In my chemistry class, we go over a ton of articles authored by chemists. My professor mentions how many of these chemists, usually the ones that have discovered or, more appropriately, found lucrative compounds or techniques, end up starting companies and making lots of money. Today he mentioned a Berkeley professor who had a great idea for fine-tuning fluorescence. I agree, it's a pretty smart idea. But! My problem with the issue is that this professor goes ahead and starts a company with the rights to this product. He can then run and exploit this product for money or, what he ended up doing, sell the company's licensing rights to another larger company for a big lump-sum payout.
I approached my professor after class and asked how the process goes. He started by saying that anyone, even myself, can start a company. That's technically true but not the answer I wanted, so I probed a little more. Whenever professors find something that can make money, the University takes half. Half of the remaining royalties goes to the Department. The last quarter of all profits goes to the professor. "A quarter can be a lot of money," says my professor.
Here's the kicker, which is what I was aiming to get at the whole time.
"So even if the original research was funded
publicly, a professor can
privatize the results if it promises profit?"
"Yes, we are allowed to do that."
* * *
And o, btw, the midterm for this class that I found out about only 5 hours in advance... we got our results back.
1. I would have been incredibly happy just to get at least one standard deviation
below the mean.
2. The mean for this test was the
highest this professor has seen on any of his exams.
*gulp*
3. I scored
exactly the mean!!! YAY! That's right, bitches! I proved that 5 hours of cramming equals 5 weeks of studying. (OK, five weeks of studying may have gotten me a little higher, but still, I got the average score with probably the least review of material.)
It's so sad that
this makes me happy. I used to not care, not even pick up exams or problem sets. I still don't care, but in the absence of other things, I gotta find something to perk up life. (Damn, you just gotta be a downer, don't you? haha)
* * *
For my Iranian film class I want to write my final paper on either gender or age, probably both. It's interesting how in GWS we talked about there being few American films that feature children as the main character(s). I'm talking about films that are not specially geared towards children. Yeah, those dumb spy movies where a 14-year old saves the world don't count. A feature film with deep meaning from the
real perspective of children, not the shit that children supposedly do and think about (though you can say misrepresentation affects reality, and perhaps more well-to-do children are subject to misrepresentation since their worlds typically don't require labor or much hardship... and maybe TV fits more prominently in their lives). But Iranian films
do feature children. We saw
A Time For Drunken Horses (Bahman Ghobadi, 2000) and I think I might use that in my final paper. There are definitely the themes of gender and age. Child as adult, child as laborer and provider, family without adults, child as parent... This would largely fall on confused ears in the US. There's a Children's Film Festival in Iran. These actors are not professional actors, but instead "real" people who even use their real names in the movie. Though my friends might disagree with me because they apparently know me better than I do, I
do like watching American films. But a lot of the mainstream ones are pretty shitty at several levels compared to Iranian films.
If I was able to choose any topic for my final paper in GWS, I would examine Iranian film as a text of gender and age and racialization and class... I guess I can't do anything on sexuality cuz that shit ain't included in Iranian films.
I should get something to eat and maybe look over my exam to see why I did so well.
Ends: 10:12AM
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calmed