-
Website
http://www.scobleizer.com/ -
Original page
http://scobleizer.com/2006/09/01/listening-to-shelley-powers-about-women-in-tech/ -
Subscribe
All Comments -
Community
-
-
Top Commenters
-
Popular Threads
All Comments
"But partly cause I just haven’t focused on making sure my show has diverse voices."... Diverse voices is one thing and non-gender. Sounds like you're getting confused and trying to make it a gender issue.
Rob
I had no idea that there were so few women in technology in Silicon Valley and California, that you have to import people like me from St. Louis just to have some female representation.
Hello Robert Scoble's readers: is this true? Are there no women geeks in California?
If you're having trouble finding people, I would say you're probably not trying hard enough. However, after implying that you have a choice between women and 'interesting geeks', I would say you might have some problems connecting with women technologists int he future.
I notice you didn't answer my question. Which geeks would you like to see on a video show? Male or female?
And, I pointed out at least two women who DO meet my definition of "interesting geeks" (Deborah Kurata, who I hired, and Heather Champ (who I'm hoping to have on my show).
So, YOU are the one who is reading too much into what I wrote and making this a devisive issue instead of helping me find great geeks to have on my show. But maybe that's the role you want to play instead of helping improve the situation.
Me? I'm just looking to have the most interesting tech geeks on my show. I'd love to have you on, because you wrote an interesting Java Script book, but I can't get outside of California this month. Maybe next.
diversity is about all sorts of things. Am I getting a complete range of voices on my show? Am I presenting the tech industry fairly and completely? Am I encouraging new voices? And, yes, do I have my own biases that I need to overcome and learn from?
Why have diverse voices on a show? Cause we learn more if we don't hear from just the same old set of people. I get bored hearing from the same set too.
http://channel9.msdn.com/shows/wm_in
C
Your posts are getting really obnoxious. Your reply to Shelley just proved it.
Why only Geeks ?? ain't there female bloggers out there doin just interesting stuff ???
Oh boy the "MSN Search Champs " was not Tara C also invited and Liz was the only participant ?? so now we know the 3 females who were actually invited at the MSN search champs....hmmmmmmm ok if I remember correctly there were a total of 30 participants in that forum and only 3 females were invited.. and BTW Robert, your organized that event correct ??
Diversity is good, just don't force it.
A good share of the Execs I've worked with over 30 years have been female. Each and every one could hold their own and rose to the cream level without any false "diversity" claims. They were just good and stood out.
As to my show? It's a tech/geek show. NOT a blogger show. So, I want geeks and/or execs in the tech industry.
So take it as it comes...some will be women, some will be men. A lot don't seek to be stars (like Mena) so you may have to dig for both men and women. Too many focus on the stars, the self promoters, the samo-samo. The ones I've been most impressed with in my career have not been the self-promoters, just doers.
Robert: given that Heather describes herself as "not that technical," I'd be interested to know how you define "geek".
Dori (Bay area female geek)
Isn't this a tech/geek blog. There are way too many blogs out there all other sorts of interesting stuff.
I was walking around Flock the other day and noticed that a few of the engineers (almost all of whom were male) were just very quiet and reserved. They don't get the spotlight, unfortunately. Hopefully I can help change that.
I hope more people come to this conclusion. I had the same experience and never had to think they were females.
Heather might say she's not very technical, but I heard her speak at BlogHer and she's definitely a geek. She takes a geeky approach to her photos and she works for an interesting photosharing company. So, I'd love to have her on.
I'm honored that you'll be on cause you're definitely a geek. Geeks don't have to be employed. I'd love to have Shelley on cause she wrote an interesting JavaScript book and she's also an awesome photographer and we go at each other enough to know that she'd be an interesting interview.
Shelley - From your link on your comment I visited your blog for the first time just now. I don't see a bio, I don't know what you do and there is no e-mail address. If I were a conference organizer, please tell me just how I'd get the idea that you would be interested in being a speaker and what type of topic you'd speak about???
I'm currently interested in being a speaker, writing even more than I am and joining an A+ orgranization that is intensely customer focused. All of that information is clearly posted on my blog - I have Robert and Shel to thank for that, it has led to me meeting some amazing people so far and I'm making steps towards my goals every day.
P.S. You take real nice pictures of baby elephants, this I can tell for sure, how did you manage to keep the baby elephant in focus without the closer one becoming blurry?
Is that an invitation? Shelley isn't the only one with a JavaScript book to flog (and despite what Amazon says, I've got a printed book on my desk, so I know it's shipping).
..."cause you’re definitely a geek."
Given that I've labeled myself with it, I figure I might as well live up to it.
I'll talk with you offline on email. Sigh, more email. Heheh.
Look at the keynote speaker list for Oracle Open World 2006. All men. Did you decry Larry Ellison on your blog? If not, why not? Don't you feel some sense of entitlement to speak at Oracle Open World as well? Oracle Open World needs more women speakers, darn it, whether they know anything about Oracle or not.
When my five-year-old daughter grows up and becomes an Oracle sysadmin (fingers crossed!), it'll be because I started teaching her how to write stored procedures in the womb, not because some conference organizer was pressured into using his conference to "promote diversity". Jeez.
Just continue on the path of diversity Robert. The diversity I find on this blog is what brings me back.
Yes it would be a shame if conference organizers were forced to consider issues of diversity. I live in the south, a lot of towns here abouts thought the same of the blacks.
David, thank you for the note on the baby elephant. A smaller aperture leads to a greater depth of field. I believed I used f/10, but I'd have to check the photo's metadata to know for sure. And yes my site has no about page. They're new sites and I'm re-organizing.
However, just to clarify: I didn't bring up this issue because I wanted to be speaker. I don't bring these up because I want more visibility for myself. Having this turn into a discussion of my visibility is nothing more than sidetracking from the more serious issues.
So yes, Robert, I forgot about Search champs. However, I don't really consider that a conference. But yes, I was invited to four things in six years, two of which would have paid my way. I think, though, this really isn't germaine to either this particular discussion or the issue generally. Is it?
And when did diversity become a burden?
You know what's funny is the organizers naive pleasure in how the conference was set and speakers found even before a press release was published. See that actually works against diversity, because it reflects only that group of people initially involved in the earlier discussion of the conference. Now, should more women have been reading the Office 2.0 weblog? Perhaps. Perhaps the Office 2.0 weblogger should have been reading more women.
Even with all of this, the most important point lost in the discussion is that whatever comes out of the conference is hopelessly flawed. Why? Half the target audience was not represented. Unless someone wants to convince me Office 2.0 is meant to be used my men only, nothing that comes out of this can be accepted with any credibility.
Diversity isn't a burden; diversity is an opportunity.
FWIW, I seem to remember reading Shelley saying she declined the BlogHer invite because she wanted to speak as Shelley Powers, technologist, rather than Burningbird, activist -- that is to say, as a professional who happens to be a woman rather than a woman who happens to be a professional.
Can't find it now, though, so I may be remembering wrong.
Maybe one of your video shows can be you in drag at a tech interview or gathering as Roberta.
I know for a fact Ismael would like to have more female speakers...
But ... gee .. .how do I invite you now, Robert? Will you dress up as woman for us? :-)
Joke apart, sending email in a minute... and hope to see you there.
How publicized was this conference out to a more general populace?
But no worries, few women at this conference. Should be just about right for you. Then you can have your manly echo chamber, and when you come out of the conference with all your bright ideas, we can all smile and nod knowingly when they all fail because you all didn't bother to even try to attract participation from a significant segment of your target audience.
James, I actually wanted to speak as Shelley the activist at the BlogHer. The conference organizers asked me to teach a tech tutorial.
As for the Geek Divas thing: I don't really care for segregation. Separate but equal has never worked in the past. I believe that Robert Scoble will find women that will meet his 'geek' criteria.
geek geek geek, Robert.
That's it for me on this thread. I'm afraid we've moved away from the original topic. Anyone have anything to say to me directly, you know where to find me. Anyone wants to email me, it's shelleyp@burningbird.net.
so to make it clear, what is the real reason that woman should run companies?. plz don't use the "equal " arguement.
Dude, no it's not, unless you just aren't paying attention. Meg Whitman/eBay, Anne Mulcahy/Xerox, Carol Bartz/Autodesk, Pat Russo/Lucent, Kim Polese/SpikeSource. It's true, there aren't very many, but I know you've heard of these.
How about company (co-)founders: Ann Winblad/HummerWinblad, Heidi Roizen/TMaker, Mary Hodder/Dabble, Caterina Fake/flickr, Jessica Hardwick/SwapThing...
If you really want to talk with women who are world-class tech leaders, you can (and should) find them.
Am not a geek, but do have a blog for 13 million+ people in the business of network marketing - 80% of whom are women - to show them that they CAN use the Internet to do neat stuff.
I get a kick out of helping them feel like they know almost as much as their children, especially their boys, about enjoying their life and business more because of what they can learn from folks like you on the Internet.
The stories you wrote about your Mom were big hits and made many women feel like maybe, they could, too.
And now they do. They're online, reading good stuff to make their day and get their businesses off the ground.
Kim Klaver
thing is, why do woman buy this type of underwear?.... (I'll wait for the brain to catch up)
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2006...
At LIFT in Europe, I was the second highest ranked speaker (if I remember right) second only to Cory Doctorow. Out of dozens of speakers, including a famous author and a famous model.
And, there aren't many people alive who've interviewed the Office Live team as well as the Google Calendar team as well as the guy who runs the company that makes Open Office.
I also have a pretty deep resume of speaking engagements, including to executives from Boeing, Microsoft, Target, Nestle, Amazon, and other places.
Just to stick up for Zolli's standards. If you have someone who is a better speaker, please feel free to recommend him or her. I'm sure Zolli would appreciate that.
Also, I don't need to be a speaker there. I could run a panel discussion or do something else like interview someone like Meg Whitman or Mena Trott.
As to my Office 2.0 bonafides? I was one of the first people to email Bill Gates and Steven Sinofsky (execs in charge of Office at Microsoft) telling them that they should make a suite of apps, including a wiki, a blog tool, and a few other things. That was back before Flickr was purchased by Yahoo.
Do you know of someone else who saw this industry back then and has an email to prove it?
Where I don't qualify as a hard-core geek, I do as a female CEO of a company using tech in interesting ways. After all, you were one of the first to try us out, and to be a featured guest! [thanks again for that - we really had fun with you and Shel]
Attending a plethora of geek-centric events in San Francisco and Silicon Valley over the past months, I can attest that on a list of 400++ people I am often the only, if not one of very few, female CEOs.
However, I concur with Gene. We are out there. It's just a matter of digging a little deeper. I think even more interesting than "Digital Divas" would be to mix it up a little...a panel (or series of interviews) of smart, innovative and driven men and women brain jamming. Kind of like we do in the 'hallway discussions' at un/conferences and at tech/networking parties.
Belated congrats on your successes, and the move. Hope you're enjoying California.
Thanks for your comments and appreciate what you do!
To clarify: I was responding to Zoli's link to Ismael's post. I thought Ismael's post was clueless. I still do.
I will say in his favor: between yesterday and today Ismael added three new women speakers. Three extremely impressive women speakers, in fact. A thumbs up for that action. Now, 10 or so more like the four ladies already speaking, and this conference might even be worth the bucks.
What an abysmally stupid thing to say.
I came looking for adults, and I find boys in the later stages of arrested development.
You like stirring shit up. You're good at it. But please, don't even start to act surprised when it spatters wrong. It's silly. You get precisely the results you knew you'd both find and create, stop pretending to be surprised.
What no one's yet pointed out is that Robert's looking at who's running tech companies and leading their projects. In all of my experiences, I've always found these folks to be primarily business people -- not hard-core computer scientists. So is that the main issue, that there aren't enough women making it up the rungs of the technology corporate ladder?
My take on that question would be yes. Being a geek that made the transition to management, I know that there aren't enough women there, and it's a damn difficult leap to make.
So my suggestion, Robert, is to dig a little deeper. You're not going to always find women running the show or leading the project -- sometimes they're behind the scenes actually making shit happen!
http://rows-reality.redleif.com/
I am sure some of the "mommy bloggers" can related to some of what she writes about.
This particular 'shit' you're discussing is about a professional conference that covers a topic of interest to both men and women, yet had one woman and 52 men as presenters. What surprises me more than 'castration crew' is the fact that there are so few of us questioning such. Yet here in this post, I've had to defend not our criticism of this conference, but diversity itself. How is it possible that we've become so caught up in marketing and making money that we now consider diversity a 'roadblock' in the path to prosperity. But diversity is core to what we say we value.
I am surprised that diversity is sneered at, equated with loss of quality, and generally seen as more of an irritant than a goal. It doesn't say much for any future with a 2.0 in it to see such, do you think?
I am also suprised there aren't more women questioning statements such as those about 'not selecting based on gender' and 'wanting quality' -- with the implication being that women are not quality. I'm also surprised there aren't members of other groups not represented at these events that aren't also questioning much of this.
Stirring up shit. What would you have rather seen, John? That this conference proceed as it was, 53+ men and one women, making decisions about software to be used by both sexes? Not very effective or efficient, would you say.
Or would you rather I had admonished women for not having signed up? Most of the speakers were invited based on recommendations or being known by the conference originator. This conference has not been publicized, nor has there been any effort at outreach.
I have heard from people that our criticism of Ismael was wrong, but few have come up with anything remotely reasonable or workable or effective as a solution.
Fine.
Will I continue stirring up shit? Maybe. Maybe not.
Here are a few suggestions:
Marissa Mayer, VP Search Products, User Experience, Google - see a video of a talk she recently did at Stanford.
Tina Seelig, Executive Director, Stanford Technology Ventures Program - I have a link to a talk she recently gave here: http://www.elise.com/weblog/archives/001952tina_seelig_what_i_wish_i_knew_when_i_was_20.php Tina also recently helped host the Always On Tech conference with Tony Perkins, so if you go through the archives of that conference, you'll see her. She's a professor at Stanford, a serial entrepreneur, and has a PhD in neurology from Stanford Medical School.
Sarah Allen, former engineering VP at Macromedia, now at Laszlo Systems - she's an uber-geek, quite brilliant, and I would bet a great speaker as well.
Janice Fraser, CEO of Adaptive Path
There's a start. If I think of others, I'll let you know.
The only one saying there is a problem appears to be you and anyone you can get to listen to you. Frankly I don't think an audience really cares about the gender, race, color, or religion of a speaker. Only that they are getting quality information and insight. I don't think women are being ignored, they just aren't making themselves more visible.
I'm sure Linda Stone would welcome an invite, for example. Or Jessica Lipnak. Or Johna Till Johnson. But again, I would listen to them not because they are women, but because of what they have to say!
I haven't accepted the invitation to speak at Office 2.0 yet, have I?
But, have you ever heard me speak? How do you know I don't know what I'm talking about then?
Linda Stone rocks, by the way! And her dinners are legendary.
As far as my letting Microsoft's execs know, well, Bill Gates had me and two other people in his office to brief him on RSS (and later on Flock). Steven Sinofsky sent me a very long response to my email about the social software world that was happening without Microsoft's involvement (since then they added RSS and Wikis and Blogs to Sharepoint, by the way).
But, this is the disconnect. If I stand up for myself against attacks that I'm not a good speaker or I'm not good enough to speak about Office 2.0 then I'm an arrogant jerk. See #57. Whatever.
>You’re not going to always find women running the show or leading the project — sometimes they’re behind the scenes actually making shit happen!
I'd love to find more people who are behind the scenes. They always turn out to be the best interviews. Male or female.
Along with this challenge comes also an opportunity for you and your company. I think you have the vision and can make the difference. After all you perecive that they an;t a enough "mena trotts" - but is that a fact ?? A hrd factorid or just an assumption Because you cant digg deep enough ??
If you 're-build they will come" :)-
A couple of bits that I think need a little light
"that's just who's running the tech industry"
If you just look for the head on a stick, you can make that argument, however, if you think about this for a moment, the number of people who 'support' those heads is much larger, and as a bunch of folks are pointing out, many of them are women.
"I don’t want to devalue the accomplishments of women"
well if you don't look for them, it is hard to devalue them. This is one of those arguments that if you don't acknowledge them, then you don't have to value them at all.
The last thing regarding your "Digital Divas". Back in 1997 there were a group of women who has come together as the Digital Divas, who are still active.
You were still selling stereos then.
I bring this up as these women were able to mount and win a grass roots challenge to Microsoft, your former employer when MS tried marketing a 'Digital Diva' which culminated in MS abandoning that Idea.
Here a couple of links to get you started
http://news.com.com/2100-1017-246732.html
http://www.jamesshuggins.com/h/bas1/memberships...
http://home.fullmoonwebs.com/minimouse/index.cf...
I would be very careful using Digital Divas without performing a little bit of due diligence.
As for your briefing with Gates, I still gotta believe tht neither he nor Sinofsky were exactly clueless on the the technology before you supposedly informed them. Neither of them got where they are by relying on low level employees not dirctly within their reporting structure to keep them abreast of technology already being used by some. Particulary someone like Sinofsky, who is legend is correct, made MS aware of potential of the internet well before it was being widely used by anyone outside of some higher education institutions. My guess is they were simply getting another viewpoint. Nothing wrong with that. I'm sure appreciated you confirming for them what they already knew.
As for comment 57.. well it's true. Your continuous need to remind the blogging world of your "accomplishments" tends to expose some apparent deep seated insecurity you seem to have about yourself. Your continued defensiveness when "attacked" belies that as well. When the majority of your readers only get exposed to you via your writing it's difficult to not draw any other conclusions than that you yourself have issues with your own credibility. I know of very few people that have to periodically remind people of what the accomplished when no one asked. You often sound like that guy that used to write the BEST blog on the internet..."The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs" when he would say "I invented the iPod..perhaps you heard of it?". Your version is: "I walked around and interviewed a lot of people actually doing working within MS (unlike me)..perhaps you've seen them?". No one cares what you did in the past. People only care what you ARE doing or WILL be doing. But getting you to react is like shooting fish in a barrel. It's way too easy.
Meg Whitman - eBay
Clare Brabowski - Radio Shack
Patricial Gallup - PC Connection
Anne Mulcahy- Xerox
Patricia Russo - Lucent
Gail Deegan - Board of Directors EMC
Safra Catz - President, CFO - Oracle
Judith Sim - SVP Marketing - Oracle
(of course these are probably women Ellison is dating)
Nancy Cooper - CFO - CA
I'm sure I could go on...
and let's look in your former back yard
Lisa Brummel - VP HR - Microsoft
Debra Chrapaty - Corp VP MSN Ops
Suzan Delbene - Corp VP Moble Embedded Devices
Gerri Elliot- Corp VP - Public Sector
Kathleen Hogan - Corp VP - WW Support
Julie Larson-Green - Corp VP Windows Experience
Mitch Matthews - Sr VP Central Marketing
Lori Moore - Corp VP Service and Support
Mindy Mount - Corp VP CFO Entertainment
Tami Reller - Corp VP Business Solutions
Mary Snapp - Corp VP Deputy General Counsel
Allison Watson - Corp VP - Partner Group
Look at all those women in Tech you could have interviewed!!! now, careful not to be sexist in your repsonse.
Shelley, that's ridiculous. Your style is to bludgeon people with your opinion and your wisdom, such as it is, and then you act all surprised when people don't react with kittens and rainbows. I'm not complaining about the style, it's similar to my own, but come on. You hit people with a brick, don't act all shocked when they fling it back at you.
This particular ’shit’ you’re discussing is about a professional conference that covers a topic of interest to both men and women, yet had one woman and 52 men as presenters. What surprises me more than ‘castration crew’ is the fact that there are so few of us questioning such. Yet here in this post, I’ve had to defend not our criticism of this conference, but diversity itself. How is it possible that we’ve become so caught up in marketing and making money that we now consider diversity a ‘roadblock’ in the path to prosperity.
Did it ever occur to you that maybe a lot of women with technical backgrounds just don't care? I mean, have you SEEN the explosion in small conferences about blogging, "Web 2.0" and now this crap? Maybe it's that they're picking their conferences carefully? WTF *is* Office 2.0? I read the site description, and it sounds like yet another "IN THE FUTURE, EVERYTHING WILL BE PERFECT, WE'LL LIVE IN GIANT ZEPPELINS, AND OUR FOOD WILL ALL BE PILLS"
Pfah, who's got time for that crap. Maybe you do, but most of us don't. I've a friend who only speaks at Macworld/Photoshop world - related stuff, and she's busy as hell with just that.
No, no, it must be that the organizers don't want women. Oy.
But diversity is core to what we say we value.
Diversity in encouraging really smart people to participate, regardless of genetic makeup, or diversity so that you feel happier about the male/female ratios? There's a difference you know.
I am surprised that diversity is sneered at, equated with loss of quality, and generally seen as more of an irritant than a goal. It doesn’t say much for any future with a 2.0 in it to see such, do you think?
When it comes across as "You must have n women speaking if you have x men speaking" then yes, it is sneered at, and properly so. Sticking women on stage just so you can have more estrogen than thou is not diversity, it's bullshit, and should be properly called out as such.
I am also suprised there aren’t more women questioning statements such as those about ‘not selecting based on gender’ and ‘wanting quality’ — with the implication being that women are not quality. I’m also surprised there aren’t members of other groups not represented at these events that aren’t also questioning much of this.
Oh please. Go sing this song to someone who'll take it at face value. Me? No, I'm not going to insist on a certain number of female, black, gay, asian, etc. faces, just so we can all feel good about out commitment to diversity. Are the speakers qualified to speak on their topic? Do they want to be there? Yes? then it's all good. That's all that matters. If you don't like that, then why aren't you signing up to speak at every damned conference on the planet. Macworld Expo 2007's call for papers just ended, and I know that there are more than a few people who would love to hear from a javascript expert such as yourself. I know Dori's there, and she's damned sharp too, but everyone has their own way of approaching the same topic. So of course, you submitted a session, right? I mean, it's one of the bigger conferences out there, how could you not?
Stirring up shit. What would you have rather seen, John? That this conference proceed as it was, 53+ men and one women, making decisions about software to be used by both sexes? Not very effective or efficient, would you say.
Effective at what? Should they be required to get n women for every man just to fill in a checkbox? Is that somehow a good idea? Try again. Unless you're saying that it's simply impossible for a man to talk about software to women. Of course, that creates an interesting situation with the opposite. If only women can talk to women about things techincal, then why should any man go to a session with a woman speaker. OBVIOUSLY, she'll be COMPLETELY unable to say anything in a way he'll understand. Because, as we all know, women and men are completely different species, with different languages and are really incapable of communicating to each other.
Or would you rather I had admonished women for not having signed up? Most of the speakers were invited based on recommendations or being known by the conference originator. This conference has not been publicized, nor has there been any effort at outreach.
I have, in my speaking career only ever been specifically invited to speak at one conference. The last Comdex Chicago. It was, shall we say, a waste of time. Every other time, I've submitted sessions in accordance to the rules of the conference. What, is that a male only thing? Is there a separate set of rules for women? As far as the publicity for the conference, or lack thereof, that's a TOTAL strawman to the issue of "Why aren't there more women speaking". So they have crappy PR, what's that have to do with anything? What, Crappy PR = TEH SEXISM in your world?
I have heard from people that our criticism of Ismael was wrong, but few have come up with anything remotely reasonable or workable or effective as a solution.
You do understand that no, every criticism of you does not in fact, have to come up with a different solution to be valid. You can in fact say "I do believe you're full of crap", and have that be a valid opinion and criticism on its own. You may not like this, but your opinion doesn't change much here.
Fine.
Will I continue stirring up shit? Maybe. Maybe not.
I don't really care. Writing on the web is something I do for fun, and occaisionally money. But if you're going to stir up shit, then stop whining about the reaction you get. Shit-stirring does not, as a rule, create a calm, reflective, affirming reaction. If that is the reaction you want, then stop working so damned hard to get the opposite one.
I happen to believe that a more diverse conference is a better conference; that organizers who don't see this as a goal are lazy, shallow, money makers who care less about quality and more about sponging off the desperate last days of a bubble even more nebulous than the last.
Real reason I am commenting one last time:
Dennis, oh we're sorry, when you were talking about "castration crowd" did you mean Christopher Coulter?
Putz.
And I find this discussion interesting, because I am going to Office 2.0 - mainly because I disagree with a lot which is on the table there and am looking forward to interesting discussions which I intend to add my usual European touch.
So how do i like the idea of getting women up there to have more diverse voices? Not at all if that means the permier reason being them there is "have a skirt on the stage".
We had this conversation over and over again. There is a side which is the organizers job. Which seems not have been done this time and he should have learned out of it. And there is a side for the women to be done also.
It is not enough to sit on your backs and wait for the organizers to come to you and begging you to do something for them.
Why don't I go to him and do what i ask here? Because frankly I cant think of something worth presenting up there to the crowd for this topic. But I am sure that a pre conference podcast will have something valuable added to the conference and it is something I not only like to do but is also received well by the audience.
Very often, when those accusations are made, it is all blamed on the guys. In part very correctly. But in part also very snobbish.
If women cannot come to such a conference because they don't have the babysitter at home, complain about it. And make it clear that this is the reason why you are not coming.
If you are not coming because you find the ratio of guys coming to be intimidating, mail this and mark that you find the marketing of such an event to be lacking.
And so many more reasons. This is a game of two parties, not just one. And if you want to score in the game, then you need to actually play it.
You will not be given points for free just for being a women.
Of course, when someone disagrees with your agenda, they're instantly a chauvanist. Even worse, you accuse me of being from Cali, when that's literally as far from the truth as possible, (try Miami). By raising that strawman, it VERY conveniently allows you to ignore my point, which was that adding women just to jack the estrogen levels is *precisely* as stupid as ignoring them to jack the testosterone levels. But no, that would require you to stop crusading and start listening. How silly of me to think that making sure you had qualified speakers first, and then within that, doing what you can to jack the female/other minority count is the way to go.
Nope, quality of speaker, knowledge of topic, none of that matters. All that counts is making sure that there's females in the proper proportion. Get lucid Shelley, i'm not in the "FEAR SHELLEY" club, so if you think you're going to confuse me with strident declarations and strawmen, think again.
I happen to believe that a more diverse conference is a better conference; that organizers who don’t see this as a goal are lazy, shallow, money makers who care less about quality and more about sponging off the desperate last days of a bubble even more nebulous than the last.
However, when your SOLE definition of "good" is "number of women" then you don't really give a rat's ass about the quality of the conference, just your agenda. Of course, reconciling this with your heresay - based criticism of Blogher is amusing, since, by your sole criteria, it was the perfect conference.
Make up your mind Shelley, but until you do, stop bitching about everyone and everything, because after a while it starts to sound like "not enough kissing Shelley's ass" is the real problem.
I'm an old guy so the phrase "Digital Divas" seems to me somewhat more than a little demeaning to women. It also possibly indicates a lack of understanding regarding the issues and problems.
A number of people commenting made good suggestions with respect to women in technology for your interview initiatives (e.g., Elisa Bauer, Sept. 2nd @ 8:12 pm and LayZ, Sept 3, 9:18).
The larger issue seems to be basic human dignity including equal opportunities for involvement, participation and contribution. The positions either against or for. Clearly the technological community has some work to do.
On the comments following your article: Why engage in such seemingly unprofessional dialogue? For me, it totally distracts from your position as a thought leader in the tech world. I'm all for speaking your mind and sharing ideas, but why the useless banter? My continuing bone with blogging is that it takes to much effort to sort through all the banter to find the golden nuggets.