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Amazon Closing AmazonSmile

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Re: Amazon Closing AmazonSmile

#561
post #446

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s just plain rhetoric at this point. Anyone not actively supporting trans-rights these days are effectively labelled a “hater” or transphobic. Essentially the trans-activist doing their best to gaslight the situation and get as much chilling effect as possible. It’s dishonest, undemocratic and should be enough reason for most reasonable people to distrust them. And yeah. I’m transphobic for posting this, obviously…

This isn't rhetoric, the LGB Alliance isn't some group that just happens to not focus on T of LGBT. They're a group that wants the T dropped from LGBT, that believes, advocates for, and fights for legislation that defines trans men as women and vice versa. They were literally established in opposition to LGBT groups supporting trans people and still are. There is no gaslighting whatsoever, one of the co-founders lite…

> This isn't rhetoric, the LGB Alliance isn't some group that just happens to not focus on T of LGBT. They're a group that wants the T dropped from LGBT, that believes, advocates for, and fights for legislation that defines trans men as women and vice versa. They were literally established in opposition to LGBT groups supporting trans people and still are.

But there's nothing hateful about that. It's a perfectly reasonable position, held by the vast majority of people worldwide. The reason trans-activists are working to get acceptance for such a view, is in fact because it is not the dominant view (or why else would they need to promote it?).

Would you care to outline why you'd categorize having a specific view on gender and sex which differs from the one driven by these activists as "hateful"? Just what part here is hate?

It's a genuine question. I honestly don't understand this mentality or world-view.

Re: Amazon Closing AmazonSmile

#562

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Care to share how you can get a $180k tax credit for buying a house?

Real estate businesses have a ridiculous amount of tax benefits. The terms to look up are: Cost Segregation Bonus Depreciation (There's a third one I can't remember). She basically utilized all three. The larger the value of the house (over $1M in her case), the greater the benefit.

These just allow you to claim deductions which reduces your tax liability - it's not like you get a _credit_ out of it.

Re: Amazon Closing AmazonSmile

#563
post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Average of X > average of Y fits “a collection of quantitative data” For more detail, I have taken statistics, even tutored PHD students. Showing your work is required if the answer is 4.415 or more than average. A sample refers to a single element, statistic encompass a sample, a parameter covers to the full population. You will often hear statistics communicated as something like “more than four times as likely” an…

I don't think that meets the definition. Where is the collection - there isn’t one. Without showing your work, why should I believe a "fact" you present? You need to prove a fact. That's where statistics is helpful. Maybe you did tutor people from a pure math perspective. You might need to learn how to actually apply statistics in real life. None of the stuff you mention actually means anything when you try to apply…

“Where is the collection”

The samples that make such a calculation true. That’s what you’re missing an actual statistic X>Y is based on the underlying data.

Further someone can just as easily make up X = 27.24 +/- 0.01 with a 95% confidence interval as X > Y, it’s the actual data that makes something a fact rather than an option.

“None of the stuff you mention actually means anything when you try to apply it to policy if you don't know how the result was achieved, what it's actually measuring, and what the baseline is.” Again that applies equally to all statistics and you can provide them just as easily with either format.

Re: Amazon Closing AmazonSmile

#564

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Real estate businesses have a ridiculous amount of tax benefits. The terms to look up are: Cost Segregation Bonus Depreciation (There's a third one I can't remember). She basically utilized all three. The larger the value of the house (over $1M in her case), the greater the benefit.

These just allow you to claim deductions which reduces your tax liability - it's not like you get a _credit_ out of it.

Yes, but because of the high value of the property, your deductions can be huge. I was using the word "credit" a bit loosely. The point is that her deductions is well above the quoted $180K. The equivalent extra refund she'll get due to them was $180K.

This is also because they are high income earners (one of them has a regular job), and they've manipulated things so that they can apply the deduction to the W-2 income (not usually possible). The federal tax bracket is 35+% - not sure if they can apply it to their state's income tax, but if they can, it's another 10-11%. So you don't need a massive deduction to get the equivalent of $180K refund.

Re: Amazon Closing AmazonSmile

#565

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kinda off topic but why do grade school kids need a MacBook air?

Some schools seem to be 100% Apple for all computers for decades. I would think a Chromebook would be more fit for purpose here though.

You can get a nice, slim Chromebook with specs good enough for a high school student for a few hundred bucks. OTOH, a MacBook Air is $1000 and up.

Re: Amazon Closing AmazonSmile

#566

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They couldn’t say that because saying it explicitly would hurt their core business

This announcement falls into a category I like to call “we are closing to serve you better.”

Sounds like one of those convenience fees I have to pay in the US all the time. Very convenient to me to have to pay more!

Re: Amazon Closing AmazonSmile

#567

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've personally used chrome extension "Smile Always". It automatically converts all amazon links to amazon smile links. This is sad. I am currently at $417.30 in donations to my local charity. Amazon is in denial if they think this hasnt had an impact.

Of course it had an impact. It's guaranteed to just be something that's not seen as 'sexy' internally, and therefore has probably had no-one championing it, and it gathered dust and finally... someone just wanted to kill the code. I've seen it happen first hand in similar sized companies.

I'm quite convinced the motivations for both the creation and teardown of this donation program must have come from the money people, not from the techies. It must have been a tax write-off. Nothing else makes sense, knowing how strongly Amazon is a cost-cutting company.

Re: Amazon Closing AmazonSmile

#568
post #492
post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There warehouses are significantly worse than average in terms of injuries per hour. They also frequently sell fraudulent items directly harming consumers. I can’t think of a metric where they aren’t worse than the average retailer.

Or maybe they're just a lot better at reporting minor injuries. In the same vein, countries with stronger women's rights have higher rates of rape and sexual harassment.

These aren’t the kind of injuries you can hide.

Re: Amazon Closing AmazonSmile

#569
post #563

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that meets the definition. Where is the collection - there isn’t one. Without showing your work, why should I believe a "fact" you present? You need to prove a fact. That's where statistics is helpful. Maybe you did tutor people from a pure math perspective. You might need to learn how to actually apply statistics in real life. None of the stuff you mention actually means anything when you try to apply…

“Where is the collection” The samples that make such a calculation true. That’s what you’re missing an actual statistic X>Y is based on the underlying data. Further someone can just as easily make up X = 27.24 +/- 0.01 with a 95% confidence interval as X > Y, it’s the actual data that makes something a fact rather than an option. “None of the stuff you mention actually means anything when you try to apply it to polic…

"The samples that make such a calculation true."

THAT'S WHAT I'M ASKING TO SEE! Which you didn't initial post!

Re: Amazon Closing AmazonSmile

#570

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was to avoid paying google

Like a patent thing?

Nah, let’s say you searched for the product in google, and clicked on the Amazon result, google gets a cut. If you type in smile.Amazon.*, google can’t claim that cut ( I assume ).
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