@Demo318 Its donation based. I fund it as a charitable donation from my company as a means to support the scientific community.

@freemo @Demo318 Please don't take this the wrong way but qoto is a mirror for the seeming lack of women in STEM or is it just my perception tricking me?

@commandelicious While we have some wonderful female contributors they are sadly a minority. It is no surprise that a STEM instance would reflect the democgraphic in the world. With that said I would be the first to welcome a change where more Women go into STEM and have an interest in the topic. But sadly it just doesnt seem to be as appealing to women as it is for men and that makes me sad :( @Demo318

@freemo @commandelicious @Demo318 It starts early, here in Scotland at least. Interest is about even between m/f early in primary school and gets more and more uneven as kids get older. Even those women who study STEM in uni don't often go into STEM jobs. Initial evenness means we can only assume it's societal influence rather than natural, which means we *can* change it.

@Katobell I'm not convinced it is 100% societal, but I am not convinced it isnt either. I can see evidence in both directions.

With that said I would encourage anything that aims to reduce the societal influences at play there.

@commandelicious @Demo318

@freemo @commandelicious @Demo318 there's an organisation called Equate Scotland specifically for this, if you're interested in data and seeing some current attempts at helping the situation!

@Katobell Awesome, I will certainly check it out for ideas. Thanks for your valuable input!

@commandelicious @Demo318

@freemo @Katobell @Demo318
I think it's the same in nerd and gaming culture. Yeah, women and girls always have been there but if they said so they'd be ridiculed.

@commandelicious @freemo @Demo318 agreed. I even find myself excusing my knowledge - 'how do you know so much about that?' 'Oh, I grew up with two brothers'. Less effort than staring someone down!

@Katobell That sounds like a very self-defeating explanation for your intelligence (as im sure you realize). What do you feel, exactly, in society has personally pushed you to respond/think that way rather than to praise your ow achievements? @commandelicious @Demo318

@freemo honestly? Partly incessant questioning from men on whether my fandom/knowledge is as rigorous as theirs (so tedious) and partly that I'm not much of a talker anyway, I'd rather find out about other people. @commandelicious @Demo318