We have seen an explosion in Web 2.0 technologies from the previous passive, static and rather stagnant asynchronous information, to the now new smooth and improved synchronous ride – one that is an exploratory, creative and fully immersive experience. Oh what a wealth of new interactive possibilities that we have at our finger-tips. Aren’t we lucky!
Add to this that being ‘being in touch and connected’ is not only playful, fun, creative and for the most part pleasurable, buts its cool too! – and yes I’m fully addicted, or should that be connected?…
In fact so unconscious is my apparent ability to log on (never off!) there is rarely a moment when I am not creating, interacting and contactable in some form or other.
So amongst all this enthusiasm where lies my concern this time? Well with such enthusiastic meandering round the Web of late it has struck me how as Geek Chics we at risk from being subsumed by our male counterparts and lost in the cultural milieu that is, for the most part, a masculine driven social-scape.
Like Sarah, I have been trying to get hold of a female someone from a multitude of Web 2.0 organisations in recent weeks and have, more often than not, been met with either having to draw a complete blank, or had to trawl through so many levels of hierarchy that one is beginning to wonder whether such women are deliberately hiding, or are they truly a rare creature?
I believe I have made the comment before that Web 2.0 social media represents a more ‘feminine’ encounter with technology, which leaves me wondering where oh where are the women behind it?… More worryingly are there ANY women behind it?…
Sarah posted recently on the Girlygeekdinners group on Facebook a request for female speakers who hold a ‘technical’ and or management position.
One reply (male) was particularly striking:
‘The problem you’ll have getting (female) speakers from Yahoo! is that there are very, very few women working for Yahoo! (in the UK, at least) in techie roles. I know of two, and one of those is an intern. There are more designers, but we’re talking maybe another… 5 or so, at best. And I’m not sure _any_ of those would be much into the whole speaking thing. Can’t say for sure, but I get the feeling they probably wouldn’t a) be in a position to or b) wouldn’t want to. That’s just my guess, though’.
Cause for concern indeed.
Add to this my return from a recent visit to the San Francisco to the O’Reilly Web 2.0 Expo where I was struck by the uniformity of the male technology enthusiasts – As one of the few females in attendance, I stuck out like a PC at a Mac convention, so much so that another woman with whom I met remarked how few ‘skirts there were amongst all the suits’. Well that’s certainly one way to put it!
It does sadden me to think that amongst my daily little foray into the Web 2.0 world, there is little realisation, nor concern about such a gender imbalance. It seems ironic that where we are very savvy at collectively contributing and sharing information there is a lack of attention about the formation of such user knowledge, shares and application creation.
Maybe the way the world is Tarzan build tools; Jane gets to use them…
Perhaps the Web 3.0 jungle will bring with it a more egalitarian gender balance?
I enjoyed this post, the comment section provided interesting commentary instead of the usual progression. It was refreshing.
The trend of having more men working in companies like Yahoo than women is due to several reasons. One reason is that men are more technical by nature than women. Next reason is that the world population really shows us a 1:10 ratio of men to women.
In our company, for instance, the men are most the technical personnel and the women are the SEOs. Most men are perhaps expected to do the harder tasks.
Tech entrepreneurism is dominated by alpha males, who tend to have a very clubby culture. It may not be the traditional old boys club, and in theory it may be totally open to women, but it’s there. To be involved, you have to do the long hours plus the evening networking events, and as a rule it’s still the case that women have less support in the home, and also prioritise home/family/friends over working 24/7. Most of the men I meet in the high tech startup scene are either young (often single) and love doing tech stuff – this is their social life – or are older, with a supportive wife/girlfriend, and often (if they’ve been successful) other paid help (PAs, cleaners, etc). Whereas women tend to view being home with the kids, rather than the nanny being home with them, as important; or they have caring responsibilities for older relatives (i know of hardly any men who are caring for elders); or they simply want a work-life balance, where the life part isn’t technology or business.
Of course, my experience is a very small sample set, and it’s very easy to generalise incorrectly in this stuff.
I’ve quite a few years experience as a rare female in computing research and now high tech startups, though, and I’ve watched other women leave the field or move into less hardcore roles: sometimes because of children, but often not.
Quick post – I’m one of those cheap chicks (??!). Six months into the UK ad industry in London. Can only afford to do it as family have outrageously nice place in town (I know privileged me). Getting out to do a PG law course in Sept as all here are right (especially Maz who started this off) as my company eats up women like me who do the donkey work while the guys do the interesting stuff. From the others here there is on way up except for one who is living with one of the partners (only a small company) and seems to have a nice lifestyle.
I agree with most of what has been posted here. Not so much a case of clear discrimination but more subtle e.g. evening sessions at pubs for the boys. So as Maz says where are the women entrepreneurs in this area? If they are not about why? Is this about networks (which this blog may help to fix???) – are women accidentally or otherwise lack access to the networks of people pushing along the Web agenda? As others have pointed out there are lots of women working in mundane jobs but few elsewhere (and not all run off to have babies and even if they do many women in other areas of work manage to put both activities together e.g. doctors, psychologists etc). The personal is political as they said in the 1970s so I’m anonymous (oh and typing this on my government office PC) as I work in IT within Whitehall. My background was education but done this for over en years. Bright women or anyone come to that would – mostly – find such government Depts a non-sexist place to be but few women apply for jobs compared to men. So is that women lack ambition or otherwise disadvantage themselves?
Thanks Weesz for your comments!
I completely agree with you that female entrepeneurship is seemingly lacking.
I’m going to see if I can address some more of these issues in a forthcoming post so please get in touch with any ideas, observations etc I shall incorporate these and want to pass them on to a wider media audience.
Kaisa,
it appears that you have had similar experiences to my own in the world of media ‘saviness’. what seems to go unnoticed under the radar is the number of incidence, no srub that – what goes unnoticed is the fact that there still ARE incidence where things are less than equal between the sexes.
My chief concern is that feminism is either considered ‘dead’, not necessary, or a tag that is intended to be disparaging in its conotations, perhaps Anon was right to point out the potential to be labelled as a ‘lez’ intended as a derogatory term.
I keep coming back to where ‘we’ go from here though. But it is encouraging to see that comments have come from men in the industry who not only recognise that there is a problem, but also lend support for equal measures. No special favours wanted, just an equal playing field for one and all to play in.
Oh, I’m definitely not saying that there’s no discrimination – just that the most obvious ones don’t apply to the early stages of entrepeneurship.
To follow up on myself: According to this article: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20030873/ , you might negotiate for higher salary, but you should shut up about it to your coworkers if you’re a women.
I’m a woman in IT, and I’ve been thinking about other women in IT, or the work force in general.
As long as women are willing to work without getting paid, off course profit seekers are going to hire them. As long as there’s a steady flow of girls doing menial jobs to get a foot in the media business, why raise salaries? Unfortunately, you as a woman can’t make other women decide that they don’t want to be exploited, so you’ll have to find somewhere else to work, where the managers treat you right. Kind of a pity, but that’s how life can be.
And as long as women don’t DEMAND the same salary as the males in their office, if they feel treated unfairly, why should they be offered more? Some women need to feel less victimized and protest more. Ask for a raise. I don’t know how it is in the UK, but here in Norway it’s such a high demand on smart people, that you’d get away with it. But a lot of women don’t stand up for themselves, they expect things to be fixed by someone else. I used to be like that too, untill I decided that I was worth a lot more than what I was being payed, went to my boss and asked. I got a raise for £3000, while the guys at my office didn’t get any. It felt good. I’ve done it a few times more, and have gotten raises both those times as well. The managers have seen that there’s been an “imbalance”, and have agreed to give me more money. But off course they would have shut up completely if I hadn’t asked for it.
But exploitation and salaries are general issues, not specific for Web 2.0. Or IT, even. What I’ve found during my 7 years in the industry, is that women for some reason hardly ever get involved in anything work related OUTSIDE work. I’ve been attending user group meetings for the last 3-4 years. If there are 4 women in a group of 80, it would be a record. And these things are free! But they’re being held in the evenings, that might be it. On the other hand, Microsoft has several events during a year, where there’s lots of interesting content, it’s free and you get some quite decent food as well. There, you migh have 10 women and 150 men. And I’m not entirely convinced the number of women would rise even if there were several female speakers…
OK, so what has this rant to do with Web 2.0? It might explain why no women can be found, and if you find a few, that few other women are very enthusiastic about attending the events. I don’t think it has anything to do with Web 2.0, though. Just that a lot of women spread their attention so thinly that what they do for work has a lower priority than friends, family, house, physical training or other “usefull” and “worthwhile” things. If someone invented some technology that was both practical and esthetically pleasing, you might get the big masses of women in IT interested. Web 2.0 don’t come across as being quite that. And then you have a catch 22, because few women will bother to work out what this revolutionary technology could be, so it will probably never show up.
(Yeah, I’m a pessimist. The link in my name is to an article I wrote in 2004, called “Why are there still so few women in IT?”)
weefz,
you have hit the metaphorical nail on the head! – exactly what IS potentially putting women off being part of Web 2.0, technology and creative industry construction. I know that we are ‘out there’, but we are rather few and in-between a predominantly male-on-male industry.
As much as I would like to agree that there is no discrimination, the time for a fully equal citizenship in the techno jungle is yet to be realised, as pay, bonus’s, time off and holidays remain rather in the males corner (a female friend of mine, same job as her male office counter part is being salaried less, despite more experience etc – then there’s age discrimination but only so much we can deal with on one blog!).
Things have come a long way and I am more than proud to be part of an environment that fosters creative talent and a start-up approach. Things will infiltrate onwards, upwards and across the board, and it will be great to contribute to this!
Interesting posts – people!
How could we find out how many women are working in what we define as the Web industry? To be clearer what is needed is some account of however defined – and this is up for debate – senior or what we might mean is those that can set agendas and see projects though. In my experience there are few women in programming ie using code, languages etc. What about thinking about ‘Web creative sector’ and the roles that might be in there.
Anyone in the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (old DTI in the UK) reading this? If so any info from your Dept?
Perhaps the lack of concern over the web 2.0 gender imbalance is down to the idea that a lot of these companies were founded and built by young-ish single men. They see no reason why women can’t do the same thing. Hell, I don’t see a reason why I can’t do the same thing, beyond simple self-motivation.
There’s no obvious entrepeneurship barrier for women, like the glass ceiling or maternity discrimination. What is actually stopping ‘Jane’ from building technology?
Anon,
Your observation of the media industry has some synergies with my ‘life’ experience. Upon leaving university with my English Literature degree I dabbled in what I had thought was a career path in media. My experience however was short-lived and of a business run and sourced by the men ‘at the top’ and women ‘at the bottom’. Where we would produce reports and do the labour, the bosses lunched, self-promoted and were the ‘face’ of the company.
Yes I did feel exploited.
Furthermore, there was a high turn-over of bright young women graduates in the office, I suspect they too had felt exploited in a similar way. I left after 8 months, when it became apparent despite it being a ‘graduate’ position there was to be no formal training, and no interest in developing my skills to rise up through the company. The glass ceiling was firmly in place.
Whilst I have had no experience of being called a ‘lez’ as you put it, I do empathise with your note that it is difficult to be accepted as an ‘equal’. I do not regret my brief move into the media world, but I would not repeat that side of the industry again. Thankfully though that was only one company and many are now formed, run-by and have on their teams numerous of creative and intelligent women who are given real opportunities and career paths.
Baby,
Really encouraging to hear of the central role of women within your department, and great that this is being encouraged. Perhaps your consideration about a lack of women programmers is correct that this is due to differing styles of work and career aspirations. Although I cannot help but wonder if such supposed and seemingly ‘opposing’ feminine and masculine skills could be cultivated and developed in a different way that would lead to both more equal roles for men and women, as well as more open career routes (yes male-centric Silicon Valley I have you in mind!). I suspect that this is something that will come with time and it is encouraging to note how both sexes are willing to ‘play’ around with new technologies and cool tools. You never know, the next generation may already be ahead of us and have infiltrated what appears as a very stratified ‘cybernetic’ hierarchy. One can but hope.
Jonny,
You raise some really great points and I realise that a major short-coming of the original post was my lack of, ‘well where do we go from here’ suggestions. Something I shall rectify in another posting soon!…
As far as security holes go, just see how many times Safari crashes on your new iphone – yep that’s a hacker’s dream alright!
Is Web 2.0 is part of the media industry? This industry is especially attractive to women who have left University and want to be ‘in the media’. Lots of women work in low paid or even non-paid positions (film is notorious in this respect) and no surprise there are too many public school hair heads. Men naturally (???) exploit this. So men are in the positions that matter and have certain exceptions about women who work in their organisation. Women who don’t play into this game find it very hard to a) not be called a ‘lez’, ‘hard case’ so on b) be accepted as a equal.
Standard Disclaimer: I am, as it happens, male. I work in an admittedly periphery field to pure programming or web design, but there are a number of women where I work, and I would venture to guess more women than men in the field in general. I’m an English professor, but I spend a good bit of my time working in the more specific area of what has come to be called “Humanities Computing.” Among other things, at the university where I work we have designed an XML markup application that is being used in all freshman writing classes. Essentially we ask students to tag particular elements in their papers so that we can pull those elements out in class and look at them in isolation or in comparison to the same elements in other students’ work. My office mate, a woman, has put in a great deal of work experimenting with how to use this same mark up system to teach literature, having students tag very particular elements of a poem — metaphors, for instance — in order to heighten their awareness of these elements but also to be able to pull out just these particular elements and look at the structure that the poet creates. I wonder if the issue isn’t the lack of women programmers generally, but the fact that women programmers tend to me attracted to practical uses of programming? Just a theory.
The solution is to start speaking regularly in the media and events, then encourage and inspire other women to do the same!
Didn’t know you were a techy though so it would be good to chat about various things, like what you’re doing, etc..
Personally for me I haven’t bought the whole Web 2.0 hype as it should be called “Ajax/Interactive Web Applications from 5 years ago now actually easily cross browser compatible.” Quite weird really how it took so long to take off, and only really because of stuff like facebook and a few other mainstream sites. Now a few biggies are doing it I can see a large cascade of spin-offs and copy-cats. Personally, I think that under-qualified developers are going to make even more security holes in their already cacky applications – more work for us I guess. It will create plenty of oppportunities though!
cheers Mark, I have, since posting, realised where this polemic falls short – I am yet to come up with a solution the ‘problem’. Hmmm i shall think on it and get back to you!
I totally agree, or something!