coming months, Ives wrote. Still, Microsoft may be ahead of its major competitors in cloud computing, such as Amazons Web Services branch. Ives called A.I. the catalyst in competition between Azure and AWS over the next 12 to 18 months, and said that Microsoft is currently in an enviable position to gain market share in its enterprise business against AWS.