New Internet Domain Extensions: Don't Get Blinded by the Sunrise or Run Over by the Landrush

2014 is going to be a landmark year for the Internet as the oldest and most basic form of user online navigation gets a major overhaul. The domain names that marketers and end users have relied on since the Internet's inception—extensions like .com, .net, and .org—will no longer be the only game in town. New generic top-level domains (gTLDs), including extensions such as .app, .sports, .club, .healthcare and many more, have already started to launch.

However, bringing those new extensions to market is more complicated than slapping on a price tag and hanging a for sale sign. It's been a multiyear process already; and, despite some hiccups, the organization that governs the Internet and is managing the rollout, http://newgtlds.icann.org/en ICANN, has tried to make it fair for everyone involved. Accordingly, introducing domains under a new extension is a multistep process that's designed to include protections for trademark holders and give average users a fair shake at getting the names they want.

Every marketer should understand the two important phases under this process: the Sunrise and the Landrush periods. ICANN mandates that a Sunrise period lasting at least 30 days must take place for every new domain extension that launches. During that timeframe, trademark holders are given an opportunity to claim domains that are associated with their marks before anyone else is able to register them. If multiple parties are seeking the same domain, disputes will be arbitrated or will go to auction at the end of the Sunrise period.

Read more from MarketingProfs.

If Famous Events Had Happened in the Viral Era

Please stop this, Internet.

From Brian Sargent.

This Is the Williamsburg of Your City: A Map of Hip America

What is your city's Williamsburg? What's its hippest—or formerly hippest—or sometimes just youngest—neighborhood, the one with the art galleries and the boutiques and the lines for brunch? (And what, for that matter, is its Bushwick, or "Next Williamsburg"?) If you don't know off the top of your head, don't worry. Today, we present to you the results—tabulated and mapped.

The Williamsburg of/is/(and its Bushwick is)
Albany, N.Y./Center Square/-
Buffalo, N.Y./Elmwood/Allentown
Hudson, N.Y./Warren St./-


More from Gawker.

How We Won—and Lost—the War on Poverty, in 6 Charts

President Lyndon B. Johnson announced a "war on poverty" in America in his State of the Union address on January 8, 1964. "This administration today, here and now, declares unconditional war on poverty in America," he said. "It will not be a short or easy struggle, no single weapon or strategy will suffice, but we shall not rest until that war is won. The richest nation on Earth can afford to win it. We cannot afford to lose it." The aim of the war, he said would be to "cure" and "prevent" poverty.

Johnson's administration went on to design "Great Society" initiatives, including a permanent food stamp program, Medicare and Medicaid, Head Start, which provides early education to low-income kids, and increased funding to public schools.

The war on poverty helped raise millions above the poverty line. During Johnson's years in office, the poverty rate dropped from 23 percent to 12 percent.

But where do we stand today? The government's official measure of poverty shows that poverty has actually increased slightly since the Johnson administration, rising from 14.2 percent in 1967 to 15 percent in 2012.

But those numbers aren't quite accurate...

More from Mother Jones.

Magnets for Migrants: States with the Highest Domestic Migration Rates, 2012-13

The mobility rate of Americans has plunged over the past few decades, falling to historic lows in the aftermath of the Great Recession. Nevertheless, Americans are still moving and some states are attracting more movers than others, according to the most recent estimates from the Census Bureau. Here are the states, ranked from highest to lowest, with positive rates of net domestic migration (meaning more U.S. residents moved into the state than out of the state per 1,000 population) between July 1, 2012 and June 30, 2013...

1. North Dakota
2. District of Columbia
3. Colorado
4. South Carolina
5. South Dakota
6. Montana
7. Florida
8. Nevada
9. Wyoming
10. Texas
11. Arizona
12. North Carolina
13. Oklahoma
14. Delaware
15. Idaho
16. Oregon
17. Washington
18. Tennessee
19. Utah
20. Virginia
21. Iowa
22. Alabama

Among the 29 states with negative domestic migration rates (meaning more U.S. residents are moving out of the state than into the state per 1,000 population) Alaska had the fastest rate of outflow between 2012 and 2013, followed by New York, Illinois, New Jersey, and New Mexico.

Find great stats from the New Strategist.

New York county-to-county migration

Today the Census Bureau released County-to-County flow data based on the 2007-2011 ACS. This year the flows are cross-tabulated with education and income (individual and household). Last year they were cross-tabulated with sex, age, race and Hispanic origin.

More on that release HERE and HERE.

Data can be found through HERE and they have a mapping application where you can find out where people with certain characteristics come from and go to.

See also the data tabular format on a new web page. You can find estimates of the characteristics of people moving in and out of each County (“Overview”) or you can get estimates of the characteristics of people moving between two New York counties.

Looking for Number of Waterfront Homes in the US

From the BUSLIB listserv:

The American Housing Survey may be of use; latest is for 2011. There are links to AFF, but searching is cumbersome.

For 2009, though, the National Summary Report and Tables is in pdf - 175 pages. Much more direct.

Marrying Older, But Sooner?

The age when Americans marry for the first time has risen to its highest point since the 1950s. Although true, there is more to the story. With life expectancy increasing, Americans today are actually marrying sooner in their lifetime, despite marrying at older ages.

Although it is common to use the 1950s as a comparison period, doing so exaggerates how much the age at marriage has really risen . Looking at trends since 1890 reveals a U-shaped curve in which the 1950s and 1960s stand out as the exception for marriage, not the norm (estimates for these two decades are not significantly different from one another).

By the end of the 19th century, men married for the first time at 26 years old, three years later than they did in the decade following the Second World War. By 1900 their age at marriage began falling, and it took a full century before returning to its 1890 level. For women, it took 90 years. The idea then that our great-great-grandparents married when they were little older than teenagers is little more than myth.

More from the US Census.

The science behind a happy relationship

Regardless of how happy you are in a current relationship (and trust us, you'll find some fascinating facts on how marriage and kids can affect your happiness levels at different stages)--the main takeaway is that there are small changes you can make in your interactions that can boost your relationship satisfaction for the long run.

See the infographic from Happify.

Where in the U.S. will you find the most “pleasant” days in a year?

“Pleasant” here means the mean temperature was between (55° F and 75° F), the minimum temperature was above 45° F, the maximum temperature was below 85° F and there was no significant precipitation or snow depth.

More from Kellegous.

New York State and energy

From HERE.

In 2010, New York was the eighth largest energy consumer in the United States, but, due in part to its widely used mass transportation systems, it had the second lowest energy consumption per capita after Rhode Island.

The Marcellus shale, which underlies southwestern New York, is estimated to hold at least 141 trillion cubic feet in technically recoverable natural gas.

The 2,353-megawatt Robert Moses Niagara hydroelectric power plant was the fourth largest hydroelectric power plant in the United States in 2010 and, in 2011, New York produced more hydroelectric power than any other State east of the Rocky Mountains.

New York's Renewable Portfolio Standard requires that 30 percent of electricity come from renewable energy resources by 2015; in 2011, 24 percent of electricity came from renewable energy resources.

In 2011, New York had the fourth highest average electricity prices in the United States.

More than half of New York households (53 percent) use individual window or wall air conditioning units, while only 20 percent have a central air conditioning system, according to EIA's Residential Energy Consumption Survey.


More Energy Information Agency data and maps.

Webinar Invitation - Economic Census - Industries Overview (Wed., 2 pm)

Tomorrow, Wednesday, Feb. 12, at 2 pm, the Census Bureau is hosting the second in a series of four webinars about the Economic Census. This 30-minute webinar will cover industry data from the Economic Census, primarily focusing on what is new for this 2012 data set.
Because you, our Census Bureau partners, serve as a direct link to local communities, you are in a position to help us disseminate information and data products from the Economic Census. This webinar series is meant to inform you about information from the Economic Census that is important to data users in your communities.
These webinars are recorded so that they can be used as a reference resource for data users, and will be housed on both the SDC and CIC websites.

Here is an overview of what will be covered in this week’s webinar.
What’s New for the 2012 Economic Census – Industries
a) New industries (solar, wind, geothermal, and biomass electric power generation)
b) Manufacturing industries consolidation
c) Other changes
d) Bridge and Comparative Statistics reports

Topic: Economic Census
Date: Wednesday, February 12, 2014
Time: 2:00 pm, EST
Meeting Number: 747 382 634
Meeting Password: 2012econ2

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To start or join the online meeting
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Go to https://census.webex.com/census/j.php?MTID=mc2cd54ef6cfb47b56c30478d75b93446

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Teleconference information
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Call-in toll-free number (Verizon): 1-877-950-4283 (US)
Attendee access code: 268 482 34

Democrats are from cities, Republicans are from exurbs

The first reaction many people may have when looking at a standard red/blue map of county-level election results is often "Holy crap, look at all that red!" While that huge red bulls-eye in the nation's middle is easily explained away—trees and tumbleweeds don't vote; only people do—when it's presented without disclaimers, it can help reinforce the perception that this is a "center-right nation." One of the best ways around that is with a cartogram (a map that distorts boundaries to account for another variable, like population) ... but how do we express that in a way that still looks like the United States, and not a piece of purple roadkill?

Princeton's Robert Vanderbei put together a fantastic 3-d map in 2012... that visualizes the country with blue skyscrapers towering over pink plains, reflecting the heavy concentration of votes in urban areas. However, I wanted to try going in a different direction, with a flat map, but one where the color varies by intensity according to the change in the number of votes over the years.

More from Daily Kos.

Map: Local Government Employees in New York State

A look at census data relating to employment patterns in New York State constructed by Andy Arthur.

Identity Theft in 2012

Seventeen million Americans aged 16 or older were victims of identity theft in 2012, but only 14 percent of victims experienced out-of-pocket losses of $1 or more. Most were able to resolve the problem in a day or less, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics' report Victims of Identity Theft, 2012. Despite the relatively minor inconvenience identity theft poses to most of its victims, a substantial 36 percent of identity theft victims reported moderate to severe emotional distress because of the incident.

Victims of identity theft are more likely than nonvictims to take measures to reduce the future risk of theft. Here is the percentage of identity theft victims (and the percentage of nonvictims) who took selected actions in the past 12 months...

Checked bank or credit statements: 92% (74%)
Shredded documents with personal information: 80% (67%)
Changed passwords on financial accounts: 56% (27%)
Checked credit report: 53% (37%)
Used identity theft security program on computer: 25% (16%)
Purchased credit monitoring service: 12% (5%)


Thanks to Demo Memo.

Cities are growing

Between 2010 and 2012, the nation's largest cities (with populations of 50,000 or more) grew 2.1 percent. This was nearly double the 1.1 percent growth elsewhere. During the same time, the USDA reports population loss in nonmetropolitan areas--the first ever recorded. For more about this trend, see City Growth by Size, and Why Metros Are Growing, and Population Change along the Rural-Urban Continuum.

Surgeon General's Reports on Smoking and Tobacco Use

In honor of CVS banning the sale of tobacco products in its 7,600+ stores by October 1:
Surgeon General's Reports on Smoking and Tobacco Use. From the 2014 report:

In the last 50 years, 31 Surgeon General’s Reports have been released, increasing our understanding of the devastating health and financial burdens caused by tobacco use. We now know that smoking causes a host of cancers and other illnesses and is still the leading preventable cause of death in the United States, killing 443,000 people each year.

Computer and Internet Use in the United States: 2012

Based on Current Population Survey statistics from July 2012, the Computer and Internet Access in the United States infographic provides household and individual level analysis of computer use and Internet access, as well as a profile of individual smartphone usage.

Detailed Tables
Infographic PDF

2008-2012 American Community Survey Voting Age Population by Citizenship and Race

This tabulation from the 2008-2012 American Community Survey shows estimates of the citizen voting age population by race for small areas of geography.

The downloadable files show the population 18 and older by citizenship status and race for the nation, states, District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, counties, minor civil divisions, places, tracts and block groups. The files reflect both the population living in housing units and in group quarters, such as college dormitories. The new files and technical documentation along with previous versions of the files can be found on the Census Bureau’s Redistricting Data website.

This is the fourth year in a row that the American Community Survey has produced estimates of this population for even the smallest geographic areas. Prior to the American Community Survey, communities would have to wait 10 years for an update on the citizen voting-age population.

How much snow it takes to close schools (map)

A recent post on Reddit provided a map of the US, broken down by counties, which predicts the general amount of snow needed before your local school closes. It was created based on a combination of local news reports, a survey, and average snowfall levels from NOAA maps. It then makes an approximation of the differing levels of snow it takes to call off school.

From Herkimer and Oneida Counties Census Data Affiliate via HERE.