Despite its unsteady status in the post-Steve Jobs era and concerns over its performance, Apple got a PR turbo boost last week when it was again named the world's most admired company by executives in a Fortune magazine poll. For the sixth year in a row, Apple took home top honors for the title, this year scoring 8.24 on Fortune's ranking system, ahead of Google with a score of 8.01 and Amazon with 7.28, CNET reports. Even though the gadget giant's stock has tanked 35 percent since September as investors and analysts fret that Apple's best days may be behind it, the company still rates as a financial and technological powerhouse …

Many Americans would never let their eight year old see an R-rated movie, but according to findings from a recent Harris Poll of 2,278 U.S. adults (ages 18+) interviewed online, some children may be playing video games beyond their maturity level. While only one third of Americans (32%) said they understand everything or a lot about video game ratings and nearly two in five (38%) indicated they know nothing about the system, the majority (66%) of those U.S. adults with video game-playing children in their households indicate using a video game's rating to determine whether they allow their child to play it. "The findings underscore the lack of awareness Americans have …"

The Livestrong Foundation's leaders acknowledged this week that they'll face new challenges thanks to Lance Armstrong's fall from grace — but they insist the group will survive. At its first annual meeting since the cyclist's high-profile admission that he used performance-enhancing drugs, the cancer charity he founded announced it is changing its annual day of action as a step toward charting its own course without its founder. The group's day of action had been Oct. 2, the date in 1996 that Armstrong was diagnosed with cancer. It'll now be May 17 — the day in 2004 the charity launched its trademark yellow Livestrong bands. "Our success has never been based on one person. Will the Livestrong Foundation survive? Yes. Absolutely, yes. Hell, yes …"

A new study of 2,490 respondents aged 12-17 years old from the U.S., Poland, Germany and the UK, looked at how this new digital generation connects with the Internet, what they do online, and how they feel about digital and traditional advertisements. The survey, from Research Now, found that teenagers in all four markets enjoy unlimited and unsupervised access to the Internet. The top reason why teens go online, cited by 92% of respondents, is to find out information — "looking up things I don't know." The second most popular activity is finding out about events and what's happening, with 83% of teens doing this. Next, young people use the Internet to research public transport and "window shop" (researching and browsing for items), with 74% saying …

How do you choose a hotel? By the quality of service? The view? What your friends might think? How about the water pressure in the shower? Don't laugh. Brodeur Partners looked into the heart of what really matters when it comes to online conversation about hotel choice and has come up with intriguing answers. "We wanted to go beyond speculation and opinion, and really see what drives online behavior — in this case, conversation — around different hotel brands," said Brodeur Partners CEO Andy Coville, in a news release. The study reveals that Hilton, Marriott and Four Seasons (in that order) have the highest "Conversational Relevance" in online discussions among leisure and business travelers. The conclusion is based on an analysis by Brodeur Partners and MavenMagnet of what is "relevant" in online brand conversation …

The spotlight was on former BP chief exec Tony Hayward as the oil giant's civil trial continued on Wednesday — and although Hayward didn't drop any major gaffes a la "I want my life back," his statements about cost-cutting did conflict with another former BP exec who oversaw the company's Gulf drilling operations — and who reported stepped down a few months prior to the spill because of disagreements with BP over its commitment to safety. Hayward said the cost-cutting didn't effect drilling operations, but Kevin Lacy, who served as BP's senior vice president for drilling operations in the Gulf before resigning four months before the spill, said BP slashed between $250 million and $300 million from 2008 to 2009 while at the same time its production rose by more than 50 percent …

Yoh's 2013 Workforce Trends Study reveals that 80 percent of major U.S. employers expect their 2013 hiring will meet or exceed their rate of hiring in 2012. Of companies that plan to accelerate hiring in 2013, 83 percent expect to increase staffing levels by at least 3 percent. Demand for talent exists at nearly every level of these organizations, but especially in information technology, sales, and operations and production, according to the survey of 150 HR executives and hiring managers at organizations with revenue of $750 million or more. Those findings, however, are dampened by lingering concerns over a variety of economic and political headwinds. "The optimism evident in our 2013 Workforce Trends Study is tempered by persistent economic uncertainty …"

Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, who recently returned to HQ after a brief maternity leave, may be making headway with the tech titan's turnaround, but she's not scoring many points with Yahoo employees now that she has essentially banned employees from working at home — and the backlash may even threaten to overshadow the progress she has made at Yahoo. In addition to company employees — many of whom rely on flexible schedules — working moms are also in an uproar because they believe that Mayer is setting them back by taking away their own flexible working arrangements, the LA Times reports. "When a working mother is standing behind this, you know we are a long way from a culture that will honor the thankless sacrifices …"

How specialized does a marketing services agency need to be to be considered a specialist in its field? The answers marketers gave in the 2013 RSW/US Agency-Marketer National survey might surprise you. "While we know first-hand that specialization is important — we see it every day when we represent agencies as their outsourced agency new business firm — the percentage of specialization an agency needs to have has always been somewhat of a wildcard," said Mark Sneider, owner and president of RSW/US. Surprisingly, close to 60% of marketers state that an agency only needs 50% or less of their business focused on a sector to be considered a specialist. And while marketers value specialization (77% say it's important), fewer of them …

According to a new World Vision study, conducted online earlier this month by Harris Interactive on behalf of World Vision, more than half of teens (56%) say social media sites like Facebook and Twitter have made them more aware of the needs of others — a huge increase from 2011, when just over 4 in 10 (44%) said their use of social media made them more aware. More than 2 in 3 teens (68%) say that, when it comes to helping those in need, adults don't do enough to set a positive example for teens. From now until April, some 200,000 teens will go hungry as part of World Vision's 30 Hour Famine (30HF) to raise funds and hunger awareness …

So hungry you could eat a horse? Chances are, if you've regularly consumed processed-meat products in Europe, you already have. Since Ireland published surprise DNA results on Jan. 15 showing that a third of frozen "beef" burgers in Ireland contained at least a trace of horse, food scientists in more than a dozen countries have found the animal trotting into products where it was never meant to roam. Daily revelations from an ever-increasing menu of supermarket, catering and restaurant goods have taught the world one lesson: When minced up with other meat or slathered with spices, consumers cannot tell equine from bovine in the food chain, an AP news release reports …

With brand marketers always looking to get the most out of their advertising budgets, the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) this week released A Comprehensive Picture of Digital Video and TV Advertising: Viewing, Budget Share Shift and Effectiveness, a Nielsen research study commissioned by the IAB investigating how moving dollars from TV ad budgets to digital media — especially digital video — affects reach and costs. The report reveals that a 15-percent shift in media spend to digital will drive a distinct increase in advertiser reach across verticals. "It's eye-opening to discover that viewers actually have an easier time naming the brand behind a TV commercial if they have had the opportunity to be introduced to the creative first on a digital screen. Marketers and media planners clearly need …"

The BBC is a bloated, top-heavy and poorly led corporation staffed by dull executives and backbiting journalists — and that's just what the company's leadership says. In 3,000 pages of emails and interviews published last week, the BBC's top officials have harsh words for the institutional culture of their respected media group, whose image has been damaged by a scandal over a top entertainer who police say sexually assaulted hundreds of women and children during his decades-long career at the broadcaster, an AP news release reports. "These documents paint a very unhappy picture," said BBC Trust chairman Chris Patten, whose criticisms were among the harshest. But he said in a statement that the taxpayer-funded corporation needed "to acknowledge these shortcomings and learn from them …

In this post-modern world where personal technology reigns supreme (particularly mobile devices), it is not outlandish to think that a smartphone or tablet can become your best friend. Just how intimately connected are we with our mobile devices? A new survey commissioned by Citrix found that Americans admitted to spending almost every waking minute with their devices, whether checking news and social media feeds first thing each morning, eating every meal with device in hand, or watching reality TV shows in secret. Like most close relationships, it's not all fun and games. The survey also highlights where the relationship between user and device can go south. "These survey findings confirm suspicions that most of us are rendered completely helpless when separated from our mobile devices …"

U.S. shoppers earning at least $150,000 a year rank 16 mainstream retailers in the 2013 Luxury Consumer Experience (LCEI) survey jointly conducted by the New York-based Luxury Institute and Customer Culture Institute. Respondents evaluated national and regional department store brands, as well retailers of office supplies and electronics. Among national retailers, Lord & Taylor earns the highest (8.00) LCEI score, and ranks first on all seven subcomponents, which include shoppers' evaluations of staff, stores and degree of overall satisfaction. In electronics, Apple's LCEI score of 8.40 tops Best Buy's 6.97. Staples (7.31) is the clear winner in office supplies, ranked ahead of Office Depot (7.05) and OfficeMax (7.00). "Wealthy consumers don't confine their shopping to luxury retailers …"

Millennials have never known a time when their address book (and the world's information) wasn't at their fingertips, but today the dependence on mobile devices to manage all aspects of life spans every generation of women. BlogHer, Inc., a cross-platform media network and publisher for women, has released its second annual consumer electronics study (December 2012). The findings state that we are all the mobile generation now. Women of all ages were asked to describe when they buy electronic gadgets, what they love most about this constant companion, and what fears accompany their mobile dependence. Millennials are mobile natives, but money (or lack thereof) may keep them from living up to their early adopter reputation …

Google's stock price topped $800 for the first time this week amid renewed confidence in the company's ability to reap steadily higher profits from its dominance of Internet search and prominence in the increasingly important mobile device market. The milestone comes more than five years after Google's shares initially hit $700. But during the "Great Recession," Google's stock tumbled into a prolonged malaise that eventually led to a change in leadership. The company's resurgent stock is an implicit endorsement of co-founder Larry Page. He replaced his managerial mentor, Eric Schmidt, as CEO in April 2011. Google's stock has risen by about 35 percent since Page took over. By contrast, the benchmark Standard & Poor's 500 index has climbed by 15 percent over the same stretch …

A probe into the overheating of a lithium ion battery in an All Nippon Airways Boeing 787 that made an emergency landing found it was improperly wired, Japan's Transport Ministry said this week. The Transport Safety Board said in a report that the battery for the aircraft's auxiliary power unit was incorrectly connected to the main battery that overheated, although a protective valve would have prevented power from the auxiliary unit from causing damage, an AP news release reports. Flickering of the plane's tail and wing lights after it landed and the fact the main battery was switched off led the investigators to conclude there was an abnormal current traveling from the auxiliary power unit due to miswiring …

Yahoo is renovating the main entry into its website in an effort to get people to visit more frequently and stay longer. The long-awaited makeover of Yahoo.com's home page is the most notable change to the website since the Internet company hired Marissa Mayer as its CEO seven months ago. The new look debuted this week in the U.S., although it could take a few more days before everyone starts to see it. It's the first time Yahoo has redesigned the page in four years. In that time, the company has seen its annual revenue drop by about 30 percent from $7.2 billion in 2008 to $5 billion last year as more online advertising flowed to rivals such as Google and Facebook …

Aquent, a global staffing organization dedicated to marketing, creative and digital professionals, this week announced the results of the study, Planning for Mobile Marketing Success Through Smart Staffing, commissioned with Forrester Research. The study found that demonstrating the ROI of mobile marketing is the top concern of marketers planning to grow marketing programs. In addition, marketers indicated a struggle with accurately staffing for mobile campaigns — in fact, few organizations have a full-time employee dedicated to driving mobile marketing initiatives.The results of the survey revealed that mobile marketing strategies are still in the early stages of development for many companies, with more than two-thirds of respondents indicating that they had a mobile strategy in place for two years or less …

Good news for the company formally known as Research in Motion: Blackberry is enjoying its best consumer perception in the U.S. since September 2011 in the wake of its new smart phone line announcement — bringing the brand closer to industry leaders Apple and Samsung. The Blackberry brand has been picking up more positive feedback than negative from consumers since mid-January, after spending most of the past 14 months with predominantly negative scores. Samsung's Galaxy's brand perception has been moving steadily upwards since early 2012. The iPhone hit its perception peak in October with the introduction of its latest model, but has been unable to maintain its momentum, and has been falling since the beginning of this year …

BP acknowledged this week it had failed to reach a settlement in advance of next week's civil trial on the Deepwater Horizon accident and is ready to defend itself vigorously against allegations of gross negligence in the U.S.'s biggest environmental disaster. Rupert Bondy, the group's general counsel, said in a statement that settlement demands were "not based on reality or the merits of the case." The company said it was confident and ready to move to trial, an AP news release reports. "Gross negligence is a very high bar that BP believes cannot be met in this case," Bondy said. "This was a tragic accident, resulting from multiple causes and involving multiple parties …"

National Rifle Association leader Wayne LaPierre renewed his call last week for armed guards in schools and urged gun owners to "stand and fight" for the Second Amendment. In a speech billed as the NRA response to President Obama's State of the Union call for new gun regulations, LaPierre noted in remarks to the National Wild Turkey Federation in Nashville that the speech didn't mention school security. He dismissed Obama's calls for background checks for all firearms purchases and bans on assault weapons and ammunition magazines that hold more than 10 rounds, an AP news release reports. "We will not be duped by the hypocrisy in the White House or the Congress who would deny our right to semi-automatic technology …"

NetBase, a social intelligence company, recently released a new survey revealing the conflicting consumer awareness and attitudes about social media listening. The survey of 1,062 U.S. adult consumers, ages 18-55+, conducted by the J.D. Power Panel, found that while 51 percent of consumers want to talk about companies without being listened to, 58 percent want companies to respond to their complaints shared on social media. "It's really important that marketers consider these findings when developing social media strategies. The companies that take the time to understand what customers are saying, and engage in a way that considers context and builds relationships, are the ones that will benefit from social listening and engagement …"