SEATTLE, Jan. 06, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Porch Group, Inc. (Porch or the Company) (Nasdaq: PRCH) (Nasdaq: PRCHW), a leading software and services platform reinventing the home services industry, has been invited to present at the 23rd Annual Needham Growth Conference being held virtually on January 11-15, 2021.

Porch management is scheduled to present on Monday, January 11 at 2:45 p.m. Eastern time, with one-on-one meetings to be held throughout the conference. The companys presentation will be webcast live and available for replay here.

For additional information or to schedule a one-on-one meeting with Porch management, please contact your Needham representative or Gateway Investor Relations at (949) 574-3860 or PRCH@gatewayir.com.

About Porch Group, Inc. Seattle-based Porch Group, the vertical software platform for the home, provides software and services to more than 10,500 home services companies such as home inspectors, moving companies, real estate agencies, utility companies, and warranty companies. Through these relationships and its multiple brands, Porch provides a moving concierge service to homebuyers, helping them save time and make better decisions on critical services, including insurance, moving, security, TV/internet, home repair and improvement, and more. To learn more, visit porchgroup.com and porch.com.

Investor Relations contact:Gateway Investor RelationsCody Slach, Matt Glover(949) 574-3860PRCH@gatewayir.com

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Porch Group to Present at the 23rd Annual Needham Growth Conference on January 11, 2021 - GlobeNewswire

Key Glockcomes in hot for the new year with the new single "Off the Porch" and its accompanying music video.

The Memphis rapper keeps it cool and low-key for the visual, which features him in a dark room surrounded only by a yellow sports car, a matching yellow bike and a mic that catches on fire once he's done spitting. He flexes his chains, including one featuring Homer Simpson that blinks after he lets him hit his blunt, and compares his drip to that ofLil Uzi Vert. "Diamonds dancing on me like Uzi, choppa keep Bruce Lee, pullin' up too deep," he raps in the first verse.

He released two back-to-back mixtapes last year, Yellow Tape in January andSon of a Gunin May via Paper Route Empire. His 2019 joint album with mentor Young Dolph,Dum and Dummer,reached No. 5 onBillboard's Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart andNo. 8 on the Billboard 200.

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Key Glock Spits a (Literally) Fire Banger in 'Off the Porch' Video - Billboard

CHARLOTTE, NC. Security camera video shows three thieves stealing packages and porch furniture from Louis Gillards home on Rozzelles Ferry Road in the Wesley Heights neighborhood. It happened around noon on December 23rd. Gillard says the brazen burglars struck his house five times in a 45 minute period.

You can just see that they did not care. Do not care about getting caught, they did not care about a single thing except for larceny, says Gillard.

Gillard was visiting family in Florida when his phone pinged.

I received an alert from my ring doorbell that there was a visitor, a person detected at my front door. Didnt think much of it. I thought it was maybe a delivery or package or UPS guy and ignored it.

He says the next day, he reviewed the video.

And then I noticed that my porch furniture had been stolen. A sectional as well as a daybed mattress as well as all the pillows that are associated with it were all taken.

Gillard called the police. According to the police report $2,000 worth of furniture was taken.

If they were really in that much need, they couldve knocked on my door and I wouldve handed out money, food whatever they needed. But to rob me and acting that way its just inhumane.

Gillard says the two responding officers told him theyve seen similar cases in NoDa and Plaza Midwood.

Of people taking porch furniture, brazenly in the middle of the day with their face on camera and that they fit the description and fit the items that were stolen.

WCCB asked CMPD if this incident was connected to others. A spokesperson says its too early in the investigation to tell.

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Thieves Steal Thousands Of Dollars Worth In Porch Furniture - WCCB Charlotte

At the start of a new year, Im not so much about resolutions as I am about words.

My inner word nerd is compelled to look back at the year just ended to see how language has evolved, based largely on events of the year. This is also the time when lexographers and groups of linguists, historians, grammarians and others interested in language evolution publish their Words of the Year lists.

It is geek-heaven time for those of us who savor the written and spoken word.

Surprising to not a single person on the planet, the chosen words of 2020 all center around COVID-19, though some of the runners-up widen the net to include other society-shaking events of the year.

Its all pretty grim stuff this year, so let me start with the one-and-only lighter popular-culture item I could find. Oxford Dictionaries noted the word Brexit saw an 80% drop in usage this year, while Collins Dictionaries included in its runners-up list the word Megxit, which is described as the withdrawal of Meghan Markle and Prince Harry, the duke and duchess of Sussex, from their royal duties.

My favorite sources are the Oxford Dictionaries and the American Dialect Society, but Merriam-Webster, Dictionary.com, Cambridge, Collins and others also have their selections most based on how often the words have been looked up or how their usage reflects the mood and focus of the past year. Oxford also has a Childrens Word of the Year, based on essays written in a BBC 500 Words story writing competition (136,000 kids submitted entries this year).

For the first time Oxford did not select just one word or phrase, describing 2020 as a year which cannot be neatly accommodated in one single word and announced instead its words of an unprecedented year.

Oxford noted that one of the most remarkable linguistic developments has been the emergence of scientific terms in general conversation as we all have become armchair epidemiologists. Among Oxfords words and phrases of 2020 are Coronavirus, COVID-19, Following the Science, Pandemic, Shelter-in-Place, Face Masks and Key Workers, among others.

Oxford also noted spikes in the use of words such as Impeachment, Mail-In, Back Lives Matter and QAnon. Looking farther back, Oxfords Word of the Year for 2019 was Climate Emergency; it was Toxic in 2018.

The childrens writing competition sponsored by Oxford and the BBC revealed Coronavirus as the Oxford Childrens Word of the Year. Brexit was the winner last year and Plastic the year before. The stories ran the gamut from realistic to prophetic, hopeful to sweet. One girl, aged 8, wrote in her entry: That night I had an interesting dream, a magical sparkling unicorn came and whispered to me the secret ingredients of the cure for the Coronavirus.

The American Dialect Society chose COVID for its Word of the Year. The word didnt exist a year ago, said Ben Zimmer, chair of the dialect societysNew Words Committee, and now it has come to define our lives in 2020.

Some of the runners-up considered by the 13-year-old organization were also fascinating, such as Doomscrolling, the habit of obsessively scanning social media and websites for bad news. The American Dialect Society also selected key words in a variety of individual categories. Before Times, the time before the beginning of the pandemic, was considered Most Useful; Abolish/Defund was deemed the Most Significant Political Word. And its Euphemism of the Year was Essential (workers, labor, businesses), used for people, often underpaid, who are actually treated as expendable because they are required to work and thus risk infection from coronavirus.

Pandemic was chosen by both Merriam-Webster and Dictionary.com, each citing the phenomenal increase in dictionary searches of the word (Merriam-Webster showed a 115,806% spike in dictionary traffic for Pandemic).

Collins Dictionary selected Lockdown, while Cambridge chose Quarantine, also noting that the word has experienced an expansion of its original meaning to include a period of time when people are not allowed to leave their homes or travel freely. Also on Collins Word of the Year short list was BLM (Black Lives Matter), Coronavirus, Key Worker, Furlough and Social Distancing.

In a New York Times article last month, 20 words were suggested as best capturing what it felt to be alive in 2020 most, of course, centering in COVID-19 and its effects. Most notable was Black Lives Matter. Also Contact Tracing, Essential Workers, Flatten the Curve, Super-Spreader, Voter Fraud, Wildfires and Zoom.

NYTs two almost whimsical choices were Blursday, whatever day of the week it might happen to be being hard to decipher since the passage of time has become so unreliable, and Virtual Happy Hour, a kind of socializing online or, as the writer put it, we just kind of drunk in front of our computers a whole bunch.

Sad to say, gone are the years when the defining words were such sweet things as Geek, Tweet, Selfie and Binge Watch.

I think 2020 and the words that popped out from it were best described by Oxford Dictionaries president Casper Grathwohl, who said: Ive never witnessed a year in language like the one weve just had Its both unprecedented and a little ironic in a year that left us speechless, 2020 has been filled with new words unlike any other.

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Front Porch: Take guess on 2020s words of year new vocabulary sprang up around COVID-19 - The Spokesman-Review

When I heard theChaseTheMoney producer tag onKey Glocksnew single Off The Porch, I knew we were in for an eerie, bassy banger. The Memphis rapper floats over the beat, delivering relaxed but menacing bars about being Mr. Glock, and taking you to school, riding 10 speeds before upgrading to coupes, and my favorite line, Heater on my side, dont test my cool. In the video, Key Glock furthersthe yellow imageryof his 2020Yellow Tapeera, surrounded by a yellow coupe and bicycle. Glock raps into a dangling mic and after he delivers his last bar the mic bursts into flames, naturally.Off The Porch, follows upKeyGlocks May release ofSon Of A Gunand JanuarysYellow Tape.Hip-Hops foremost purveyor of blunt-force punchlines,KeyGlocknever stops grinding. Coming through with two heavy-hitting projects, stacking flex after flex with wit and panache, 2020 findsKeyGlockone of raps most locked in and consistent.

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Key Glock Jumped Out the Porch and Jumped in the Booth (Prod. Chase The Money) - RESPECT.

A woman who police said is responsible for going into mailboxes and swiping packages off residents' porches has been identified and arraigned.

Michelle Lee Marquez, 34, was arraigned Dec. 23 in 27th District Court and charged with seven counts of mail fraud.

Wyandotte Deputy Police Chief Archie Hamilton said her identification shows a Texas address, but that she has local ties.

We believe she was residing somewhere in Wyandotte, Hamilton said.

If convicted on all charges, she could face up to seven years in prison.

According to police, at about 2 a.m. Dec. 20, a sleeping resident in the 2000 of 23rd Street in Wyandotte was alerted by his Ring Doorbell system that someone was on his front porch.

Police said the man got up and discovered a woman on his property rifling through his mailbox.

He immediately contacted police and within minutes, officers located Marquez prowling the streets.

According to a report, police found she was in possession of several pieces of stolen mail along with numerous stolen credit cards.

In addition to that, police said, Marquez was in possession of tools commonly used for committing burglaries.

Police believe Marquez also is responsible for the highly publicized custom memory blanket that was found ripped from its packaging.

The blanket was a Christmas gift a Wyandotte resident ordered for her friend.

While other items found had names and/or addresses associated with it, police had no way of locating the blanket's owner.

After posting a picture of the blanket on its Facebook page, police found the owner and was able to return the blanket right in time for Christmas.

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Woman suspected of going through Wyandotte mail boxes, taking packages off porches arraigned - Southgate News Herald

KIAH (CW39) The pandemic has changed the way many of us shop. More and more Americans are turning to online shopping and home deliveries than ever before. A new survey conducted by CR Research found out that 43% of Americans have had a package stolen in 2020 which is up from 36% from 2019.

Take a look what researchers found and also see how you can prevent packages from getting stolen right off your front porch.

C R Researched surveyed 2,000 consumers who have shopped online at least once within the last 12 months to learn more about their experiences with package theft and what preventative measures theyve taken to deter porch pirates.

Heres what they found:59% of Americans receive package deliveries at least once per week (Up from 49% in 2019).43% of Americans have had a package stolen in 2020 (Up from 36% in 2019 and 31% in 2018).Almost two-thirds (64%) say theyve been a victim of package theft more than once.The average value of the stolen packagewas $136, but thankfully 81% say theyve receiveda refund on the stolen items.

The top ways consumers prevented package theft this holiday season:

1. Stayed home for delivery

2. Opted for in-store pick up

3. Installed a doorbell camera

4. Shopped in stores

5. Requested a signature for delivery.

Take a look at the fullreport.

Originally posted here:
Porch pirates on the rise - CW39 Houston

OREGON -- Porch piracy is a concern for many people who get packages delivered year round, and around the holidays the chance of a package being stolen from your front porch is even more likely.

Safety.com reports an expected 27% increase in stolen packages this holiday season.

Derek Wing, the communications manager for PEMCO Insurace says, There was a recent survey that was done that showed nearly 4 in 10 people say that they've had a package stolen off their porch at least once so I think it's definitely a problem that is happening, it's probably going to continue to happen.

PEMCO Insurance advises remote shoppers to ask for an out-of-sight delivery option.

It also offers a list of other tips to keep your shipments safe from pirates.

Though many people install cameras at their front door, Safety.com found few people actually report porch theft to sellers and police. A recent survey finds Americans will have, on average, $224 in merchandise sitting on their porch in plain sight around the holidays.

PEMCO Insurance says having items sent to P.O. boxes is a good idea and package insurance are wise options to mitigate losses this year.

Wing says, You definitely want to let the police know because they might be able to help solve the crimebut contact the people from whom you ordered or the shipping company.

Excerpt from:
Porch Piracy around the holidays - KDRV

They drive behind UPS and Fedex trucks driving the streets of Fresno. Once packages are delivered, theyre almost immediately nabbed by so called porch pirates.

Its such an issue in Fresno, City Council Member Mike Karbassi campaigned on it. Hes got his hands a little tied up due to staffing constraints in the Police Department.

But now theres a way every resident in Fresno (and beyond) can fight back.

Chad Pickens started an Anti Porch Pirate Coalition last year because he was fed up with packages being stolen in his northeast Fresno neighborhood near Shields and Cedar.

This isnt an organized group, you know, its just kind of like, well, what can I do to help my neighborhood?, Pickens tellsGV Wire by phone. He posted messages on forums like Nextdoor and the Ring Camera network and referred to himself as us and we.

Nobody knew it was just one person, says Pickens.

This isnt an organized group, you know, its just kind of like, well, what can I do to help my neighborhood?Chad Pickens, Spearheaded theAnti Porch Pirate Coalition

The coalition grew from just himself. People reached out to him through word of mouth and through private messaging. Now, he says at least 20 to 30 of his neighbors have joined him.

Hes now taking it a step further by creating a Facebook page thats not restricted to where you live, or whether you are on a doorbell camera network. The page just went live on Wednesday.

The purpose of the group is to encourage vigilance by having at least one person visible outside, maybe on their front porch, keeping an eye on things.

Its just presence, explains Pickens. If they (porch pirates) feel somebody is just out walking their neighborhood, whether its just around the block or not, or even just walking to stand in front of their front yard, raking leaves or watering their lawn, it deters them.

He says from his experience the thieves dont care about the Ring cameras, but they do care about actually being seen by an actual person. I have yet to find somebody bold enough to steal a package in front of me, says Pickens.

Pickens recalls a recent incident when one of his neighbors posted a porch theft video that had happened just minutes before.

He saw the video, and almost immediately spotted someone that matched the appearance of the culprit. Ifound somebody on a bike that stole a package from somebodys doorstep that was three blocks away, says Pickens.

He called police who caught up with the thief and returned the package to the porch it was taken from.

Recently, hes noticed more and more people are working from home due to the pandemic and picking up their packages within minutes of delivery.

Pickens also believes his group has made a big difference in not only stopping porch thieves, but also just bringing the community together to work towards common goals.

Fresno Police Lt. Tim Tietjen works with officers on patrol in northwest Fresno. Were not seeing anything out of the ordinary in terms of porch thefts, says Tietjen.

He says he doesnt have precise numbers because the department is currently transitioning to a new computer system, but he says porch thefts are not trending up.

Although its always a concern this time of year, hes seeing more neighbors coming together to help one another out. They do that all the time, said Tietjen.

He does say that anyone who witnesses a theft in progress shouldnt hesitate to call 9-1-1 so officers can respond right away.

Watching out for neighbors helps.Fresno City Councilmember Mike Karbassi

Fresno City Councilmember Mike Karbassi says there are certain things people can do to help fend off porch thieves.

Watching out for neighbors helps, says Karbassi.He says he recently bought a doorbell camera from Costco for himself. He also says good lighting is a great deterrent.

Karbassi believes its important for neighbors to help each other because Fresno police officers are already under a lot of stress due to a recent gang crackdown, and adverse impacts to their workforce due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Were also losing officers to retirement and we cant recruit.So what do people want us to do? asks Karbassi rhetorically. We need to support enough law enforcement to keep the city safe.

To that end, Karbassi is working with police leaders and the Fresno Police Officers Association to find ways to attract more officers.

The fact that we cant recruit officers into the academy is very alarming, said Karbassi. I want to increase the signing bonuses if they live in the city of Fresno. He plans to work with his fellow city council members in either January or February to increase onboarding bonuses from $5,000 to $10,000 dollars.

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Fresno Area Porch Pirates Get Your Packages Within Minutes, Now You Have a Way To Fight Back - gvwire.com

Gary Cartwright, the runt of Blackie Sherrods literary progeny at the old Fort Worth Press, left the toy department at an early age but never outgrew it. Everything important he learned, he learned at the Press. Which is probably why a few of his most notable magazine pieces, from the legacies of Jack Ruby and a Dallas stripper to the death of a Texas Ranger, were collected under the title, Confessions of a Washed-Up Sportswriter.

With apologies to the late press boxer, who took a pretty dim view of the yahoos who came after him, consider the confessions of a shut-in sportswriter:

A fountain gurgles in a nearby bed of ferns under the canopy of a Japanese maple. A cocky blue jay primps in the basin. Across the alley, the breeze rippling the leaves in a three-story cottonwood sighs like a wave dying on a beach.

And then theres the sound a screen door makes after you let it go: one bark, then two...

I wrote that in late May well into a pandemic that shut down sports for months and let them up grudgingly to provide a glimpse of my world view from the screen porch in the age of the coronavirus.

From my North Dallas home, its a little more than a half-hour to JerryWorld and Globe Life Field, and American Airlines Center is just 15 minutes down the tollway. But for the better part of my six-month exile from press boxes, all three might as well have been around the world.

On the screen porch, I wrote in March that responding to this global crisis would be more difficult than what we were asked to do after 9/11, when we were told that wed be fighting terrorism simply by going about our normal routines. I called Planos Natalie Chou, the UCLA basketball star, to discuss her concerns about the targeting of Asian Americans during the pandemic.

I wrote about the prospects of little ol Colonial breaking the sports drought, the effects of the 1918 flu at Texas A&M, and the impact of protests popping up everywhere. In one column, I speculated what might be the point of no return for some sports this year; in another, I worried we might be rushing back too soon.

In August, I wrote about the Mavs in the playoff bubble from my wicker seat out back. This was new. Part of the job requirement has been to provide a sense of place. Unless readers wanted to know how my new sunshine ligustrums were coming along as Luka Doncic lifted the Mavs on his shoulders, they were out of luck.

Communicating with athletes and coaches has been futile. Zoom calls are a poor substitute for real eye contact.

Worse yet, in the wake of Mike McCarthys wacky first year: Jerry Jones doesnt Zoom.

Even when I occasionally got out of the house, nothing was the same. The Argyle PA announcer tried diligently to keep fans six feet apart. But, as I wrote, playing a high school football game in a pandemic was like putting on a rock concert in a hospital ward.

The perspective from high atop Globe Life Field was different, and not because of the roof or air conditioning. What unnerved me even more than the creepy DoppelRangers lined up like sentries was the fake crowd noise. Go figure. It seemed symbolic of our predicament. I felt like a pawn in a ruse.

For the first time in my life, the games Ive loved felt like they were forced, like we were trying a little too hard to distract everyone from a bigger truth. Reminded me of a 12-year-old boy and the Sunday afternoon after his fathers first heart attack. Neighbors took the kid and his younger brother to a park for a game of baseball as a diversion. Its what good neighbors do, and they had the best of intentions. But nothing, not even baseball, would blot out the image of the ambulance taking my father away from me.

Even now, with vaccines on the way, its difficult to reconcile the conceit of games against a backdrop of more than 300,000 U.S. deaths and cases rising by the hour. But on we forge, nonetheless. Players and coaches test positive. Games are postponed or canceled. But the business of sports cannot, must not, will not stop.

Because of conflicting emotions bubbling up as we tried to act like all is normal, it was probably inevitable that it would make some of us more reflective. Maybe as a result, causes and protests that once might have received cursory attention took center stage. Especially with athletes. This wasnt exactly different, but it was certainly more pronounced. Athletes changed lanes; the media veered, too.

We didnt just write about the protests by pro athletes, either. In July, I streamed a Tyler school board meeting where board members voted unanimously to change the names of the high schools in an effort to right an old wrong.

Giving voice to these protests made a lot of you uncomfortable. Even angry. Some readers thought I occasionally took it too far. One old civil rights warrior said I didnt go far enough.

Finding a way to bridge what divides us was impossible. These are unprecedented times, and in meeting these challenges, weve often failed to heed the better angels of our nature. As I wrote in the wake of athlete boycotts in August, the pandemic wrung out most of our patience and social upheaval squeezed out what was left.

Fortunately, the screen porch proved to be a zen kind of place this year. I could sit out back and let my thoughts drift. I miss it. Too cold now. Probably just as well. Let me tell you something, I risked my sportswriter card writing about blue jays and birdbaths. Gary Cartwright would have hated it. Then again, he never had a season like this one.

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Writing from the porch: Kevin Sherrington's tranquil perch to capture a bizarre year in sports - The Dallas Morning News