Things To Do In SW Florida

By KELVIN CHAN

LONDON (AP) — Apple users are starting to get ways out of the iPhone maker’s so-called “walled garden.”

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For years, the company blocked app developers from informing people about how to pay for a subscription or service that didn’t involve going through its own iOS App Store.

Some apps didn’t like this. It’s the reason you weren’t able to pay for your Spotify subscription from the app.

But all that changed last month, when U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers issued a scathing decision against Apple that promises to shake up the iPhone app payment ecosystem. read more

Almost four dozen Venezuelan workers who had temporary protected status have been put on leave by Disney after the U.S. Supreme Court allowed the Trump administration to strip them of legal protections.

The move was made to make sure that the employees were not in violation of the law, Disney said in a statement Friday.

The 45 workers across the company who were put on leave will continue to get benefits.

“We are committed to protecting the health, safety, and well-being of all our employees who may be navigating changing immigration policies and how they could impact them or their families,” the statement said.

About two-thirds of the workers were in union jobs. The union contract for Walt Disney World service workers in Florida allows them to be reinstated without loss of seniority or benefits once they provide proper work authorization within a year of losing their jobs, said Julee Jerkovich, secretary-treasurer of the United Food And Commercial Workers International Union’s Local 1625. read more

By DEE-ANN DURBIN, AP Business Writer

The Republican-controlled Federal Trade Commission is abandoning a Biden-era effort to block Microsoft’s purchase of “Call of Duty” video game maker Activision Blizzard.

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In an order issued Thursday, the FTC said it had determined that “the public interest is best served by dismissing the administrative litigation in this case.”

It was the second time in one day that the FTC pulled out of litigation begun during the Biden administration. Earlier Thursday, the FTC said it was dismissing a lawsuit against PepsiCo that was filed by the Democratic-controlled FTC in January. read more

By ALEX VEIGA, AP Business Writer

LOS ANGELES (AP) — U.S. homeowners are spending more on home renovation projects, bucking a broader pullback by consumers amid diminished confidence in the economy.

Sales at building materials and garden supply retailers rose 0.8% last month from March, the biggest gain since 2022, and were up 3.2% from April last year. At the same time, U.S. retail sales overall rose 0.1%, a sharp slowdown from March.

The trend comes even as prices for home improvement products have been rising.

The cost of home repairs and remodeling climbed by nearly 4% in the first quarter from a year earlier, according to Verisk’s Remodel Index. The strategic data analytics firm tracks costs for more than 10,000 home repair items, from appliances to windows.

Recent price increases appear to be driven primarily by labor costs and don’t appear to reflect the ongoing trade war that the Trump administration is engaged in with major U.S. trading partners like Mexico, China and Canada.

“We haven’t seen panic buying from contractors or investors concerned about the impact tariffs might have on future costs, or labor rates being driven up by stricter enforcement of immigration policies,” Greg Pyne, vice president of pricing for Verisk Property Estimating Solutions, said in a report earlier this month. read more

By MICHAEL LIEDTKE, AP Technology Writer

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Lashing out at Apple’s plans to make most of its U.S. iPhones in India, President Donald Trump on Friday threatened to slap a 25% tariff on the popular device unless the tech giant starts building the product in its home country — a move that still seems unlikely to happen any time soon, if ever.

Apple for decades has been building most of its devices in China, where it has invested tens of billions dollars massive factories that rely on a vast network of local suppliers. The company’s reliance on a crucial pipeline outside the U.S. thrust the technology trendsetter into the crosshairs of Trump’s trade war.

In response to Trump’s tussle with China, Apple CEO Tim Cook said earlier this month that most iPhones sold in the U.S. during the March-June period would come from India. Although Trump in late April decided to temporarily exempt the iPhone and other electronics from most of his initial tariffs, Cook said the trade war would end up costing Apple an additional $900 million during the March-June period. read more