March 3, 2014

Gay, Lesbian Troops Perform in Drag at Fundraiser

Since the repeal of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, U.S. military bases have hosted a gay marriage ceremonies and a potluck gatherings. But on Saturday, servicemembers here may have been the first to take to the stage and perform as drag queens on a military installation in support of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender troops.

Drag queens and drag kings, to be precise.

Six servicemembers -- gay, lesbian and straight -- donned heavy makeup to dance and lip sync songs such as "I Wanna Dance with Somebody" for a raucous capacity crowd at the Rocker NCO Club at Kadena Air Base. The event was a fundraiser for the recently formed Okinawa chapter of OutServe-SLDN, which is the largest nonprofit advocate for the military's LGBT community.

"We didn't think there was much of a desire for an event like this on the island but it has actually blown up," said Navy Lt. Marissa Greene, co-chapter leader of OutServe Okinawa.

Greene said she had hoped to sell about 75 tickets to fund some future support activities for the group, which was formed last summer and still "starting from scratch." The event was approved as a "variety show" by Kadena's 18th Wing through the same process as other on-base fundraisers.

But an initial 200 tickets were plucked up almost immediately, so they issued another 200.

"We ended up selling 400 tickets in 10 days," she said.

Amid the unexpected success, OutServe carefully avoided any mention of politics, but its variety show comes at a pivotal time for gay civil rights in the United States, with many states passing laws dealing with marriage or debating individual liberties.

It is also a sign of the times within the military; just a few years ago, gay and lesbian drag performances on a military base would have been unthinkable and potentially a cause for dismissal from the service.

Read More: http://www.military.com/daily-news/2014/03/03/gay-lesbian-troops-perform-in-drag-at-fundraiser.html?comp=700001075741&rank=3

March 3, 2014

Americans used smartphone and tablet apps more than PCs to access the Internet last month

the first time that has ever happened.

Mobile apps overtake PC Internet usage in U.S.


Americans used smartphone and tablet apps more than PCs to access the Internet last month -- the first time that has ever happened.

Mobile devices accounted for 55% of Internet usage in the United States in January. Apps made up 47% of Internet traffic and 8% of traffic came from mobile browsers, according to data from comScore, cited Thursday by research firm Enders Analysis. PCs clocked in at 45%.

Although total Internet usage on mobile devices has previously exceeded that on PCs, this is the first time it's happened for app usage alone.

The shift follows a freefall in PC sales, which suffered their worst decline in history last year.

http://money.cnn.com/2014/02/28/technology/mobile/mobile-apps-internet/index.html

March 1, 2014

Blowing Up: Tesla's Gigafactory Is Going To Revolutionize The Auto And Utility Industries

Very soon, Tesla is going to announce plans to build the world’s largest battery factory here in the United States. It desperately needs to get started on the project in order to have enough lithium-ion capacity to power its third-generation car that it hopes to sell for $35,000 just 3 years from now. To do this, the company will enlist longtime partner Panasonic, who is rumored to be investing upwards of $1 billion of its own money; likely raise significant capital of its own; and quite possibly even bring in additional outside players. That alone should be enough of an undertaking. But Elon Musk is thinking bigger. Not only is this multi-billion-dolllar venture going to set his automaker up for a move to the big time in the world market, it’s also going to give him a wedge to basically destroy the utility business in the U.S. And, those companies have no one but themselves to blame.

Batteries included

Under existing agreements with Panasonic, Tesla is already planning on buying 1.8 billion lithium-ion cells over the next 4 years. The reason it needs so many is because it uses thousands of them in each of its vehicles. Those nearly 2 billion batteries will barely give Tesla the ability to produce 250,000 Model S sedans and Model X SUVs and it’s likely the less-expensive “Model E” as its often referred to will sell nearly that many in its first year alone. Enter the Gigafactory, as Musk has taken to calling it, which will produce upwards of 30 gigawatt-hours worth of batteries per year. How much is that? “We are talking about something that is comparable to all of the lithium-ion battery production in the world in one factory,” Musk has said.

And it’s enough for hundreds of thousands of Tesla vehicles, assuming they offer similar packs to today’s cars, which Musk has also promised on a number of occasions. The marvel of the factory is that it will take in raw materials — lithium and the other metals needed — and spit out finished packs on the other end, in whatever sizes Tesla requires. Today, that’s 60 and 85 kilowatt-hours in a “large format” that will support both the S and X. The future vehicle likely will require a smaller pack and it seems probable a 100-kilowatt pack (or larger) is coming to the big vehicles soon.

Power to the people

But there’s much more. Tesla has already been running trials with SolarCity, which is run by Musk’s cousin Lyndon Rive, on a storage unit. What it does is hold onto some excess power generated by the panels on the roof of a home or business rather than immediately sending it to the grid. In the short run, this has the potential to solve a very big problem that’s headed California’s way brought on by the success of solar in the state. It’s something called “the duck graph” and what it shows is what happens when the sun starts to set and people head home from work. The result is a big mess where net demand for electricity spikes to the highest levels of the day all in the space of one hour. California is so concerned it has mandated significant energy storage be brought online to reel in the length of the duck’s neck before it gets too long.

snip

But the utilities have instead begun a war on solar. In Arizona, the state’s largest utility sought a fee of roughly $50 per month from each solar customer for the right to connect back to the grid. They lost and the fee will be $3-6 instead. Five other states are now seeking similar money grabs. Their problem is that solar customers are supposedly not paying their fair share of grid costs and are are costing everyone else money by selling power back to the grid they don’t use at the same retail rates they buy power, something called “net metering.”

The danger for utilities, though, is that they get exactly what they want. If net metering is killed, more customers will simply install storage and hardly ever tap the grid at all. While those customers will end up paying something to be on the grid, it will be a minimal amount. All their excess power will fill their battery pack and their electric vehicle and none of it will go to stabilizing the grid. It turns out the utility model isn’t well designed to lose even small numbers of customers yet in many states, it’s already cheaper to roll your own power than to buy it from the local utility. Make it punitive to play nice with the grid and more people will simply choose not to. That sets off a chain reaction that basically kills the utility business in a matter of a few years.

Where the Gigafactory fits in is that it’s likely going to drive the cost of that storage into the ground.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/markrogowsky/2014/02/26/blowing-up-teslas-gigafactory-is-going-to-revolutionize-the-auto-and-utility-industries/

February 28, 2014

Court to drivers: It's ok to use a cell phone to look at a map

Source: SFGate

It's illegal in California to talk or text on a hand-held cell phone while driving. But it's OK to pick up your phone and look at a map to see where you're going and how to get there.

That was the message Thursday from a state appeals court in Fresno, which threw out a driver's traffic ticket and $165 fine for using a map app in a traffic jam.

In a 2006 state law, the Legislature responded to concerns about distracted driving "by prohibiting drivers from engaging in conversations while holding the telephone in one's hand rather than prohibiting all hand-held uses of the telephone," said the Fifth District Court of Appeal.

The ruling is the first appellate interpretation of a 2006 state law that restricts hand-held uses of a mobile telephone while driving. Theruling will have statewide impact if it withstands further appeals.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Court-to-drivers-It-s-ok-to-use-a-cell-phone-to-5274997.php

February 27, 2014

Americans would give up TV before Internet

Americans have become so enamored of the Internet, they would more readily forgo television than online access, a survey showed Thursday.

The Pew Research Center survey released ahead of the 25th anniversary of the World Wide Web found 53 percent of US Internet users would find it "very hard" to give up Web access, up from 38 percent in 2006.

Even when counting those who don't go online, Pew said 46 percent of all adults would find it hard to give up the Internet.

By contrast, Pew's survey showed 35 percent of all US adults television would be very hard to give up, compared with 44 percent in 2006.

Women were more likely than men to be attached to the Internet, as were people with higher levels of income and education, Pew said in the report issued ahead of the March 12 anniversary.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iMp8WL1OAjLbbAdiWHA6PRwsEmXQ?docId=ac3a5c3b-f1b1-4fc4-ba56-919736c47ee8&hl=en

February 27, 2014

U.S. Retail Chains See First Profit Decline Since Recession

U.S. retailers last quarter suffered their darkest days since the recession.

With results in from 62 of 122 retail chains, the industry has posted its first profit quarterly drop since the economic contraction that ended in 2009, according to Retail Metrics Inc. Revenue also rose at the lowest rate since that year, the research firm found.

The results paint a grim picture of an industry hit hard by the sluggish job recovery and slow wage growth, which have turned U.S. consumers into a nation of penny pinchers. Earnings are expected to drop 6.1 percent on average during the holiday quarter, according to Retail Metrics data. The broader pool of Standard & Poor’s 500 Index companies, meanwhile, are estimated to see profit rise 8.5 percent.

“It was a very tough season for the retailers, no question about it,” Ken Perkins, president of Swampscott, Massachusetts-based Retail Metrics, said in a phone interview. “They were facing pressure on multiple fronts.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-27/u-s-retail-chains-seeing-first-profit-decline-since-recession.html

February 27, 2014

Israel seeks house arrest for defendant in 2009 TA gay center murders

Source: Haaretz

The State Prosecutor’s Office on Wednesday asked the Tel Aviv District Court to release to house arrest Hagai Felician, who is charged with murdering two people and wounding dozens more in a shooting in 2009 at Barnoar, a youth center for LGBT teens in Tel Aviv. The prosecution cited new evidence that undermines the original indictment.

The recent disclosures have become the foundation for a new criminal investigation focusing on the state’s main witness in the case. The witness was arrested last week and remains in police custody. He is suspected of fabricating evidence and obstructing justice.

The rest of the details of the new investigation are under a court-approved gag order, at the request of the police. The decision to ask the court to release Felician was made by State Prosecutor Shai Nitzan himself, in consultation with the police and the Tel Aviv District chief prosecutor.

The State Prosecutor’s Office said it is examining the all the evidence and will reconsider the prosecution of Felician, based on developments in the investigation. Anonymous sources in both the Israel Police and the prosecutor’s office say they believe the charges against Felician will be dismissed.



Read more: http://www.haaretz.com/misc/article-print-page/1.576716

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worst attack against the gay community in Israel's history

February 27, 2014

NYC Church Warns That 'Homo Demons' Unleashed By Obama Will Steal Men

A New York City church sign is warning black women that "homo demons" unleashed by President Barack Obama are out to steal their men, the Washington Times reported Thursday.



Read More: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/church-sign-warns-homo-demons-unleashed-by-obama-will-steal-husbands

This bigotry is in NY and not some backwater.

February 27, 2014

Man

February 27, 2014

California town shaken as police officers arrested

Residents of a California farming town were grappling Wednesday with the feeling that their trust has been violated after learning the acting police chief and a handful of officers were charged with crimes including selling or giving away the impounded cars of poor Hispanic residents.

The misgivings had been building for some time. Investigators heard people — many unable to speak English — complain that police were taking their cars and money, and there was nothing they could do about it.

"I'm not at all surprised by the arrests, I'm just surprised there weren't more charges," restaurateur Vivian Villa said Wednesday in Spanish while sizzling a pan of beef in preparation for the lunch rush. "Now maybe some of them are going to feel what we feel when they target us."

Later in the day, Villa held a meeting in her little restaurant where about a dozen community members spoke out against police abuse and corruption.

Latinos account for nearly 90 percent of the community of 13,000 people tucked among fields of tomatoes, strawberries and lettuce along the Salinas River, 150 miles southeast of San Francisco.

http://www.sfgate.com/news/crime/article/California-town-shaken-as-police-officers-arrested-5267574.php