*By Alisha Haridasani*
Apple plans to introduce software that will reportedly help habitual iPhone users spend less time glued to their smartphones, a shift away from the company’s efforts to keep people more reliant on its hardware.
The company is expected to unveil its Digital Health initiative at the annual Worldwide Developers Conference next week in San Jose, [Bloomberg reported](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-05-31/apple-to-tout-digital-health-ar-features-at-software-conference). The tools, bundled with the new iOS mobile operating system, help monitor how much time people spend on their phones.
The Digital Health tools are likely a response to concerns raised by two of the company's shareholders in January about the possibly addictive nature of some smartphone apps, particularly among children. “We believe there is a clear need for Apple to offer parents more choices and tools to help them ensure that young consumers are using their products in an optimal manner,” the shareholders said in an [open letter](https://thinkdifferentlyaboutkids.com/).
Apple’s decision to encourage people to put down the company’s most popular product may seem counterintuitive, but it may also point towards a future business strategy for Apple that is more reliant on its services business, which includes Apple Music and iCloud.
The iPhone accounted for more than 60 percent of Apple's revenue in [Q2](https://www.apple.com/newsroom/pdfs/Q2_FY18_Data_Summary.pdf), but growth in sales have slowed in the past few years. Apple’s services, however, are starting to generate more revenue, surpassing revenue from iPads, Macs, and other accessories, such as Apple Watch and Apple TV.
Apple has tried to boost subscriptions for its Music service and has invested in producing original content, as competition with Spotify and Netflix heats up.
Venture capitalists and CEOs are clashing over the future of the internet. Web3 is the tech world's name for a decentralized, blockchain-based internet that runs on cryptocurrency. It was recently the topic of a tweet from Block CEO and former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey who wrote that Web3 will not actually be owned by users, and instead be controlled by rich venture capitalists. Dorsey later shared that he was blocked on Twitter by Marc Andreesen, co-founder of VC firm Andreesen Horowitz, which has invested billions of dollars into Web3 and crypto projects. Correspondent for DealBook from the New York Times, Ephrat Livni, joins Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss what this could mean for the future of Web3.
Prices at the pump this year reached a seven-year high, and a new forecast from GasBuddy shared with CNN predicts that gas prices will only continue to rise in 2022 and that the national average could even reach $4.00 a gallon; however, analysts at GasBuddy say anything could happen when it comes to gas prices in the future, as the pandemic has made it difficult to make any predictions about the economy. Consumer Energy Alliance federal policy advisor Michael Zehr joins Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss.
The two tech- billionaires Elon Musk and Jack Dorsey are the latest voices to discuss the new hypothetical internet called Web 3.0. According to the billionaires, the new concept is just a "marketing buzzword" and cannot exist without venture capitalists or large backing. However, advocates of the Web 3.0 believe this decentralized space is the next big thing to help put ownership back into the hands of the people. Senior News Editor at The Verge, Richard Lawler, joined Cheddar to discuss more.
This year, the games market will generate total revenues of $180.3 billion dollars, a significant increase from 2020. While the industry continues to grow and expand into new spaces, such as the metaverse, there is still plenty of room for growth and reform in this male-dominated market. Katie Robinson, content creator, joins Cheddar News to discuss.
Barstool Sports CEO Erika Nardini joined Cheddar's Kristen Scholer to discuss plans for the future even as COVID-19 upended Barstool's sponsorship of the Arizona Bowl featuring the Boise State Broncos and the Central Michigan Chippewas due to the spreading omicron variant. "In our case as a company, coronavirus has been a big boom for us," she noted. "We've been able to create a lot of new programming, launch a lot of different personalities, and frankly take share from traditional media, and that's what we've done the entire pandemic." While she admitted to taking a hit on the canceled Bowl game, live events aren't completely off the table for Barstool in 2022. Nardini also talked about potential sports betting expansion following its partnership with Penn National Gaming.
