Voters meet with Collier County candidatesTexas Roadhouse honors memory of five teenagers lost in tragic crash
NAPLES Voters meet with Collier County candidates It was a packed house at Seed to Table on Tuesday night as Collier County voters met with the candidates running to represent them.
FORT MYERS Texas Roadhouse honors memory of five teenagers lost in tragic crash It has been one year since the tragic crash that took the lives of five teenagers on Top Golf Way in Lee County.
CAPE CORAL Locals react to Wade Wilson jury recommendation Wade Wilson, the man found guilty of killing two innocent women, has his life in the hands of a jury and judge. In less than two hours on Tuesday – the jury came to their decision.
FORT MYERS Austan Cristiaan talks joining Bishop Verot and first D-1 offers Quarterback Austan Cristiaan talks about joining Bishop Verot for his freshman season and securing his first two D-1 offers.
FL researchers testing Zika virus to fight childhood brain cancer Neuroblastoma is one of the deadliest childhood cancers. Now, a team of researchers out of Nemours Children’s Hospital in Orlando are taking a novel approach to wipe out disease. Their studies involve the use of the Zika virus.
FORT MYERS Community Redevelopment Agency seeks public input for Cleveland Avenue project Mayor Kevin Anderson said Tuesday was an opportunity for the Community Redevelopment Agency and leaders to hear what the public thinks this redevelopment should look like.
FGCU professor agrees with US Surgeon General: gun violence is a public health crisis Gun violence: We’ve seen it here firsthand in southwest Florida. Many agree gun violence is a growing problem in the United States. Now, the U.S. Surgeon General is calling it a crisis.
Charlotte County Charlotte County now requiring condo and co-op inspections for building 25-years or older On the 3-year anniversary of the Champlain Towers South building collapse in Surfside, FL, many look to remember those lost and continue to learn from the tragedy.
FORT MYERS A third diamond interchange on its way to Southwest Florida The third iteration of a construction project that strikes fear into some drivers could be a tell-tell sign about the trends of Southwest Florida.
NAPLES Naples practice comes under fire from a former employee A Naples dermatology practice acknowledges it had issues when it first opened two years ago but says those issues are now behind them.
CAPE CORAL Cape Coral hosts more FEMA hearings Red tags are rearing their ugly head. Cape Coral homeowners who were slapped with these tags and found non-compliant with city code permits are back to defend themselves.
4 local music shows to choose from in one day If you’re an indecisive local music fan, Friday will be a tough day for you.
FORT MYERS Walt Wesley Way unveiled in honor of local legend Take a drive down Lincoln Blvd. in Fort Myers and you will notice above the street sign is another that reads ‘Honorary Walt Wesley Way.’
LABELLE Man reunited with dog after she appears in LaBelle 2 years after disappearing in Maryland A man has been reunited with his dog after she went missing for two years and many states away.
SOUTHWEST FLORIDA Several brands of ice cream, a variety of products, recalled for possible Listeria contamination Several brands of ice cream sold at Southwest Florida grocery stores are part of a massive nationwide recall involving 14 brands.
NAPLES Voters meet with Collier County candidates It was a packed house at Seed to Table on Tuesday night as Collier County voters met with the candidates running to represent them.
FORT MYERS Texas Roadhouse honors memory of five teenagers lost in tragic crash It has been one year since the tragic crash that took the lives of five teenagers on Top Golf Way in Lee County.
CAPE CORAL Locals react to Wade Wilson jury recommendation Wade Wilson, the man found guilty of killing two innocent women, has his life in the hands of a jury and judge. In less than two hours on Tuesday – the jury came to their decision.
FORT MYERS Austan Cristiaan talks joining Bishop Verot and first D-1 offers Quarterback Austan Cristiaan talks about joining Bishop Verot for his freshman season and securing his first two D-1 offers.
FL researchers testing Zika virus to fight childhood brain cancer Neuroblastoma is one of the deadliest childhood cancers. Now, a team of researchers out of Nemours Children’s Hospital in Orlando are taking a novel approach to wipe out disease. Their studies involve the use of the Zika virus.
FORT MYERS Community Redevelopment Agency seeks public input for Cleveland Avenue project Mayor Kevin Anderson said Tuesday was an opportunity for the Community Redevelopment Agency and leaders to hear what the public thinks this redevelopment should look like.
FGCU professor agrees with US Surgeon General: gun violence is a public health crisis Gun violence: We’ve seen it here firsthand in southwest Florida. Many agree gun violence is a growing problem in the United States. Now, the U.S. Surgeon General is calling it a crisis.
Charlotte County Charlotte County now requiring condo and co-op inspections for building 25-years or older On the 3-year anniversary of the Champlain Towers South building collapse in Surfside, FL, many look to remember those lost and continue to learn from the tragedy.
FORT MYERS A third diamond interchange on its way to Southwest Florida The third iteration of a construction project that strikes fear into some drivers could be a tell-tell sign about the trends of Southwest Florida.
NAPLES Naples practice comes under fire from a former employee A Naples dermatology practice acknowledges it had issues when it first opened two years ago but says those issues are now behind them.
CAPE CORAL Cape Coral hosts more FEMA hearings Red tags are rearing their ugly head. Cape Coral homeowners who were slapped with these tags and found non-compliant with city code permits are back to defend themselves.
4 local music shows to choose from in one day If you’re an indecisive local music fan, Friday will be a tough day for you.
FORT MYERS Walt Wesley Way unveiled in honor of local legend Take a drive down Lincoln Blvd. in Fort Myers and you will notice above the street sign is another that reads ‘Honorary Walt Wesley Way.’
LABELLE Man reunited with dog after she appears in LaBelle 2 years after disappearing in Maryland A man has been reunited with his dog after she went missing for two years and many states away.
SOUTHWEST FLORIDA Several brands of ice cream, a variety of products, recalled for possible Listeria contamination Several brands of ice cream sold at Southwest Florida grocery stores are part of a massive nationwide recall involving 14 brands.
MGN NEW YORK (AP) The company behind the popular messaging app Snapchat is expected to start trading Thursday after a better-than-expected stock offering. Snap Inc. passed its first major test on Wall Street on Wednesday as it priced its initial public offering of 200 million shares at $17 each. That is above the expected range of $14 to $16 and values the Los Angeles company at $24 billion. Snap’s IPO is one of the most anticipated for a technology company since Twitter’s stock market debut in 2013. Co-founders Evan Spiegel and Robert Murphy will retain controlling power over all matters at Snap; the Class A stock being sold in the IPO has no voting power. Snap is getting the ticker symbol “SNAP” on the New York Stock Exchange. Prospects for Snap For Snap, which started its official bid to go public last Halloween, the looming question now is whether investors are in for a trick or a treat. Snap’s Snapchat app is best known for disappearing messages and quirky facial filters for jazzing up selfies. It’s popular with teenagers and younger millennials. While Facebook launched in the era of desktop computers and Twitter in text-based mobile, Snapchat jumped straight to photos and videos. In a sense, it’s ahead of the game. But its user growth has slowed down in recent months. Blame Facebook. Growth slowed to a crawl since Facebook’s Instagram cloned Snapchat’s “stories” in August. With the feature, photos and videos shared by users play in a loop for 24 hours, then disappear. The feature helped Snapchat recover from stagnant growth before, but now it’s no longer unique to Snapchat. After adding 36 million daily active users during the first half of last year, Snapchat picked up just 15 million in the second half. The number of people downloading Instagram’s app has been accelerating during the past six months, suggesting a gradual shift away from the Snapchat app, based on an analysis financial advice site ValuePenguin did of activity in Apple’s app store. While the higher-than-expected pricing looks good for Snap, its troubles aren’t over. “What that number means for the longer term – very little,” said Chi-Hua Chien, managing partner at Goodwater Capital who originated the VC firm Accel Partners’ investment in Facebook and later invested in Twitter while at another firm. Twitter, for example, shot up nearly 73 percent on its first trading day and now trades well below its IPO price. Facebook, meanwhile, saw its stock decline sharply for a few months after going public. Now, it’s trading more than three times its IPO price, near a record high. Time is limited Snapchat started 2017 with 158 million daily active users, most of whom are people in their teens, 20s and early 30s. But many of them are finding Snapchat harder to fit in with daily life. Evan Rodriguez, a 20-year old student at Abilene Christian University in Texas, used to send snaps of funny stuff he saw throughout the day, just as his friends did. For instance, he might take video of a friend walking across campus and send it via Snapchat – “Hey, I see you!” But something about the whole thing “just became cumbersome,” Rodriguez said. “It was like one more thing to do.” Celia Schlekewey, a 20-year-old University of Washington student who also works at a small business, liked the fact that when she first joined, it was “all just about sending pictures to your friends.” Over time, the stories feature became a “big deal,” and keeping up with friends and famous people became time-consuming. “It got to the point that if I wanted to keep up with everyone’s story, I’d have to sit on my phone and watch it for 25 minutes,” she said. Easing this feeling of pressure will be key for Snapchat, especially if it wants to attract older users. They might not have as much time – or might not feel like spending that time on social media – as their young millennial counterparts. Snapchat’s identity Since Snapchat was never about typing, the phone’s camera is already its main focus. In fact, CEO Evan Spiegel has taken to calling it a “camera company,” and this is how the company describes itself in its IPO documents. That doesn’t necessarily just mean that Snap wants to make cameras, though last year it launched Spectacles, actual physical sunglasses that snap photos for you. Snapchat is more about image-based communication, said Chien of Goodwater Capital. Open the app, and you open a camera. Turn the camera to selfie mode, and you get a bunch of filters to overlay on your face. Because the images you send eventually disappear, there’s less pressure to put forward your best self. Snapchat has often drawn comparisons to both Twitter, which also faces stagnant growth, and Facebook, whose users are highly engaged, just like Snapchat’s. Ultimately, Snap doesn’t have to be like either to succeed and can forge its own path and identity. LaVon Murphy, 45, a photographer in Portland, Oregon, uses Facebook to keep up with friends, Instagram to express herself through pictures and Twitter to keep up with the news. She added Snapchat recently to stay in touch with her 17-year-old son. “I don’t really understand why he and his friends use the app so extensively, but I am trying to keep up,” she said. “It allows me to be silly and show a silly side of myself to my son and it allows him to be silly with me.” Snap just needs millions more like Murphy willing to make time for yet another social network.