Activist Investors Call on Apple to Address Youth Phone Addiction
Apple under fire after two Apple investors urged the company to step up and play a bigger role in managing smartphone overuse and addiction. David Benoit, Activism Reporter at The Wall Street Journal, was with us to discuss why Jana Partners has decided to push Apple to develop tools and research the effects of smartphone overuse by young people.
Benoit says the investors aren’t saying its necessarily Apple’s responsibility to monitor phone usage. Instead, he thinks they believe that Apple could play an important role in acknowledging that they aren’t sure what the impact of all this phone usage will be, but could score points by giving parents the option to monitor usage.
Activist investors typically focus on things like buybacks and acquisitions. Benoit says this move by Jana Partners to take a stance on corporate responsibility is very different. He thinks following Jana's advice could help protect Apple from potential backlash on teen iPhone usage. In addition, Benoit says goodwill could help drive future sales if consumers feel Apple made a phone that is safe for kids.
Meta, Facebook’s parent company, hired a Republican consulting firm called Targeted Victory to “orchestrate a nationwide campaign” against TikTok, The Washington Post reported on Wednesday.
Mortgage rates reach sky-high levels amid the spring prime time for house buying. Lawrence Yun, the chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, joined Cheddar News to talk about what buyers should be looking for this season. “The only way to make affordability better is to assure that we have increased supply assure that the home builders are not facing any artificial barriers," he said. "We need to construct more homes, also construct more apartment buildings, because rents are rising very fast for the renters."
A federal judge has given the go-ahead for a class-action lawsuit against Facebook parent company Meta over allegations it exaggerated its advertising reach and overcharged advertisers. Jon Swartz, a senior reporter for MarketWatch, joined Cheddar News to give his take on the impact the legal action might have on the social media giant. "Remember Facebook is the ultimate Teflon company in tech. FTC investigates, it's constantly being accused of anything from the left to the right in terms of misinformation, yet it continues because it's the biggest brand of its kind and number one in terms of what it tries to do. It continues to benefit," he said. "So it's going to take something magnificent, not a class action suit, but something bigger and beyond that to knock them off the rails."
If you have a minute, Protégé thinks it might be enough to get your talent noticed by stars and industry movers like DJ Khaled. Jackson Jhin, co-founder and CEO of the platform, talked to Cheddar about how the services might better democratize access to performing arts like music and acting. "You have 60 seconds to send a video to the best experts in each industry and send it to people who otherwise would have been inaccessible," he noted. For a wide-ranging fee, applicants can submit their work to garner feedback from folks like Jason Alexander or Scooter Braun — with a money-back guarantee, according to Jhin.
Job openings hovered at a near-record level in February, little changed from the previous month, continuing a trend that Federal Reserve officials see as a driver of inflation.
Ron Carson, CEO and Founder of Carson Wealth, sits down with Cheddar's Hena Doba to share how the blueprinting process keeps him on track to achieve goals and live life by his own design.
Around 4.4 Million Americans have either quit their jobs or changed them this past February. The high turnover comes as the Bureau of Labor reported that there were more than 11.3 million job openings despite 6.7 million people getting hired.
