gender

Same-gender romance will soon be in the air in Star Wars: The Old Republic, meaning your Jedi Knight or Bounty Hunter will have more opportunities to get some lovin' in the online game.

To date, characters' romance options have been limited by class and gender. But in a blog post today, Jeff Hickman, executive producer of the BioWare/EA title, revealed that that's shifting come spring -- to an extent.

The upcoming Rise of the Hutt Cartel expansion pack, he said, will make it possible for players on the new planet (called Makeb) to flirt with same-gender non-player characters, created by BioWare to give quests, sell items, and otherwise move the story forward. Players will not yet, however, be able to put the moves on same-sex companion characters, the NPCs that accompany them on their intergalactic escapades as a major plotline piece. … Read more

This secret is out. Sometimes, girls like to play with He-Man action figures and boys like to nurture dolls. A Swedish toy catalog is getting a lot of attention for swapping out traditional gender roles by depicting a boy playing with a dollhouse and a girl blasting an imaginary foe with a Nerf gun.

Top Toy created the holiday catalog for toy chains BR and Toys"R"Us. The catalog was released in both Denmark and Sweden, but the Swedish version features some Photoshopped changes. Perhaps most notably, a boy wielding a toy gun in the Danish catalog was replaced by a girl, while a boy appears on another page playing with a very pink dollhouse.… Read more

Twitter is trying to suss out which of its users are male and which are female. And so far, it's gotten its prediction science down to a 90 percent accuracy rate.

But, let me back up. Why in the world would the social network want to figure out the gender of its individual users?

Why for advertising, of course.

According to Twitter, the fairer sex might like to see a promoted tweet featuring cosmetics, while men would most likely ignore such advertising. All of this apparently matters when trying to generate ad revenue and monetize the site.

Unlike some … Read more

Last updated: 11:25 a.m. PT

Ellen Pao, the junior partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers who filed a lawsuit earlier this year against her employer alleging gender discrimination and retaliation, has been fired from the Silicon Valley VC, she announced late Tuesday.

"I have been terminated from my job at KPCB," she said in a statement on Q&A site Quora. "On Monday afternoon, senior management told me to clean out my office, leave, and not come back."

Pao's allegation was included in an updated response to a Quora user's … Read more

One of the more unspoken thoughts about why girls don't want to become scientists is that science is less interesting than scientists would have you believe.

But here are some girl scientists who clearly believe the opposite and may leave you unable to speak.

For these are the Science Cheerleaders. They are crusaders for the cause of getting more little girls to love science.

Yes, they wear short skirts and carry pom-poms. But these are engineers and dentists who want to find any way possible to get you to pay attention.

I am grateful to Jezebel for locating evidence … Read more

The venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers was tentatively denied its request for arbitration in the gender discrimination lawsuit brought by junior partner Ellen Pao.

According to Reuters, Judge Harold Kahn made a preliminary ruling today that the case should continue to go through the courts rather than be moved to third-party arbitration, which the firm requested last month.

"There is no arbitration agreement between plaintiff and defendant," Kahn wrote in his initial ruling, according to Reuters.

Kleiner Perkins, in a statement, said it believes it has strong arguments and precedent to move the matter to … Read more

Kleiner Perkins filed a seven-page response that denied the gender discrimination and retaliation charges brought by junior partner Ellen Pao in a lawsuit last month, stating that her complaints were "without merit."

In other words, Kleiner Perkins has made good on its promise to "vigorously defend our reputation," as Kleiner's senior partner John Doerr said in a statement last month.

The issue at hand is a gender discrimination complaint that junior partner Ellen Pao filed against the venture capital firm in the Superior Court of California on May 10. The complaint alleges that Pao endured … Read more

After weeks of dodging the press about the gender discrimination lawsuit she filed against her employer, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Ellen Pao says she doesn't plan on quitting the venture capital firm.

This news doesn't come by the way of the press, however. Instead, Pao quietly made the announcement on the Web site Quora, according to TechCrunch, which first reported this news.

Yesterday, a Quora user posted the question, "Did Ellen Pao quit KPCB after the lawsuit?" and under her own account name Pao replied "No, and I don't plan to quit."… Read more

A female junior partner has sued the venerable Silicon Valley VC firm Kleiner Perkins for alleged gender discrimination, saying she suffered retaliation for rebuffing sexual advances. (See the full complaint below.)

In a complaint filed May 10 in the Superior Court of California, Ellen Pao outlined more than five years of such behavior on the part of the firm's senior partners. Pao, a San Francisco resident, is alleging the company discriminated against her and other female employees when it came to promotions and pay.

According to the complaint, Pao lists 20 other female employees, known as Jane Does throughout … Read more