Airbnb isn't hurting the Hotel Industry

Ever since Airbnb came on the scene, the hotel industry has been worried the home-sharing company could hurt the hospitality and real estate industries. 

It turns out that at least some of those concerns might be unfounded. 

Data research firm STR took a look at Airbnb data alongside hotel data in 13 US and international markets. STR compared Airbnb to the biggest hotel chains in the world, like Marriott and Starwood (which recently merged), Hilton, Intercontinental Hotels Group, and more.

The data found that Airbnb has more than double the number of listings worldwide than Marriott/Starwood and Hilton combined, but it's not actually replacing hotels.  

Comparing Airbnb and hotels in the first place is "apples to oranges," as STR senior research analyst Jessica Haywood notes in her breakdown of the data. Travelers who choose to stay in an Airbnb versus a hotel are often looking for an entirely different type of experience. They want to interact with hosts, want to be immersed in the local culture, or simply can't afford to stay in a hotel, so will only travel if they have free or very cheap accommodations. 

Beyond that, Airbnb offers accommodations that hotels don't, like shared spaces or more whimsical places like tree houses and tents. Haywood notes that those kinds of atypical lodgings may have skewed her findings. 

Still, hotels crushed Airbnb in terms of occupancy in every market measured in the study. 

Hotel occupancy was still significantly higher in major markets like Los Angeles and San Francisco — Airbnb's home town — and the gap was even larger in international cities like Mexico City and London. Haywood estimates that in US cities, Airbnb is picking up the slack when hotels are full. Hotels also saw higher growth than Airbnb in nearly every US city. 

While Airbnb may certainly be stealing a small portion of hotel guests, that portion isn't nearly enough to unseat traditional lodgings. And while the hotel industry has other qualms with Airbnb — many believe Airbnb is contributing to gentrification and impacting housing costs — there's no reason to think Airbnb will put hotels out of business anytime soon.

After Hurricane Matthew, Floodwaters Rise To Record Levels In North Carolina

When Hurricane Matthew lost strength and headed out to sea over the weekend, the storm took its high winds and driving rains with it.

But it left behind water — from the record rains that fell during its trip up the southeastern U.S. coast. And particularly in North Carolina, the long-gone storm has continued to threaten lives as floodwaters rise, sometimes to record levels, flowing over the banks of rivers and threatening dams.

More than half of those deaths occurred in North Carolina, where rescue operations are still underway.The hurricane killed hundreds of people in Haiti and elsewhere in the Caribbean, and more than two-dozen people in the U.S. have died as a result of the storm, The Associated Press reports.

Early forecasts had predicted that Hurricane Matthew would turn out to sea before causing much damage in North Carolina. But the storm stayed along the U.S. coast for longer than expected, making landfall in South Carolina and bringing torrential rains to both the Carolinas.

A "serious inland flooding event" began immediately, according to the National Hurricane Center, and the consequences are still unfolding as the rainwater flows downriver.

On Monday, volunteers, U.S. marshals and water-rescue crews used helicopters, boats and massive trucks to save people stranded in Lumberton, N.C., after the Lumber River burst its banks, the AP says.

Sean Rayford/Getty Images

"The rescue teams were expected to be back at work across eastern North Carolina on Tuesday as the deluge rolled downstream toward the Atlantic Ocean," the wire service writes. "At least three rivers were forecast to reach record levels, some not cresting until Friday."

On Monday night, President Obama signed a disaster declaration to make federal funds available to help North Carolina cope with the flooding, the AP says.

Jay Price of member station WUNC got a close look at the floods in Lumberton on Monday. He told NPR that he has seen places where the floodwaters were topping the roofs of cars. "You're dealing with just massive amounts of water," he said.

"The weather's great — picture perfect, in fact," he said. "It's kind of startling."In what he called an "ironic juxtaposition," the sun came out and it was bright and clear in the storm-stricken towns.

The crisis is far from over. In some cases, the floodwaters aren't expected to crest until Friday.

"Nobody quite knows how bad it's going to be in some of these communities, but they know it's going to be at or close to record levels," Price says.

A building is inundated with floodwaters in Lumberton on Monday. Record floodwaters were rising in some areas of North Carolina.

Sean Rayford/Getty Images

He notes that Matthew brought "huge amounts" of rain, topping 15 inches in some areas. And that rain fell on already saturated ground.

"The water just has nowhere to go," he said. "When I drove in, I was for miles and miles nowhere near any river.

Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of customers across the South still didn't have electricity. The lights went out for millions of people and businesses after Matthew arrived on the coast. In some cases, it will take weeks to get the power back on, utilities say."It's just rising everywhere," Price said.

Want to fight global warming? Watch some car racing this weekend

Here’s the most important thing you can do this weekend: Turn on the television.
Formula E, a new motor racing championship, begins in Beijing tomorrow. The E stands for electric. As in electric cars. And there’s a lot riding on its success.
The money put in by sponsors is one thing. The investment by the participating teams is another, as are the jobs that have been created as a result. But if the new championship is a success, the most important outcome will not be profits for firms or continued employment for drivers, but the very future of private mobility.
The thinking goes something like this: Motor races in the late 19th and early 20th centuries drove some of the most major advancements in automotive technology. Developments by Peugeot in the 1910s had big effects on engine design. Later, things like fuel injection, commonplace in modern cars, were a direct result of innovations on the race track, says John Heitmann, president of the Society of Automotive Historians and a professor at the University of Dayton. Heitmann sees a similar revolution if electric car racing takes off. “There’s inordinate promise for technology transfer to go from racing to production,” he says.
The question of sustainability has been dogging motor sports for years. Even as Formula 1 has grown into a global behemoth, it has tried to reduce its environmental impact by changing engines to be more efficient. But that is incremental change. Formula E presents the chance to rethink engines altogether, and to create a market for innovation in electric cars and batteries.
“Motor sport has been losing a bit of its relevance. So this was a way to come back to where the mainstream is and to bring relevance to motor sport and do something useful for society,” says Alejandro Agag, a former Formula 1 man who owns the rights to Formula E and runs the company handling and promoting the championship.
Agag and his team have faced criticism along the way. Purists complain that the cars are too silent (hear for yourself in the video above), and that audience engagement tactics such as giving an extra power boost to the driver who receives the most tweets—perhaps materially altering the outcome of the race—are too gimmicky. But Agag argues that such innovations are necessary for a sport created in the 21st century. “It’s a designed media strategy consistent with the way media works in the modern world,” he says.

Booming electric car sales under fire in Norway

Ministers in Norway -- a major and rich oil-producing country -- are under increasing public pressure to reduce perks and tax breaks for booming electric car sales.
"It's become a problem," said Erik Haugstad, a bus driver in the Oslo region who complains about the numerous electric cars clogging bus lanes, which they have the right to use in Norway.
The cars are also exempt from urban toll payments or fees at public parking spaces, where they can recharge batteries without cost.
But above all, they are exempt from Norway's sky high sales taxes and VAT.
Norway brought in the generous incentives to cut back on greenhouse gas emissions from traffic, which accounts for 10 percent of total emissions in the Nordic nation.
The policy has been so successful that 32,000 electric cars are now on the road -- by far the highest rate per capita in the world, in a country with a 5.1 million population.
"I'm a bus driver and I want to transport my passengers as quickly as possible. So, I'd like electric cars to leave the bus lanes, where they're getting in my way," Haugstad said.
"These delays have a cost for society. Time lost by thousands of our passengers in traffic is far greater than that gained by a few dozen electric car drivers."
He said the cars can create a vicious circle -- tired of being stuck in traffic, bus users could be tempted to buy an electric car themselves, worsening the congestion problem.
Electric cars already represent 85 percent of traffic in bus lanes during rush hour, according to a study by the Norwegian Public Roads Administration on a busy stretch of road outside Oslo.
"It's a subject we discuss very often with colleagues during lunch break. Many of them are far more aggressive and don't measure their words as much as me," Haugstad said.
No decision has been made so far, but it looks increasingly likely that authorities will take action to unclog congested areas -- especially during rush hour.
In the meantime, electric car sales keep growing. From the popular Leaf by Japan's Nissan to high-end US-made Tesla S, they have accounted for 13 percent of new car sales since the beginning of 2014, far ahead of the rest of the world.
In March, the Tesla became the highest selling car in a single month in Norway's history, despite its relatively high price.
Although a basic model costs about 60,000 euros ($79,000), it still sounds like a bargain considering that a price including taxes would be roughly double.
The popularity of electric cars has caught the authorities off guard, as they expected to keep the incentives in place until 2017, or until they number 50,000.
At the current pace, that figure could be reached in the beginning of 2015, forcing the government to rethink its costly policy.
The tax exemptions alone account for up to 4 billion kroner (500 million euros, $650 million), according to the state's own estimates.
"We might make lowering adjustments in the future," Prime Minister Erna Solberg recently told Norwegian newspaper VG.
"But I can promise drivers that there will still be fiscal advantages to driving an electric car."
The commitment is important, because 48 percent of electric car owners say their main reason for buying them was to save money.
According to a survey by the Norwegian Electric Vehicle Association, only 27 percent said it was for environmental reasons and 12 percent to gain time in their rides.
"It's too early to remove the fiscal incentives. The market isn't competitive enough yet" compared to that of fossil-fuel-driven cars, said Christina Bu, general secretary of the association.
"If the tax and VAT exemption ends, the market could collapse and it would be hard for Norway to reach its climate goals. We must increase the number of electric cars, not reduce it."

NY Attorney General Calls for Ban of Soaps Containing Microbeads

New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman has called for a state-wide ban of soaps containing microbeads, citing recent studies that show how harmful the tiny cosmetic abrasives can be to the environment.
The office of Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman released a new report detailing the damages that microbeads - tiny plastic beads that are used as cleansing abrasives in cosmetic products - cause to New York waterways.
According to the report, which was prepared by the Attorney General's Environmental Protection Bureau (EPB), "nineteen tons of microbeads are washed down the drain each year and many end up in New York's waters, where they remain for decades, acting as sponges for toxic chemical pollutants."
The tiny "toxic sponges" can then be eaten by fish and wildlife, spreading toxin contamination throughout entire food chains and threatening the New York ecosystem, the authors of the report write.
Alongside this release, nine additional officials and political figures joined Schneiderman to support the passing of the Attorney General's Microbead-Free Waters Act, which was first proposed earlier this year. This bill would make New York State the first in the nation to ban the sale of any-and-all products containing microbeads.
"New York has always been at the forefront of national progress when it comes to addressing the issue of plastic pollution," Schneiderman said in a prepared statement. "By passing the Microbead-Free Waters Act, we will show that New York remains a leader in protecting the health of our families and our environment."
The bill was unanimously passed by the Assembly on May 5 and is currently being considered in the Senate.
However, research has shown that microbeads are not just a New York problem. Similar battles are being fought in other parts of the United States and Europe as well. "Beat the Microbead" is an international campaign dedicated to eliminating the use of the plastic abrasives in cosmetics. According to the organization - which is supported by the United Nation Environmental Programme - approximately 11 percent of all environmental problems caused by marine debris can be directly linked to microbeads. Eliminating this threat could take a significant chunk out of the water pollution problem that some experts call "the plastic soup."
Encouragingly, at least 21 companies around the world have already expressed a commitment to "phasing out" microbeads in their products. Other companies have not acknowledged the threat of these beads, but none have taken pains to deny the claims of environmental experts, according to the EPB report.

The Futuristic Liquid Nitrogen Machine That Makes Ice Cream To Order

Despite the warm wood and cheery red accents, Smitten Ice Cream can feel a bit like a mad scientist's shop. There's the industrial-sized tank of liquid nitrogen that greets you inside the entrance of its new flagship location in Oakland. And there's the billowing clouds of nitrogen when the stainless steel ice cream machines churn out personalized scoops to order.

With Smitten's Oakland store set to open next week, Gizmodo went to visit and get the, erh, inside scoop on how these machines make some of the best ice cream out there.
I have to say I was skeptical when I first heard about Smitten's schtick, which just seemed like a way to differentiate itself from the other cultishly trendy ice cream shops in the Bay Area. (That there is more than one such ice cream shop perhaps says something about the San Francisco of 2014.) I've made liquid nitrogen ice cream before, and the lumpy result was, put charitably, no better than supermarket brands. It's kinda fun but definitely not worthy of cultish devotion. But when I tried the ice at Smitten's original San Francisco location, damned if it wasn't delicious and creamy.
In theory, liquid nitrogen is supposed to make the best ice cream because its extremely low temperature prevents the formation of large ice crystals—hence the creamier result. In practice, though, superchilling your cream causes it to stick to the cold steel bowl, creating those lumps I encountered stirring by hand. That's where Brr does its job.
Smitten's founder Robyn Sue Fisher spent two years tinkering in a basement lab with a retired engineer to make Brr, the shop's patented ice cream machine. The breakthrough behind Smitten's ice cream is not really liquid nitrogen, but the little machine that stirs. "My first kid was Brr," jokes Fisher.
At first, they tried to tinker with existing mixers, but none were up to the formidable stirring. So they threw it all out and started from scratch. Fisher recalls looking at snow plows and airplanes for inspiration—machines that are already designed to prevent ice buildup. Oe of their earlier prototypes was "literally a snowplow that went around the snow." Ultimately, they settled on two helical stirrers shaped much like strands of DNA.
With a design in place, getting a handcrafted batch of customized machines manufactured was also no small (nor cheap) feat. "You could basically buy a car for the cost of a machine," says Fisher. To keep the machines running smoothly, she also has a team of seven engineers to call for help. Smitten has now expanded to two existing locations with two more slated to open soon, including the one I visited in Oakland.
With the new stores, Smitten is also upgrading to Brr 2.0, which is more than the sum of its mechanical parts. It knows to stir every flavor a little differently because, for example, chocolate ice cream is more viscous than strawberry white balsamic.
Fisher doesn't have any plans to franchise the brand or make Brr for sale, so you'll just have to be in the Bay Area to judge the ice cream for yourself. But really, watching the machines go and getting ice cream made in front of you is half the fun.

Honda, Toyota to roll out fuel-cell cars in 2015

Honda Motor Co Ltd and Toyota Motor Corp plan to launch fuel-cell vehicles in the consumer market in 2015, with each producing about 1,000 eco-friendly cars a year, the Nikkei newspaper reported.
The automakers now offer fuel-cell cars on lease, with users centering on municipalities and businesses, the daily said.
Initial prices of these zero-emission vehicles, which cover longer distances than electric cars, will set below 10 million yen, the Nikkei said.
Honda is developing a sedan that it plans to roll out as early as November 2015, which will be able to travel about 500 kilometer on a single charge -- twice the range of an electric vehicle, the Nikkei reported.
Honda intends to churn out 5,000 units over five years, selling them in Japan, the United States and Europe, the daily said.
Toyota, the global leader in hybrid vehicles, intends to release a sedan in Japan, the United States and Europe in 2015, the Nikkei said, adding that by 2020, the automaker aims to lift annual output to tens of thousands of units.
Toyota hopes to cut prices to between 3-5 million yen in the 2020s, the Nikkei said, quoting an unnamed development staffer.

Canada's 'shocking' natural gas prices expected to continue to rise

Natural gas customers in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia who were facing record bills in January are being warned to expect another wave of increases in February, the fifth increase in the price of natural gas since September.
Daniel Picard's natural gas metre didn't record any unusual consumption at his Fredericton townhouse in January, so his record natural gas bill caught him off guard.
"I had never seen $400. I have seen maybe $250 or $200 — that's shocking," he said.
Picard is among thousands in the region coping with runaway natural gas prices that have ambushed northeastern North America this winter, according to New Brunswick government energy consultant Jon Sorensen.
"We've seen a record world price - the highest price we've seen for natural gas in the world from New Jersey to Nova Scotia. It's been like a horror movie," he said.
In Halifax, Heritage Gas passed along gas price increases of 110 per cent between September and January. That’s a bargain compared to New Brunswick where prices quadrupled for customers of Irving Energy and quintupled for customers of Park Fuels.
Enbridge executive Gilles Volpe said buying gas on spot markets this winter has been like high stakes roulette.
"Within two or three days we saw price swings from $5 to $75," he said.
Dave Young with New Brunswick's Energy and Utilities Board is warning even worse is on the way.
"The prices you had in January are very likely to be higher in February, so consumers should take whatever action they think they can take to prepare for that," said Young.
Natural gas is the most widely-used form of heating on the continent, heating about half of all homes. The second-most common — electricity — is also vulnerable to the price of natural gas because many power plants that generate electricity are gas-powered.
"This winter looked to be slightly colder than normal, but no one was really screaming for this kind of cold weather,” said Aaron Calder, a market analyst at Gelber & Associates.
All the cold air is resulting in a draw-down of supplies of gas in storage. They’re down 20 per cent from where they were this time  a year ago, the U.S. Department of Energy said last month.
At the same time, drillers are struggling to produce enough to keep up with the demand for new gas.
The supply situation has been exacerbated by the fact that in the past, much of gas production was in the Gulf of Mexico. There, weather only plays a role during the Atlantic hurricane season in the summer and fall.
New sources of gas are on the mainland and they’re vulnerable to freezing, ice and snow. Wells that are not designed for such extreme conditions can freeze, halting production.

Toy Story: Old Favourites Fight Rise of the Tablet

The big players in the traditional toy market have come out fighting in Britain as little fingers are increasingly occupied by iPad-type devices at playtime.
Previously seen as the preserve of grown-ups, tablets are increasingly top of children's wish-lists.
The best-selling toy in Britain last year was the Furby, the cuddly robotic "pet" that has irritated millions of parents with its constant chatter. But tablet computers designed specifically for kids came close behind, according to the NPD market research group.
With toddlers frequently more nimble on touchscreens than their parents, major players including Samsung are cashing in with tablets designed for the lucrative and tech-savvy youth market.
At this week's London Toy Fair, manufacturers of traditional toys insisted they face a bright future -- but admitted the rise of tablets means they're in for a tough fight.
"We have to recognise these days that there's a place for tablets and for technology," said Jamie Dickinson, marketing manager at Playmobil, the German-based brand that has produced some 2.6 billion plastic figures since 1974.
"When children grow up and go into the adult world, they need to know how to use the technology," he told AFP as he stood in front of a display of Playmobil figures at London's Olympia exhibition centre.
"But there are lots of other skills that they need to learn, which only traditional toys can give them."
Playmobil is resisting the digital onslaught, with its global sales increasing by 5.3 percent to 531 million euros ($726 million) last year.
In the British market, the building sets and action figures markets will enjoy a 10-percent jump in growth this year, NPD predicts, partly thanks to toys linked to the football World Cup in Brazil.
Many of the toy firms displaying their wares in London were counting on the support of parents with an instinctive suspicion of the Internet and, by extension, tablets.
Metal construction kits by Meccano have been a boys' favourite since they were invented in England in 1909 -- and are "still very popular, especially in the eyes of parents, grandparents and those who buy gifts", said Kevin Jones, European marketing director for the brand's owner Spin Master.

Coca- Cola Laptop Theft could have Comprimised Info

A theft of company laptops could have compromised info for 74,000 people.
A spokeswoman for the company said the laptops were stolen by a former employee responsible for maintenance and disposal of equipment, the business daily reported. The company on December 10 learned that personal information was stored on the laptops after recovering them, the newspaper said.
Coca-Cola could not immediately be reached for comment outside regular U.S. business hours.
The world's largest soft drink company has alerted domestic and Canadian employees about the security breach through a memo, the Journal reported.
Personal details such as social security numbers, driver's license numbers and credit-card information may have been compromised, the Journal said.
The company, which has managed to recover the laptops, which were not encrypted, contacted law enforcement authorities, while saying it could not confirm whether the information has been misused, the newspaper reported.

New York Seeks to Double Recycling by 2017

More than 40,000 tonnes of waste a day, 7,000 employees and a fleet of more than 2,500 trucks: New York faces an uphill task in trashing its garbage and doubling recycling by 2017.
It is the US city that generates the most garbage: a dizzying 2.5 kilos (5.5 pounds) per person per day compared to two kilos in the rest of the country, according to the office of Mayor Bill de Blasio.
"Sanitation is the most important uniformed force on the street," writes Robin Nagle, anthropologist at New York University in her book "Picking Up".
"If sanitation workers aren't there, the city becomes unlivable, fast."
But New York, in so many other respects a municipal policy trailblazer for the United States, lags woefully behind its West Coast and European rivals on the issue of recycling.
Ron Gonen, New York recycling czar, says the amount of waste rises each year and that the city spends $330 million on trucking off its refuse to places like Ohio or North Carolina.
But in the last two years the city of 8.4 million, where businesses organize their own separate waste collection, has made serious if belated efforts to improve recycling.
Of the 11,200 tonnes of daily rubbish collected by the city, it is committed to increasing the rate of recycling from 15 to 30 percent by 2017, organic waste not included.
Private companies discard another 29,000 tonnes a day.
The city has partnered with private investors to build a brand-new, state-of-the-art recycling plant in Brooklyn.
The city has extended a pilot program to collect organic waste from 300 schools this year, up from 90 in the last.
From July 2015 restaurants, delis and grocers will also have to separate out organic waste and recycling.
"In the last two years there was phenomenal dedication. There is a lot of potential," Gonen told AFP.
'Catching up quickly"
Eric Goldstein, an expert from the Natural Resources Defense Council also working with the city, agrees.
"We are in an early stage of transformation,"
"We had a slow start, we are still not one of the leading cities, as Seattle or San Francisco. But we are catching up quickly by good steps forward."
He blamed the delay on being too focused on the short-term and shying away from long-term investments.
"The biggest challenge is that the progress of the Bloomberg administration continues with the new mayor," Goldstein told AFP, referring to the just-finished reign of billionaire media mogul Michael Bloomberg.
In December, an ultra-modern recycling plant for metals, glass and plastics
In December, an ultra-modern recycling plant for metals, glass and plastics opened in Brooklyn, operated by Sims Municipal Recycling, a world leader in the sector.
It took 10 years and $110 million from private and state investors to build the 44,515 square meter Sunset Park Material Recovery Facility along the East River.
"This is the largest sorting system of this type, to my knowledge, in the world, certainly in the United States," said Tom Outerbridge, general manager of the Sims plant.
The machinery is mostly Dutch and German. There is an educational center for students but at the moment it functions only eight hours a day with the plan to go 24-seven by spring.
Of the approximately 800 tonnes of plastic, glass and metal that the city collects each day, the plant currently treats about 272.
The rest goes to another plant in neighboring New Jersey. The two plants combined can recycle 1,180 tonnes a day according to Outerbridge, who has 25 years experience in the sector.
Recycling is not just good for the environment. It also generates revenue: an aluminum cube produced by Sunset Park weighing around 680 kilos can be resold for $1,000.