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Modern parenting means apps for sports, school and more. What this means for data privacy
For every aspect of a student’s life, there’s a tech company trying to digitize it.
Logitech’s new Mobi Fold squeezes a lot of functionality into a tiny folding mouse
Logitech’s new travel mouse borrows a fun trick from your first cellphone.
FCC Considers Allowing More Political Robocalls Before Midterms, Including Those Created With AI
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Communications Commission is considering a request by a conservative group to loosen rules on political robocalls, including those with artificial intelligence-generated voices, before November’s midterm elections. Federal law currently bans most robocalls to cellphones ...
As RFK Jr. Opens Inquiry On Disputed Health Effects Of Cellphone Radiation, What Does Science Tell Us About Radiofrequency Emissions?
The Trump Administration aims to “identify gaps in our knowledge.” But it's not clear this investigation will add much to the conversation beyond what scientific studies have already shown.
Cellphone health risks in focus of new government study: 'Very concerned'
A cell phone radiation health study has been launched by the HHS to investigate whether electromagnetic radiation from phones and cell towers could harm Americans.
School cellphone ban clears Pa. Senate, awaits Gov. Shapiro’s signature
Pennsylvania is one step closer to banning cell phones in public schools across the state after the Senate voted Wednesday to approve a measure sent over by the House on
Diddy's rep responds to report alleging cellphone, alcohol use in prison
Sean "Diddy" Combs' representative has responded to reporting that alleges the rapper uses contraband electronics and alcohol in prison and also pays fellow inmates to perform duties for him.
'Get off your phones': Surgeon general advisory calls on kids to cut screen time
The advisory was released amid a growing debate over cellphone usage and its impact on youth.
Trump’s spat with GOP lawmaker over Daylight Saving Time
President Donald Trump railed against Sen. Tom Cotton in a series of posts on Saturday, accusing the Arkansas Republican of holding up a bill that would make Daylight Saving Time permanent and encouraging people to call the senator at his cellphone number.
Ayotte highlights housing, cellphone ban in comic campaign s...
Gov. Kelly Ayotte and first gentleman Joe Daley reprise their campaign-ad banter as her reelection race enters its final three weeks.
Nonprofit launches crisis line for those struggling with mental health, substance abuse
Are Cellphones Harmful to My Health?
For older adults, excessive smartphone time can fuel anxiety, isolation and even physical pain
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services launching study on cellphone radiation
Study builds on Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr’s claims linking them to both cancer and neurological damage
Was Life Better Before Cellphones? People Say Yes
"It's funny, isn't it? How we talked for hours on the phone back then, but now that we all have a phone in our pockets, we rarely talk on the phone."
Guilty: Cellphone repair business owner paid girls for videos of sex acts, cutting
The owner of a now-shuttered cellphone repair business pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Tallahassee to charges involving the sexual exploitation of underage girls.
HVRSD Prepares for New School Year With New Cellphone Rules, Mental Health Funding
With students returning to classrooms on Sept.1, the Hopewell Valley Regional School District is putting the final pieces in place for the 2026-27 school
Out‑of‑this‑world selfies from the Artemis II astronauts
Artemis II astronauts use iPhones in zero gravity to capture candid selfies and sweeping views during their journey around the Moon.
The Venezuela Earthquakes Hit a Health System Already in Crisis
Firefighters are using cellphone lights because of a flashlight shortage, and an overwhelmed hospital in the disaster zone is operating without running water, one doctor said.
School Phone Bans Are Increasing Across America—Here’s What The Science Says On Their Effects On Mental Health
More states are adopting cellphone bans in schools. A doctor breaks down the science on how these interventions can affect a child's mental health.
FCC considers allowing more political robocalls before midterms, including those created with AI
The Federal Communications Commission is considering a request to loosen rules on political robocalls, including those with AI-generated voices. Current federal law bans most robocalls to cellphones without prior consent.
Roku May Help Fox Avoid Aggregeddon
(Welcome to the “Most Important Story of the Week”, my bi-weekly strategy column analyzing the most important (but often not buzziest) news story of the last two weeks. I’m the Entertainment Strategy Guy, a former streaming executive who now analyzes business strategy in the entertainment industry. Please subscribe.) Scrolling through links over the last week, I stumbled across this fun headline: Wow. Formula 1 (the sport, not the docu-series) is the perfect “dog not barking”. As a reminder, each week in my Streaming Ratings Report, I call out the shows that miss every viewership chart. I dub them “dogs not barking”—like the Sherlock Holmes mystery—because without any data, we forget they even exist. This is in contrast to something like, say, a film flop—cough The Mandalorian and Grogu cough—where even underperforming at the box office is widely discussed here, there and everywhere. In the US, Formula 1 is now in “no public viewership data, so not discussed” territory. After moving to Apple TV from its former home of ESPN, basically no one talks about it. Apple did publish an initial, unsourced, unsubstantiated, (dare I say unserious) datecdote claiming more folks are watching Formula 1 on Apple than ESPN, but we haven’t gotten any updates since. This stands in contrast to when the sport streamed on ESPN, and ESPN PR provided weekly viewership figures. Formula 1 was, at best, a niche sport in America—averaging 1.3 million viewers in the Big Data Plus era—but now it’s basically anonymous. (And yeah, after moving to Apple, I very, very, very much doubt its ratings increased.) Unfortunately, that story isn’t quite big enough to warrant a section in today’s “Most Important Story of the Week” column, but I wanted to call it out, because otherwise, no one else will! Certainly, no one will write articles about the silence/ratings decline, unlike when they wrote breathless articles connecting the rise in viewership to Netflix’s Drive to Survive, including Reuters just last month. (This is a topic I’ve tried to provide a moderate/nuanced/non-hyped take since 2022.) Anyway, on to this week’s issue. I was a bit worried I didn’t have a juicy topic, then the Murdochs went out and did their Murdoch thing: buying Roku. So that’s the story of the week, and it happens to touch on quite a few themes of the streaming wars and the disruption therein. I’ll cover that, plus why more consolidation in Hollywood media looks likely, more good news on the Hollywood labor front, whether we’ll see an uptick in production in Los Angeles, some Broadway and theme park news, cellphone prices going up in the third world (and possibly everywhere), and more. Subscribe Most Important Story of the Week - Another Big Media & Entertainment Merger The story of the week is clearly Fox is buying Roku for $22 billion. I read a lot of good strategy takes on why Fox bought this streaming TV device maker—and I’ll have mine below—but what fascinates me more is how this deal connects to quite a few themes of the streaming wars, linking to everything from the pace of M&A to “aggregeddon” to Netflix’s recent M&A actions/inactions to the shift to advertising from pure play streaming and more. The only topic I can’t really connect it to is my old theory, “never bet against Rupert Murdoch” because he isn’t the one who did this deal; his son Lachlan inked it. (Do I think he provided advice, even at his 95 years of age? Sure.) That plus I have one additional piece of strategy for all entertainment players, inspired by this deal. So let’s dive into all those topics, starting with why I like this deal. Roku is a Great M&A Buy
Analysis: Two mass shootings many time zones apart shatter communities and expose fraught politics
At about 4:20 p.m. on a cold Rhode Island Saturday, a message from Brown University flashed up on cellphones all over campus — everyone should run or take cover from an active shooter.
Why Meta’s social media restrictions aren’t a cure-all for the youth mental health crisis
Janet Currie: The most powerful intervention would be increasing efforts to prevent serious childhood mental health problems from developing in the first place.
School Phone Bans Are Increasing Across America—Here’s What The Science Says On Their Effects On Mental Health
More states are adopting cellphone bans in schools. A doctor breaks down the science on how these interventions can affect a child's mental health.
Long Reads for the Long Weekend
(Welcome to the Entertainment Strategy Guy, a newsletter on the entertainment industry and business strategy. I write a weekly Streaming Ratings Report and a bi-weekly strategy column, along with occasional deep dives into other topics, like today’s article. Please subscribe.) Happy Fourth of July weekend! As has been a tradition of mine going back to the beginning of the EntStrategyGuy website, I’m sharing my favorite long reads of the last year, like I did in 2019, 2020, 2021, 2024, and 2025. Let’s dive right in! Subscribe “Different Prices for the Same Ride: How Uber and Lyft Use AI to Get More Money Out of You“ by Derek Kravitz in Consumer Reports I don’t think surveillance pricing, like the kind described in this brilliant Consumer Reports article, is long for the world—it’s toxically unpopular—but we’ll see if either party takes on this issue. If I ran a political party focused on affordability, I would focus on a few pro-consumer and pro-market policies: Banning non-compete agreements. Ending surveillance pricing Eliminating junk fees (read more here...) Ensuring “right to repair” for consumer (and military!) products Capping excessive app store fees Stopping digital/algorithmic price-fixing tools. Preventing automatic subscription price increases. And more. If you want to fight inflation, there are a lot of great ways to do it quickly. Speaking of higher prices... “Secret Documents Show Pepsi and Walmart Colluded to Raise Food Prices Across the Economy“ by Matt Stoller in BIG Again, I think a political party should focus on lowering prices for consumers. And deals like this—Walmart making a deal/forcing Pepsi to offer the lowest prices at its stores and nowhere else—hypothetically lower prices at Walmart...but raise them everywhere else. “15 DUIs, still driving: California’s failure to take repeat drunk drivers off the road“ by Robert Lewis and Lauren Hepler in CalMatters CalMatters does terrific reporting in California, something the Golden State desperately needs more of, and this article is a great example of that. “PugLips: The next insanely popular thing you’ve never heard of…” by Simon Carless in Game Discover Co I thought that this parody article (and yes, it’s a parody, but I was definitely unsure at first) was hilarious and totally nailed how much tech/business journalism feels these days. Actually, three of my favorite articles this year were on hype in the video game industry, including Georg Zoller’s “The Video Game Industries Very Dark Night”—which I linked to recently and wrote a follow-up here—and Owen Mahoney’s “Derek Zoolander, Videogame Exec”. In particular, I like Mahoney’s focus on user experience as a guide to what trends will actually grab hold of customers. “The Matrix Lies“ by Evan Shapiro in Media War & Peace Evan Shapiro’s first person account of his experience with AI was hilarious. I think LLMs capabilities have significantly grown from last summer, and yet...my editor/researcher just had an abysmal experience using an LLM to do a quite basic task (which our LLM normally does each week) and the LLM made a mistake on every single data entry...along with seven different mistakes affecting twelve of the twenty or so entries, including mistakes that are explicitly spelled out in the prompt. That’s a brutal failure rate. Again, if you use AI/LLM for data collection, you need to take a lot of extra steps to verify and check the data. “Ghosts in the Balcony: A Cross-Country Trip to 58 Theaters Fighting to Survive“ by Matthew Frank in The Ankler I thought Matthew Frank’s pitch to head across America to visit theaters sounded insane aggressive at the time—at least it felt that way to someone a decade older than him; man, to be in your twenties again, am I right?—but I knew the result would be great. And it was, a terrific feature by a great young writer. Also, I loved Matthew’s recent article on who’s getting the precious few entry level jobs in Hollywood. (Hint: nepotism.) “Disney erased FiveThirtyEight“ and “Did Las Vegas get too greedy?” by Nate Silver in Silver Bulletin I love media history and analysis, and there’s no one better to get the history of FiveThirtyEight than from Nate Silver, who wrote about his personal experience in one of my favorite pieces from this year. I also loved Nate’s breakdown of what’s causing Vegas’ woes, but I’ll offer one criticism, summarized as “Might I suggest antitrust?” Many centrists/center-right/libertarian thinkers (Nate is self-described as the latter) often don’t consider consolidation or antitrust as factors in policy issues like housing, America’s military readiness, or, in this case, Las Vegas. Even if libertarians want to debunk antitrust/consolidation concerns, I’d love to read that debunking. In this case, Vegas is incredibly consolidated (though it also has been for a long time) and I’d have loved to read Nate at least contending with this factor, since he addresses almost every other potential factor for Vegas’ decline. “Why Microsoft’s Carbon Removal Pullback Is Such a Big Deal“ by Robinson Meyer in Heatmap News I’m a big supporter of carbon removal efforts, but this nascent industry faces a lot of headwinds, including this big move most recently. I think it’s clear that solar panels and batteries should be able to get the world to its carbon footprint goals, but effective carbon renewal remains necessary to prevent the worst impacts of global warming. “AI is killing the cheap smartphone“ by David Oks LLMs and AI will impact the world in ways we’re not ready for, and already, third world countries are seeing the prices of cheap cellphones skyrocket due to the cost of chips skyrocketing. This article by David Oks is a terrific breakdown. “100 Days of Madness: Netflix, Paramount, Warner and the Future of Hollywood“ by Wade Major at Hollywood Heretic Wade Major dove deep into Hollywood/streaming’s financials in this must read piece. Not that I agree with everything in this article (read my take on Warner Bros./Paramount here) but the analysis is top notch. I think many people discount how quality thinking, regardless of the argument/conclusion, will make you a better thinker. “Erased by the UFC: Frank Shamrock, The MMA GOAT of the 20th Century“ by Nate Wilcox in The MMA Draw Newsletter Growing up playing the UFC fighting game on the Dreamcast, Frank Shamrock was my favorite MMA fighter, and this history/tribute to him was great. Other Fun Reads “The Hardest Part Of History To Tell Is How It Felt“ by Craig Fehrman at Defector “Unmasking the Sea Star Killer“ by Craig Welch at bioGraphic “What Could Save the Industry? Fin-Syn“ by Richard Rushfield in The Ankler Alex Rollins Berg in Underexposed on movie bumpers, pillow shots, Disney trash cinema, cult films, and Casablanca. David H. Montgomery in YouGov’s The Surveyor on punctuation marks, condiments, dinosaurs, and comic strips and kids media. “How Medium finally pivoted its way to profitability“ and “Why the best journalists on YouTube are all former Vox employees“ by Simon Owens in Simon Owens’s Media Newsletter “It’s Not Just You, Netflix Shows Have Gotten Slightly Shorter: Here’s What the Data Says“ by Kasey Moore at What’s on Netflix “Numlock Awards: How Diane Warren became the biggest loser in Oscar history“ by Nathaniel Rakich and “Numlock Awards: The Oscar Bait era is over. The Oscar Chum era is here.” by Walt Hickey & Michael Domanico at Numlock Awards
Phone-free school year: How schools are adjusting to new law
This summer, a new California law required all school districts in the state to have policies either limiting or prohibiting the use of cellphones in school.
Exclusive | RFK Jr.’s Health Department Is Studying Health Effects of Cellphones
Government webpages saying cellphones aren’t dangerous have been quietly removed.
Trump posts GOP lawmaker’s phone number amid spat over Daylight Saving Time
President Donald Trump railed against Sen. Tom Cotton in a series of posts on Saturday, accusing the Arkansas Republican of holding up a bill that would make Daylight Saving Time permanent and encouraging people to call the senator at his cellphone number.
News | Soundstage landlords cater to new entertainment platform: the cellphone
Sunset Studios launches prebuilt sets for fast-turn, short-form series
Trump’s Recent Outreach to Democrats Could Be a Big Deal
Plus, the president was warned an attack on Iran might not topple the regime, the race to be Fed chair and RFK Jr. shifts advice on cellphone radiation.
CHANCELL-ING: A Hopeful Conversation about Adolescent Mental Health
When our daughters were teenagers, LeShelle and I had many conversations about when we should give them cellphones. We were sensitive to potential mental health challenges that adolescents faced related to cellphone use and social media. We wanted to be careful about exposing our daughters to the inherit risks of social media, which were still emerging at that time.
US Health Department to Launch Study on Cellphone Radiation
Jan 15 (Reuters) - The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services will launch a study on cellphone radiation, a department spokesman said on Thursday, building on Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr's criticism linking them to neurological damage and cancer. Last year, the department said 22 ...
Lower Burrell taps intern for business outreach, hopes to improve Leechburg Road corridor
Armed with a manilla folder of flyers explaining his business outreach project and a cellphone loaded with survey questions, Kyle Radecki starts every work day at a different Lower Burrell business. An urban planning student at the University of Pittsburgh, Radecki is doing a summer internship for the city focused
As RFK Jr. Opens Inquiry On Disputed Health Effects Of Cellphone Radiation, What Does Science Tell Us About Radiofrequency Emissions?
The Trump Administration aims to “identify gaps in our knowledge.” But it's not clear this investigation will add much to the conversation beyond what scientific studies have already shown.
'We are to bone’; Idaho Health and Welfare budget cuts may endanger state's crisis system
Cuts to the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare budget has a high likelihood of disrupting the state’s crisis response system.
Teens and screens
WFU’s Center for Literacy Education explores the intersections of teen digital literacy, brain health, and intentional engagement in a 96% online world.
Veteran trucker: AI made job safer but autonomous trucks aren't ready
Ingrid Brown, a trucker of 47 years, said technology like the cellphone and AI has made truck driving safer but autonomous trucks still need work.
Survey: New York cellphone ban helping student engagement, teacher effectiveness
92% of respondents said the transition to the policy, implemented at the beginning of this academic school year, went smoothly.
Health department to launch study on cellphone radiation
The FDA also took down old webpages saying cellphones are not dangerous.