Author: Brett

Bea Arthur Residence for LGBT Homeless Youths Gains $3 Million in New York City Funding

Brett

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/09/lgbt-homeless-youths-new-york_n_1659572.html

For homeless youth and their advocates, the fight for resources can be fierce. New York City has about 4,000 homeless youths — many of whom are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender — yet its government funds just 259 shelter beds. Waiting lists for these beds, particularly at centers that cater to young LGBT homeless people, are growing.

But on Monday, the Ali Forney Center, an organization that provides housing for gay homeless youths in New York, announced some good news for those seeking a shelter bed. The New York City Council and the Manhattan borough president designated $3.3 million to help renovate a city-owned building and transform it into a new 18-bed shelter.

The space will be named after former “Golden Girls” star Bea Arthur. Before her death in 2009, Arthur served as an icon for many gay people and left the Ali Forney Center $300,000 in her will. That year was the height of the recession, when the facility had been in danger of eliminating beds because it had fallen behind on rent, the center’s executive director Carl Siciliano recalled on Monday. And Arthur’s gift to the center prevented that.

5 Questions to Ask Yourself Before Taking a Startup Job

Brett

http://www.fastcompany.com/1839311/5-questions-to-ask-yourself-before-taking-a-startup-job

A few weeks ago, I wrote an article for Fast Company on why those searching for jobs should consider working at a startup over a bigger, more established corporation. While many Fast Company readers agreed with the sentiment, a few did point out the inherent risks of working at a startup. Jobs at a startup are naturally sketchy, with less job security, lower pay, and more turnover than a bigger corporation. But just because something is risky, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do it. It does mean that you need to weigh the risks against the many positives I outlined in my previous article.

To do so, ask yourself these important questions to help you decide if your startup option will be rewarding or if the entire office will be packing their boxes before the end of summer.

Death to Retail: The Rise of the Online-Only Brand

Brett

http://thenextweb.com/insider/2012/07/07/death-to-retail-the-rise-of-the-online-only-brand/?utm_medium=Spreadus&utm_campaign=social%20media&awesm=tnw.to_i1UP&utm_source=Twitter

How many startups garner 17,000 paying customers in their first seven days? How many more compete with CVS and Walgreens?

When Dollar Shave Club launched in March, the headlines were dumbfounding: Razors? By Subscription? It seemed the feared tech bubble, primed to burst, had finally arrived. However, once you watched Dollar Shave Club’s launch video, “Our Blades Are F***ing Great,” of CEO Mike Dubin deadpanning about his love of fine razors, it all made sense. This wasn’t just another subscription startup. This was the launch of a new brand; a competitor to the Schicks of the world; a new alternative to your trusty, albeit underused, Mach III. For $1 per month, Dubin promised you would get high quality razors delivered to your door. Almost 20,000 people laid down their credit cards in the first week, proving that Kleiner Perkins and other A-list investors were onto something.

Dollar Shave Club isn’t just the culmination of an underserved need for affordable razors. It exemplifies the emergence of the “Online-Only Brand.” Whether it’s underwear from MeUndies, retro glasses from Warby Parker, or luxury soft t-shirts from Everlane, online brands with an irreverent disregard for retail are popping up in every category imaginable. Everlane CEO Michael Preysman told the New York Times “We are going to shut the company down before we go to physical retail.”

These brands represent a new movement in e-commerce, a second generation that is focused on the vertical integration of manufacturing, branding, and distribution—while upending the traditional retail model in the process.

22 Latino Organizations Back Pro-LGBT Campaign

Brett

22 Latino organizations back pro-LGBT campaign

More than 20 Latino civil rights organizations announced on Sunday that they have endorsed a campaign designed to bolster acceptance of LGBT-specific issues among Hispanics.

The U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, the Cuban American National Council, the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, the League of United Latin American Citizens and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund are among the 22 groups that have backed the “Familia es Familia” campaign.  The initiative will provide affiliated organizations with trainings, videos, publications and other resources in both English and Spanish on marriage rights for same-sex couples, discrimination and other issues. “Familia es Familia” will also use Facebook, Twitter and other social media networks to further engage Latinos on these issues.

Ingrid Duran of D&P Creative Strategies, a D.C.-based public relations firm that helped create the campaign, told the Blade that “Familia es Familia” will provide “tools and resources to the community to start having conversations about LGBT issues.” She added the campaign deliberately decided to focus on families because of the central role they play in many Latinos’ lives.

“Family unity is extremely important,” said Duran. “We felt that the first line of entry into the community to talk to families.”

Shooting of lesbian teen couple leaves Texas town searching for answers

Brett
As Americans across the country prepared to take part in a weekend of gay pride celebrations last Friday, Mollie Olgin and her girlfriend Mary Kristene Chapa, gay teenagers in a small Texas town, were gunned down and left for dead in the tall grass of a local park.
Olgin – a 19-year-old who hoped to one day become a psychologist and had just finished her first semester of college – died at the scene. Chapa, who is 18 years old, is currently in intensive care.
http://m.guardian.co.uk/ms/p/gnm/op/view.m?id=15&gid=/world/2012/jun/28/texas-lesbian-teenagers-shot-crime&cat=world#.T-1RLlDUPR0.mailto

For Ambitious Nonprofits, Capital to Grow

Brett

Imagine that you’re an entrepreneur running a chain of coffee bars and you want to raise capital to open up in new locations. You meet a potential investor, and he says, “I’d love to finance your business, but only the chai latte operation, not the coffee, and only to support drinks you sell in Cleveland next year.”

It might sound absurd, but this is the kind of thing that people running nonprofit organizations hear all the time. Whether they are providing housing or preschool or vocational training services, social organizations typically find their funding restricted to specific programs, locations and time frames. That doesn’t make it easy to grow.

 

Obama Saw Immediate Fundraising Spike After Same-Sex Marriage Announcement

Brett

In the days following President Obama’s announcement that hesupports same-sex marriage, anecdotal evidence suggested that the political position had a financial payoff. But without public financial disclosures, news sources relied on anonymous quotes saying that Obama’s re-election campaign took in $2 million in the 24 hours following the announcement, or $1 million in the first 90 minutes.

 

http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2012/06/27/155854165/obama-saw-immediate-fundraising-spike-after-same-sex-marriage-announcement?live=1

YouTube HUNGRY Guide: The Food Channel’s New Shows Plus Everything You Need to Know

Brett

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/25/yout

YouTube’s brand new food channel HUNGRY, created by multimedia studio Electus, is set to launch Wednesday and HuffPost Food has you covered with everything you need to know. The channel, helmed by Food Network and Cooking Channel veteran Bruce Seidel, aims to form a more direct community with viewers than television can, and have more flexibility with format and content. Seidel believes that the programs on HUNGRY have strong enough production value to rival food programs on mainstream television — though the programs are much shorter for the online audience. Expect a lot in the one to three minute range.

Duff Goldman, a consultant for HUNGRY in addition to having his own show on the channel, told the Associated Press, “It’s magic. It doesn’t have any boundaries. I don’t need to make it 22 minutes. I don’t need to make any sponsors happy. I can get away with stuff.”

HUNGRY is part of YouTube’s plan to roll out 100 niche channels with original programming. The $200 million venture will be marketed across Google and its advertising networks.

Below, you’ll find a guide to all the shows and when they’ll premiere, plus photos and video clips. Included in the guide are three never-before-announced programs: Drink, Inc., Summer Beer Cocktails With The Beer Chicks and Grill This With Nathan Lippy.

 

Transgender kids get help navigating a difficult path

Brett

Amber, a soft-spoken, feminine 12-year-old who loves Hello Kitty and fashion design, lives with a secret. It is a secret most sixth-graders can’t fathom, one she hides behind pink skirts and makeup. It is a secret that led to all her baby pictures being tucked away as though her childhood had never happened.

Amber was born a boy.

When she was 10, she stopped going by her given name, Aaron, and began dressing as a girl. Last year, she started taking medication to keep her from going through puberty.

“I can be who I am,” Amber said. “I can be a girl.”

 

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-transgender-kids-20120615,0,216229.story

Gorgeous George

Brett

IT IS Alan Bennett, and his “The Madness of King George”, who is to blame for the image of George III as a cartoon of inherited malady, all purple urine and verbal spasm. So Stella Tillyard’s book comes as a timely reminder that, long before the king screamed down the corridors at Windsor or chased ladies-in-waiting at Kew, he was a working monarch who steered Britain through decades of choppy waters.

Ms Tillyard’s interest, however, lies not so much with the big upsets of George’s long reign—the endless Whig infighting, economic jitteriness and, of course, the loss of America—but with a parallel set of dramas within the king’s own family. For while George was a husband and father of earnest strenuousness, the majority of his eight siblings turned out to be a giddy and ill-behaved crew.

 

http://www.economist.com/node/5436773