Need to read something happy on the Internet? Meet Mauro Gatti, creator of The Happy Broadcast.

Gatti, 46, created The Happy Broadcast in 2019. Every single day, on its dedicated Instagram account, he shares a piece of positive news coupled with one of his cheerful drawings. For example, a post on July 28 read: “Tree planting in England is now at its highest recorded rate in over 20 years! The figures show that over the past year, 10.4 million trees were planted.”

This year, he’ll be a featured speaker at the 11th annual PINC (People, Ideas, Nature and Community) Experience in Sarasota on Dec. 11, where he’ll talk about how The Happy Broadcast got started and discuss how he’s grown it and his strategies for running it.

“I’m a big advocate for mental health,” says Gatti, who moved to the United States in 2015 and speaks in melodic, Italian-accented English. “One year after I got here, we entered the 2016 election period. It was doom and gloom—crazy clickbait headlines no matter where I looked. I thought, ‘How come we don’t have any outlets for good news?’ So I found some.”

Today, The Happy Broadcast Instagram account has more than 800,000 followers, and Gatti and his team have expanded the brand to include a website, a shop and an app called Lid, which provides users with thoughtful prompts and encourages them to respond by speaking into the app, or “voice journaling.”

“I’m doing it for [other] people, but I benefit from it,” Gatti says. “I would find myself doomscrolling—just flipping through a carousel of terrible things—and my anxiety would spike.”

Gatti is quick to add that people who follow The Happy Broadcast should read other news, too. “I’m against closing yourself off to reality and
living in a bubble of toxic positivity, like everything is fine,” he says. “But
for me, the bad news incentivizes me to be more proactive about issues facing the world.”

It’s an ethos Gatti has employed his entire life. He spent the majority of his childhood with his grandmother on a small farm in rural Italy. “I had a happy childhood, but it was isolated,” he says. Diagnosed with Aspberger’s syndrome (now called autism spectrum disorder) when he was young, he was “not really verbal,” he says. Drawing became a way to communicate and an outlet for self-expression.

At 18, he left his small town to explore the world. He lived in Europe and Asia, and moved to London, where he learned English while washing dishes and applying for creative jobs that utilized his artistic talent.

“I thought, ‘I need to go out and see the world,’” he says. His lucky break came when he moved to the U.S. to take a job at JibJab, the digital entertainment platform founded by two of his best friends, who wanted to create an educational show for kids. With Gatti as creative director, they developed Ask the Storybots, a kids’ show that was acquired by Netflix and netted Gatti his Emmy. He’s gone on to hold high-level creative roles at other big tech companies like JibJab, PayPal, WhatsApp and Meta. After three years in New York City, he moved to Los Angeles in March and is heading up design for Outsmart, an AI-based education platform founded by three ex-Duolingo employees.

“I’ve always tried to work on products that either make people happy or connect people,” he says.

At OutSmart, Gatti channels his creativity to make college education affordable and accessible for everyone. “The work aligns with my values,” he says. “I’m European, so I grew up in a society where people have access to free healthcare and education. It doesn’t mean that it’s better than somewhere else, but if you grow up in a system, that’s what you long for. I love the U.S. But I do believe that access to healthcare and education should be [cornerstones] of society, so I cherish companies and products that work in that direction. Better education and better healthcare mean better mental health and a more equal society.”

And with its AI-based platform, Outsmart is also inserting itself into the buzzy conversations around that technology.

“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with AI—but it’s a broad conversation,” Gatti says. “Machine learning is not new—the first wave of AI was 10 or 15 years ago. As with every new technology, it needs to be somewhat controlled to make sure it doesn’t hurt people and businesses. I’m concerned about the ethical problems of AI stealing someone’s [creative] work, but I am interested, as an artist, in training an AI model with my own art and using it to support me in producing more work.”

As for what his work—especially The Happy Broadcast—has taught him about happiness: “A huge component is doing something for yourself and doing something for others,” he says. “Sometimes they can’t be 50/50—sometimes you do 90 percent for others and 10 percent for yourself. But you have to take care of yourself to take care of others. I’m in that sweet spot right now in my life. I love it.”

Gatti will be one of 11 featured speakers at this year’s PINC Experience, Dec. 11, 8 a.m.-6 p.m. For details about this year’s event, including ticket information, go to pincexperience.com.