Copyright won't help here. Extending it to allow the protection of concepts as well as literal implementation is what Oracle tried to do, and would've resulted in a few megacorps demanding licensing for core concepts that no one can really make quality, functional software without.
Of course, software patents are also stupid, even if the general intent of patents seems reasonable.
Patents should simply be a monopoly on an idea for enough time to gather resources to develop that idea’s prototype. I know it doesn’t work that way, but it should. They really should be there for small inventors, not giant corps who have plenty of resources, but I digress.
But software itself can implement that prototype without having to build anything. Your ideas can be created directly. We don’t patent math and we don’t patent poetry or even poetic writing structures.
Software and business method patents are utter bullshit.
Just goes to show that love can help turn someone’s life around.
Thankfully I haven’t been in the prison system (and I don’t know anyone personally who is), nor do I hope to. But it seems like a very bleak existence.
I’m glad cats are giving the prisoners at least a substitute of love and support.
So I’m an American expat living in Australia. Australia has had the option to file directly to ATO, electronically, longer than I’ve been here. (Google suggests since 1999? So, more than 20 years.) It’s an easy process if you have a straightforward tax return.
It never ceases to amaze me how far behind the rest of the world USA is in some things that just seem like really obvious solutions. Like… Why wouldn’t the IRS want to get tax returns filed directly from the tax payers, skipping the middleman? At least for simple returns. More simplicity, less confusion all around if they get everyone onto the same system. Less paper to wade through, by significantly reducing paper returns. Etc.
It just seems like such a no-brainer. But I guess that’s why it doesn’t work in the USA. >.<
Men (and granted I am male) really do need to drop the alpha male stuff. It’s a shame so many men are drawn into this weird mentality on YouTube thinking that’s what is going to get them a girl… When really it’s the furthest from the truth.
I met my wife at work, made some awkward jokes with her, and eventually asked her out. We split everything a perfect 50/50 and I’m proud to say she is a strong independent woman who definitely does not need me. I can’t imagine the disrespect she would feel if all of a sudden I went all alpha.
Also a man, I haven’t tried being an “alpha male” because I’m not a toxic asshole. But being genuine and kind has gotten me absolutely nowhere in the girlfriend department and the fact is the worst men I know all have girlfriends. If I was willing to be like that I probably would too.
My guess is that more and more people are realizing that they can still live very fulfilling lives without getting married.
I can’t imagine how weird and scary it is for women to be dating right now, knowing that there are so many far-right extremist men out there, who have a high potential of being misogynistic or even violent.
I’ve seen a few other articles on this issue and the double standard is astounding.
If a conventional minority group struggles, they need to be helped. If it’s a man, screw them! They’re oppressive and don’t deserve help.
If men are dominant in certain fields, it’s a sign of systematic discrimination against women. If women are dominant in certain fields, then that’s just because men suck at xyz and this is just the natural outcome.
And the funny part is, I read one article about this and the editor (a middle aged woman as usual) said that this imbalanced ratio is an issue because surprise surprise young women won’t have enough men to date!
It’s almost like men’s issues only matter if it affects women, and somehow that’s the only concern.
If men are dominant in certain fields, it’s a sign of systematic discrimination against women. If women are dominant in certain fields, then that’s just because men suck at xyz and this is just the natural outcome.
I’m open to having my mind changed, but I think that might actually be true. In cases where men are dominant, we can point to specific discriminatory situations. We can see how hiring committees consist primarily or exclusively of men. We can see how popular depictions of people in [field] are all male. We can note that neurodivergent boys are far more likely to get diagnoses and support than neurodivergent girls. With the exception of certain fields like education and nursing, I can’t think of any systemic factors that discriminate against men.
I don’t think an imbalance necessarily means that we should automatically assume discrimination, for example there is a small correlation between sex and interest (men to objects, women to living things) which may account for some discrepancy in certain fields.
Hiring committees would depend but very often we see HR is majority female, and some studies show that female named job applications in certain cases may be more favoured even when the exact same application is given with a male name.
In terms of school, I can attest that boys need to stop fucking around during class time and actually pay attention, but I’ve seen another study show that for the exact same work, public school teachers sometimes mark higher for a girls work.
The last point I would make is that there are quite a few female only grants and bursaries and aid programs, but there’s very few that outright exist for males.
That’s my two cents, but I understand your perspective as well.
I think Warren Farrell especially, and a bit of Leonard Sax as well have gone into this in more detail.
Unfortunately the mainstream feminist objection is that “men should just make their own support organizations” but the problem is sometimes the government won’t give them a nickel, which I find absurd.
This guy in Calgary Canada made a men’s domestic violence shelter, (shockingly women are first statistically to initiate domestic violence, which I didn’t know). This was around 2011 or so? But the local feminists at the time online were saying that he should not feel entitled to government funding and only women’s shelters should get government funding. I think he killed himself afterwards.
So it seems like when men do band together to make a support group, it doesn’t get the same amount of government support as a women’s group will.
Yesterday, I read an article¹, where it says in the context of this year’s astronomical ocean temperatures:
“The land tends to warm up more than the ocean, but if the ocean is so warm, you essentially start having very high temperatures and dry conditions because the ocean is evaporating and raining on itself,” Dr Bracco said.
As I understand this, normally it would rain near the coast, because that’s where the ocean would heat up the most, under pre-climate-change conditions. And that’s now out of wonk, generally leading to droughts.
Maybe California is for whatever reason in an inversed situation, where their rainfall likeliness is actually improved by the hot oceans…
nytimes.com
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