The 2 Million Dollar Flame War

October 16, 2010 · Filed under STEM, shesgeeky, women in technology

We See ‘em Trollin’…

I’m sure HBR or Stanford or some school will someday do a study quantifying the amount of daily production lost to arguing on the Internet or simply reading pejorative comments left by trolls.

Until then I’m just going to postulate that reading unmoderated comments can be a total a day-killer. Since taking steps into the game industry over the last few months, I’ve been learning a lot about the culture of the industry. Most of my experience at GDC Online involved me explaining that I’m not making a “fashion game” or a game with pets. When I explained who my target market was, that was typically the response I received. What I’m sad to admit is that the response never surprised me.

Women, Innovation and Awesomeness

Women in IT and STEM fields is a subject I’m very passionate about (see: She’s Geeky et al). I was overjoyed to read that Gamasutra had an article today about the 2 Million dollar grant from the National Institute of Heath to fund a game that addresses the subtle biases women often face when considering a career in STEM. The vast majority of the comments on the article, on the other hand, were filled with ignorance and fear. I’m not sure what it is about articles like these that raise the hackles of so many men on these game industry websites. They realize women read these comments, right? Would they say those same things to their mothers, sisters and daughters?

Between the research I’ve been doing for She’s Geeky as well as SieEnt I came across a very startling fact: if current trends continue, by 2018 the US will have more high tech/IT jobs then they can possibly fill (source: ncwit.org Facts 2010). What this means is we will have to outsource more primary IT jobs. Innovation and awesomeness generally occur closest to where the work is being done – think more bottom-up innovation, rather than top-down innovation. While women make up over 50% of college graduates and the workforce, female IT graduates are only about 18%. Interestingly, this number used to be much higher, closer to 40%. Overall there was simply more interest in STEM and IT in the mid-80s. For some reason, interest in IT drops off in the 90s through the millennium. If we could draw more women into IT, it has the potential effect of making the whole industry appealing to more people in general. There have been plenty of studies about how diverse teams perform better in the workplace in addition to having better retention overall. But for whatever reason the IT industry in particular has a difficult time with diversity.

Another reason to have more women in IT: US women are growing in prominence as household “CFO”s. There’s a lot of money to be made if more products were geared to these women with higher disposable income.

I’m not sure why men (and women) want to keep IT a sausagefest there is no rational reason to do so.

No comment »

She’s Geeky Twin Cities

August 12, 2010 · Filed under Jacque Urick, Liz Tupper, STEM, shesgeeky, women in technology

w00t.

Wow. What can I say? I’m pleased as a peach about how She’s Geeky Twin Cities turned out. I’m so excited about organizing the next event! It’s going to be even more awesome!

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

First, a HUGE THANK YOU to all our attendees. Ladies, you are awesome and I’m so humbled you chose to attend our unConference. Second, thank you to all our sponsors: ClockWork, ipHouse, the Science Museum of Minnesota, Fabuliss, MinneWebCon, MinneStar, and SieEnt. Thirdly, thank you to Heidi Nobantu-Saul for facilitating both days and for all the pre-conference help. Thanks to our volunteers who tweeted, blogged, facebooked, hooked us up with contacts and checked women in at registration. Finally, last but not least, to Elizabeth Tupper for driving and seeing this to its fruition. She’s Geeky Twin Cities would not have been possible with out her!

Speaking of Liz, she said it best: