February 29, 2004
Rayne Today
Lisa Williams at cadence90 came up with a brilliant idea: a round table session at BloggerCon II dedicated to women and blogging. She's drafted a session description:
Chick Blogs! A Roundtable on Women and Blogs
This session will attempt to be the pajama-party of the blogosphere -- a lively and welcoming exchange on the best of blogs by women. Participants are encouraged to prepare to share what motivated them to start their blog, and what motivates them to keep blogging.
While this session will focus on blogs written by women, guys and their perspectives on the topic will also be enthusiastically welcomed.
-- According to Perseus Research, women write more than half of existing blogs -- yet they are underrepresented in popularity rankings such as the Technorati 100. Will womens' blogs, focused on daily life and personal issues, turn out to stand the test of time better than more topical, news-focussed blogs that may have more traffic today? Do women trade off popularity today for longevity tomorrow?
-- Do womens' personal blogs -- often dismissed as self-indulgent or "ramblings of teenage girls" represent a challenge to notions of what's Really Important?
What are the great undiscovered blogs written by women?
-- If you're a woman with a blog, what effect does your gender have on how & why you blog? None at all? Quite a bit?
-- Do you blog anonymously? Do you take steps to conceal your gender in your online presence?
Does this cover it all, or are there more issues that should be addressed in a "Women and Blogging" session? I think this is a damned good start; I know a couple of these issues have generated a lot of conversation here at RFB and at misbehaving.net. But is there something else we should discuss that's unique to women in blogging?
Which female bloggers should be participants? What makes their personal situation and blog unique?
Who's interested in attending Bloggercon II? Can you make it? Fill us in!
Posted by rayne at February 29, 2004 11:41 AM
It seems a great idea to me. hope women bloggers from all over the globe can participate. it can add to the gathering's attraction and enrich aspects and debates. Although I don like this "pajama-party" concept. I prefer a more serious image, sth that may also keep the sense of liveliness in it.
Thanks, Rayne! Like Soheila, some people aren't so sure about the girl-power aspects of this session description. I posted a response to some of this feedback: Don't Call Us Chicks, Please. Personally, I like it but don't think it's an essential part of the session description. We'll see how it fares.
If anyone reading this here thinks that they do want to come to BCII and to this session, please leave me a note at my blog -- getting this session on the final schedule is dependent on how many people are interested in attending.
Rayne if you won't be going I'd be interested in your answers to these questions.
filchy -- I'd love to respond, but I think I'm going to wait until we get closer to Bloggercon II. There's a chance we may be able to do a telecon/remote-something-or-other, in which case I may be able to participate and reply at that time.
Got any suggestions on how to do that, BTW? I suspect participation numbers (versus attendance) might be quite good.
Great. Men get to change America, women get a pajama party.
Infantilize yourselfs at your peril.
I hate to say it, but even if I were to go to something like BloggerCon, I wouldn't attend this session.
Lisa I saw your response, but it still doesn't cover the fact that women are being portrayed in such a way as to find favor with the men -- chicks, pajama parties, women can "bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan, and never let you forget your a man". Recognize the theme song?
Women want to make a difference? Then go to BloggerCon, attend all the sessions, and ask why more women aren't leading the sessions. And in each and every session--speak out. Talk. Be heard. Make noise.
And for once stop categorizing all women as one type of blogger, and all men as another. You're just feading the myths and the stereotypes, most likely because you yourselves are becoming nothing more than handmaidens of Valhalla.
Leave the boy toy 'can we please play' stuff for school, where it belongs.
I'm skeptical that you read all the responses regarding Lisa's post at her blog.
If you did, you'd realize the "pajama party" comment originated with me and NOT Lisa Williams -- and that the opportunity for a couple of female bloggers to stay at Lisa's home was the real driver behind the originating comment, not the conference itself. It's not often (in my case, never) that an opportunity to have an intimate discussion with other women about the nature of blogging comes along. Hence the "pajama party" comment from me; staying up with some new friends all night talking about this in an intimate setting is likely to be highly supportive and very productive. (I'm also having some difficulty with seeing how an intimate discussion in a conference setting would be harmful...)
I suggest that readers refer to the current proposal for the session and use that as the guideline for choosing to attend.
This particular post is also rather stale -- are you really trying to encourage a positive change at this point? Or are there other motivations? This also wasn't Lisa's post; I re-posted it to encourage more discussion. Is there some really constructive here that I'm supposed to take away? Or is there a larger problem here that other readers will take away from "Women and Blogging" before the conference regarding the nature of constructive criticism?
Rayne, I am only now catching up with my reading. I didn't know this was on a timer, and when I went to Lisa's blog -- the link was to a Nixon post. So I commented here.
However, feel free to delete my comment if you're limiting your comments to a particular type, tone, time, and sugject matter.
As for the pajama party concept, I don't know whose idea is is, but it was, frankly, not something that is going to help women get credibility. Sorry, but do you want honesty, or compliance?
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