*By Conor White*
New Jersey could become a home to increased innovation with more hands-on support from lawmakers, said one of the state's leading advocates for technology innovation.
Aaron Price, the founder and CEO of Propelify, said that Gov. Chris Murphy, a Democrat elected last year to succeed the two-term Republican administration of Chris Christie, could help revive the state's tech sector.
"I think we have the right leadership, in my opinion, finally," said Price in an interview Monday with Cheddar. "We reached out to Christie's administration, who was more hands-off, I'm pleased so far that Gov. Murphy has been extremely supportive and he's making a lot of steps in the right direction."
Price founded the Propelify Innovation Festival three years ago.
"If you're looking to advance your business, or advance your career, this is the place that you should be," said Price.
Last year's festival had 10,000 people participate from around the world. Past speakers include Gary Vaynerchuk and Ariana Huffington. This year, Gov. Murphy and Sen. Cory Booker will speak to the conference participants.
For the full interview, [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/turning-ideas-into-action-at-propelify).
On this episode of Cheddar Innovates: CEO of HereAfter AI discusses how artificial intelligence can be used to preserve family history and stories, and allow you to 'talk' to loved ones that have passed; Creator of the board game 'Travel Explore Discover' explains how she came up with the idea for this informative and educational board game, and how she's using the proceeds to give back to her community; Cheddar gets a look at Curiosity Stream's 'The Humboldt Current.'
James Vlahos, Co-Founder and CEO of HereAfter AI, joins Cheddar Innovates to discuss how artificial intelligence can be used to preserve family history and stories, and allow you to 'talk' to loved ones that have passed.
Facebook parent Meta’s miss on Q4 earnings raised alarm bells amongst investors. The tech giant lost users for the first time as it invests a lot into the metaverse, its virtual realm, in the hopes that consumers will move their social media consumption there. The stock dropped around 25 percent on the report, and CEO Mark Zuckerberg chalked it up to people flocking toward apps like TikTok, even as his own platform attempts to make a big pivot to the metaverse future. "It's gonna take a long time to develop and it's gonna take a long time to bring to fruition," Rebecca Walser, president of Walser Wealth Management told Cheddar. "In the meantime, the world is moving on. We have a very short attention span, especially on social media, and we want the short little videos. And Tiktok has just taken off."
Just this week, Facebook's parent company Meta released an update for its 3D avatar creation on Facebook and messenger. This update is encouraging users of Instagram to create their virtual selves, and it is an early step towards making the metaverse vision a reality. David Ewalt, editor-in-chief at Gizmodo joins Cheddar News to discuss.
Ed Butowsky, managing partner at Chapwood Investments, joined Wake Up With Cheddar to break down the disappointing takeaways from Spotify's Q4 earnings report, which sent the stock plunging.
Google parent company Alphabet saw yet another successful quarter reporting its final earnings report for 2021 on Tuesday. The tech giant beat Wall Street expectations across the board with much of that success owed to not only the growth of its cloud business, but also its multi-platform advertising. Joanna O'Connell, Principal Analyst at Forrester explains why advertising may be one of the keys to Alphabet’s future success.
