The Future of White Male Apps

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Amen.
I just registered so I'll be representin'.
Damn you Monteiro for making this a public post! Now the comments are going to be so much tamer.
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And also, it seems like the future is sometime in 2004.
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As a woman working in the industry, I'd like to say "thank you" to Mike and "f*ck you" to the conference organizers.
Test: Name ten women qualified to speak at a Carson workshop and why the attendees should want to hear them speak, and how they might influence otherwise uniterested people to attend. Extra points for including women fluent in Rails. Go.
[amen brother and sisters] btw...anyone notice that they're mostly rather "pale" males too?
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Mena said: Damn you Monteiro for making this a public post! Now the comments are going to be so much tamer.

Actually Mena, I think that's part of the problem. Too often the anger is hiding behind closed doors. I think it's time for the anger to let loose, and let it out publically.

And every speaker pictured above needs to be asked "Why are you speaking at a conference that excludes women?"

So... Hey, Jeff Veen! Why are you speaking at a conference that excludes women?
So the event description says, "Discover how the web's most successful sites and applications were built, plus get expert practical advice from the best in the business on creating your own web app."

That would lead me to suggest Caterina Fake (though since Cal is speaking, that would be a bit strange) or Mena, since both are qualified to speak about how they built successful web apps. I note that several of the men speaking are not programmers, so I don't think Caterina or Mena's lack of hardcore programming skills should disqualify them. I also think Gina Trapani would be great, though it seems like they want people who've built famous apps (Digg, Flickr, etc.) or at least work at big companies (i.e. Coates at Yahoo).

I think part of the problem with the lack of women at this event is its focus. If it's going to be a look at how the best web apps were made, well, you're going to end up with mostly male speakers because most companies are started by men, esp. software companies. If you look at the description of what people are talking about though, it seems like you could easily find women to address some of these themes. Caterina could talk about "Selling and funding: pros and cons of bringing in a third party" as well as Ev. Or danah boyd could talk about "directions in social change on the web" as much as Coates. "10 things you didn't know about RSS" could definitely be done by Gina. Christina Wodtke could talk about IA in web apps.

I don't think you need to go as far as Sarah's challenge. You can look at what's being talked about and ask yourself, "Is there a woman in the industry who could talk about this?*" If the answer is honestly no, then it makes sense that a man is filling the slot. If not, I think it demonstrates probably some combination of laziness on the part of the conference organizers to develop a diverse pool of speakers and bad luck. For all we know, they did invite some women and the timing just wasn't right.**

Conspiracy theory: In looking over the conference site more closely, I notice that many of the speakers work for companies listed as sponsors. Maybe sponsors get speaking slots? That would explain why the list is not only men but big co. men. (Which is also annoying, as if independent people aren't doing things, or small companies aren't doing things. IMO that's the future of web apps!)

* At the same level, with similar experience, etc.

** This is often what I hear from conference organizers when I ask about this issue. Of course, if you only invite one or two women, the chances of ending up with no women speakers is higher than if you invite eight or ten.
Sarah Hatter said: Test: Name ten women qualified to speak at a Carson workshop and why the attendees should want to hear them speak, and how they might influence otherwise uniterested people to attend.

Sarah, are you saying that women should have to pass a litmus test that men don't?
I know that having NO women speak will definitely NOT inspire any more women to go into that field, and I think that's a huge deal right now. The industry needs overall diversity. Too much of what "web 2.0" (…and what a crock of shit THAT is) is focused on is solving first world problems for white men in high income brackets. It bores the fuck out of me.

We need people outside of that demographic to get into the industry and that means putting role models on stage.

Sarah Hatter
also said: Extra points for including women fluent in Rails. Go.

Good grief. Fuck rails.
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There is no excuse for a conference with a lineup like this. You would think that Blogher and all the earlier criticisms (that is from 2004, but with a little more searching I could have found one from 1994) would have changed things.
No slam against Blogher, but this country already has a sad history of "separate but equal", let's try to learn from it.
"Sarah, are you saying that women should have to pass a litmus test that men don't?"

Oh no, of course not. But I don't think just having women speak for the sake of diversity is the solution. There are a lot of very qualified women and men not represented on panels like this, and it's not because they haven't enough check boxes near their names, it's just because they're not visible. An alternative to simply complaining about the lack of women visibly involved is to suggest specific people to step up, and perhaps put out a call to order.

I have this same conversation in different colors each time there's a Getting Real conference or Building of Basecamp workshop. There's very little female presence there and it's always very obvious to everyone, just as it's obvious that a certain demographic tends to weigh the room down. Seminars, conferences, workshops, they all could do very well with more diversity of race and sex and age, but just *saying* that isn't going to do anything.

Encouraging women to be more involved and, like Meg did so wonderfully, point out certain people we'd all love to see taking part, that helps change things.




Sarah Hatter said: I don't think just having women speak for the sake of diversity is the solution.

I do.

Not to oversimplify or anything, but one of the reasons women don't get into this field is because they don't see OTHER WOMEN in this field.

And I've certainly seen my share of idiot males on stage to realize that "qualification" can't be TOO strong a requirement.
If you want me to name names; Erika Hall and Alaina Browne are smarter than any of the men I know.

No, they don't do Rails, like I said, they're smarter than any of the men I know.
"And I've certainly seen my share of idiot males on stage to realize that "qualification" can't be TOO strong a requirement."

I 100% agree with this statement, and think that if excellence were the main focus of recruiting for conferences like this, without pointing any fingers at the current lineup, I'm certain Erika and Alaina and other would be the more obvious choice than some. Another statement above that resonates is, "...I think it demonstrates probably some combination of laziness on the part of the conference organizers to develop a diverse pool of speakers..."

Fine Mike, you can coax me out -- but only because you asked so nicely.

I think Meg -- or was that Caterina -- said things best in the above comment. For every guy represented there, there's a woman who can take on that topic. The thing is that these conference organizers know that they need to pull their attendees in with the big names and, right now, these men are the well-known names in this space.

But it's more than that. I have a feeling that many of these men up there got on the speaker's list because another speaker (man) asked. And, (here comes the anger) for the most part the women I know aren't so much into the conference circle jerk. Like you said, a lot of these guys are great people and great contributors, so I'm not wanting to personally attack them. However, it must dawn on them when they see the list that it's damn male and damn white.

And as far as asking me -- no, I wasn't asked. I'm happy to be building the application of the future -- guess what, you're soaking in it -- to worry about not being there. But I would have been a lot less disgusted if other good women were speaking.

And it's not about quota or tokenism -- it's about not wanting to hear the same old story from the same old faces. And, frankly, a good number of the men I hear speaking at conferences are played out.

I posted something to misbehaving.net (not yet up) about my experience organizing the Sketching conference with Mike K. Mike has some thoughts here: http://www.orangecone.com/archives/2006/07/attracting_wome.html

I agree completely with THE KING OF VOX that yes, diversity matters. And public discussions of intention matter and accountabiity for your choices and decisions matter. [Talking about this is good]

Oh Mike, you know we ladies can't speak in public, I mean, we'd spend so much time picking oour outfits and trying out hairdos we'd never make it to the podium on time!

Seriously, though, I'm seeing fewer and fewer women represented as this industry evolves in these kinds of events, which leads me to believe there's a young old boy thing developing. If I was new to the field or considering it, it would put me off. Hell, I'm already in the field and it puts me off. But you and I have had that conversation before.

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What I am seeing is the same folk (male folk) speaking at the conferences on web apps. It has become a circle jerk.

On Saturday night I was at an after-party for an all-male speaker line-up web app conferencne talking to someone who is organizing another conference and pitched him on my speaking on mobile. He deferred and said that the line up was confirmed, sorry.

But... when I mentioned that he had missed Liza Sabater, a Python developer (BlogHer & Culture Kitchen), he got excited and asked for her contact info.

I concluded that this gentleman was not against women speaking, but needed people who had "hard" app / api experience, rather than a practioner / passionate person heavily invested in a subject or spot of the web / internets.

Every Web conference I have attended in the last year, it has been the design / inspirational speakers (Tom Coates at Carson Summit in Feb, Jeff V. & Mena T at SXSW, Mena & Maggie Mason at BlogHer, Jeff V last friday) that have excited the crowd the most, so why do the organizers keep focusing on the programmers/developers of specific applications?

Is it play out on folks' desire to get rich on selling an app (how did Jeff do it? how did Mena & Ben do it? How did Shaun I do it?) to a large multi-national corporation rather than the love of the creation and web?

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Thanks, Mike. I'm a user of the web, not a creator of the web, but I'm always on the lookout for smart women and people of color being represented on panels of all sorts. And while I hear a lot of men say "Well, I'd be happy if I was sitting by a woman on the panel, but they're just not out there" I rarely hear a man say stand up and say what you did. So thanks for doing that and creating a public post so people like me could "explore" to find it.
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Thanks for writing this.
I didn't really think about it too much before, but now that you mention it (and put it out there so well) I passionately feel the same way you and others do.
I found this post after making a comment on Chris Messina's blog about a similar post. Rather than repeat that comment, I summarize and then let you read my blog to see it in full: It was an excellent conference, give them a break, and judge them on this issue next time. More: http://www.mikeschinkel.com/blog/TheWhiteMansWeb20Club.aspx
I landed on this post because of Mike's trackback to my post of a similar nature. I actually hadn't seen your post even after searching for similar sentiments, so I'm glad I ended up on it.

While I get where the anger is coming from and can relate to it, I don't know that it solves anything in the long run.

Achieving diversity -- whether gender, race, creed, platform -- whatever -- is an ongoing process, one that needs to be teased out and supported over time.

My thesis is that there is a great deal of value to the monocultures in pursuing diversity; that it should not be diversity for diversity's sake but diversity for the sake of doing something better. And, as it is a goal that should be championed by everyone, especially white men (or whomever it is that makes up the dominant monoculture), I appreciate you wading into this issue and the dialogue it inspired.
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Curious - did anyone here attend? I enjoyed most of the speakers but was also a bit surprised about the lack of diversity, not only amongst those giving the talks but the attendees as well.

Ted Rheingold did a kickass job of demonstrating that the future of webapps is all about fostering passionate communities. The folks at Yahoo did a good job, and Jeff Veen made great points about giving up control, letting your users have fun with the interface, etc. Jeff (or was it Ted?) also gave a nod to Vox. So despite its flaws, I learned quite a lot and enjoyed the conference. But I was sad that I didn't get a chance to see some of my other favorite bloggers/entrepreneurs/visionaries talk.

Listen, at the end of the day, it will be a competitive advantage to listen to and learn from diverse perspectives. So while you can be angry at the conference lineup, realize that the attendees are really the ones that missed out. My ticket bought me the thoughts and ideas of a narrow group of perspectives, and I would have loved to hear Mena, or Danah, or Caterina talk. If there is a venue and an opportunity for me to see them, I'll be there (please come to NY!).
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I was there and the quality of the speakers was good, but not universally great. There was a fair bit of repetition on day 2 (what a startup should and should not do). For my money, the product manger from Google, Jeff Veen and Tom Coates were the best speakers. And none of these guys were super techie. I would have loved to seen Caterina or Mena there -- or a product manager (who happens to be a woman) from Six Apart or another web success story. It was great to have Cal there from Flickr, but you got the sense that he had done this a *number* of times and maybe it was time to let someone else tell the story.
Mike Schinkel said: "It was an excellent conference,give them a break..."
I'm sure it was an excellent conference, but that's not really the issue. Excellence doesn't excuse discrimination. And while the content of the conference itself may have been excellent, the larger social lesson being taught is far from it. Why should they get a break when they're not giving anyone else a break?
Chris Messina said: "Achieving diversity -- whether gender, race, creed, platform -- whatever -- is an ongoing process, one that needs to be teased out and supported over time."

Chris, it takes exactly as much time to invite a woman to a conference as it takes a to invite a man. And while I agree that solving this problem is an ongoing problem and will take some time, all processes need to start somewhere and I can't for the life of me think of one good reason why this one shouldn't start now.
Chris Messina also said: "It should not be diversity for diversity's sake."

Actually Chris, it really SHOULD be. We should include different types BECAUSE we should include different types.
WE don't need to justify the inclusion of those who are not white and male. Rather, you need to justify their continued EXCLUSION.

To paraphrase the beloved Ann Richards, who's death this week made us a poorer nation, the white men in this industry "were born on third base thinking they've hit a triple."

King of VOX said "I'm sure it was an excellent conference, but that's not really the issue. Excellence doesn't excuse discrimination. And while the content of the conference itself may have been excellent, the larger social lesson being taught is far from it. Why should they get a break when they're not giving anyone else a break? "

And you missed my point. My point was not to be outraged by this because you brought it up after the lineup was finalized. It is damn difficult to pull off a conference and not have any of the spinning plates fall to the ground (I was part of a conference team in 1995 for Visual C++) but it is really easy to be critical as an armchair quarterback. Instead I am suggesting that you give Carson the benefit of the doubt until next time. Chris' post was fair & balanced (unlike Fox News), but yours was just a unfair rant.

If Carson's next conference is still a bunch-o-white men, then be outraged. And I'll be right there with ya...

If Carson's next conference is still a bunch-o-white men, then be outraged. And I'll be right there with ya...

The point is not the "next" conference. You could recurse this argument forever, and that's more or less how Silicon Valley has been going about it's business. The point is to fix it now, not "next" time.
Hey Mike Shinkel, just to give me some perspective here; was my "rant" less or more unfair to white men than the current conference system is to others?
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(Cinnamon [my partner] also posted about this in her blog, but forgot to link to it here.)
Michael Arrington adding elementary knowledge no one asked for: check.
Chris Messina talking and talking and talking without solving the problem: check.
Frustrated post by Shelley Powers: check.
I'd put it on Valleywag but no one cares about the above.
Thanks for your insight, Nick. You've added something to the conversation where I couldn't. :P

Nevertheless, bullheaded as I am, I'll continue not solving the problem by pointing out some new facts: the AJAX Experience is Oct 23-25, more than a month away. They put out an *open* call for speakers. In the current tally of 47 or so speakers, 5 are non-white or non-male. I've contact the conference organizers and they've pointed to their application process as being "equal access and open".

Carson Systems put on show that happened to have all white, all male speakers and they got taken to the mat for it. In fairness, their organization is primarily made up of women and they did reach out to a small number of women to speak at FoWA; but that's also the past and they learned from it and no matter how much we or they would like to go back in time and make things right, they can't and we can't.

King of VOX et al, if this is something that should be fixed and/or continually worked on, what actions are you taking about the AJAX Experience or other events where an open registration process has resulted in yet another white-male speaker line up? What actions are you willing to take for other events that are closed and have underrepresented the non-white or non-male constituencies?

You can continue to lump the abuse on Carson if you like -- that's your prerogative -- but there seems to be plenty of opportunity out in the wild to make change in events that haven't happened yet. I'm no one special in this discussion, as it's been going on for ages -- but inasmuch as people seem to care about it and want change, perhaps there's a chance that we could start leading or demonstrating by example, even if we're not event organizers?
Chris,
You're looking at the effect and calling it the cause. You create an industry culture that's hostile to women and then use their absence as the justification for the continued hostility.

Carson Systems didn't HAPPEN to put on an all-white-male show. They've got a history of it. (There's ONE woman listed on that page.) I really don't mean to take one organizer to the mat here, there's plenty of blame to go around, but you really don't HAPPEN into something over and over. You mention that they reached out to a "small" number of women (your words), with the tokenism in full display in your phrasing.

But you're right, continued lumping of abuse on Carson is beside the point. This is their chance to be the heroes. They're conference organizers, how about they organize a conference on diversity in our industry. I will be happy to help out in any way possible. Heck, I even know some women! (Industry secret: They're smart as fuck!)
I'll chime in as part of the et al Chris refers to above (insert joke about being sidelined!) as a woman working in technology and participating in some of the conference circuit stuff.

As I mentioned above, in our small sample set for the Sketching conference, we had challenges getting women to the table. And part of that challenge (and, I think other organizers face this as well) was directly because the people we asked for recommendations of who to invite had not necessarily seen prominent women speakers at other conferences, had not schmoozed and networked and drank with them, let alone actually heard what they had to say about technology. This, of course, is the classic affirmative action argument - an open door is not enough. You actually have to bring people into the door. And an open door that isn't well-publicized beyond an already skewed audience isn't an open door at all.

There are smart-as-fuck women working in all areas of technology. Some of them/us have their heads down doing their work precisely because they're competing in non-traditional roles where they are being second-guessed. Some of them/us are in less-public roles or have less discretionary budget for travel to conferences. Some of them/us are tired of being the token woman and having to speak for all women when they/we just want to talk about technology trends. Some of them/us join committees and conference planning advisory boards and try to change things.

So what would I like to see?

1) Openness about the process by which conference organizers choose speakers: discussions of where calls for papers are posted, how invitations are sent, how nominations are made, etc.
2) Affirmative action: it matters to women attendees that there are women speakers. It matters, as we've seen here, to male attendees that there are women speakers. Get some women speakers.
3) More discussions like this where people acknowledge that it is in fact a problem and that there are in fact solutions.

Mary Hodder set up a Speakers List wiki last year. Lots of women and men on that list. Go look.
At the risk of splitting the discussion, I've finally moved it over to the work blog. Talk here or there, just keep talking.
The National Academy of Scienced just issued a report on gender bias in science and engineering.

It will be discussed on the PBS Newshour today (Tues, sept 19). Audio, video, and a transcript should be online
by this evening.
Yes, well I fell into this (rather old) thread and usually people restrict posting, so maybe this is just a private message but fwiw, this is a huge issue, and it's not only the lack of visible women -- of all qualities (a poor woman speaker just inspires the good ones to step up) -- it's the enormous bias in the industry on the funding side.

It's a persistent problem people have when trying to manage risk: they FEEL safer evaluating risk in an area in which they have a lot of context - in fact, it's usually the case that people actually do a better job at it -- but because of this there's much running around chasing the same concepts, which introduces a lot of risk, all by itself (due to lack of diversification).

I'd go so far as to extend this: any community that's not in the realm of experience of the organizers or other holders-of-power is going to have a tougher time being represented. The first step is to make an organizing committee that's diverse.

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