Sorry, Boys, This Is Our Domain

By STEPHANIE ROSENBLOOM
Published: February 21, 2008


THE prototypical computer whiz of popular imagination — pasty, geeky, male — has failed to live up to his reputation.

Research shows that among the youngest Internet users, the primary creators of Web content (blogs, graphics, photographs, Web sites) are not misfits resembling the Lone Gunmen of “The X Files.” On the contrary, the cyberpioneers of the moment are digitally effusive teenage girls.

“Most guys don’t have patience for this kind of thing,” said Nicole Dominguez, 13, of Miramar, Fla., whose hobbies include designing free icons, layouts and “glitters” (shimmering animations) for the Web and MySpace pages of other teenagers. “It’s really hard.”

Nicole posts her graphics, as well as her own HTML and CSS computer coding pointers (she is self-taught), on the pink and violet Sodevious.net, a domain her mother bought for her in October.

“If you did a poll I think you’d find that boys rarely have sites,” she said. “It’s mostly girls.”

Indeed, a study published in December by the Pew Internet & American Life Project found that among Web users ages 12 to 17, significantly more girls than boys blog (35 percent of girls compared with 20 percent of boys) and create or work on their own Web pages (32 percent of girls compared with 22 percent of boys).

Girls also eclipse boys when it comes to building or working on Web sites for other people and creating profiles on social networking sites (70 percent of girls 15 to 17 have one, versus 57 percent of boys 15 to 17). Video posting was the sole area in which boys outdid girls: boys are almost twice as likely as girls to post video files.

Explanations for the gender imbalance are nearly as wide-ranging as cybergirls themselves. The girls include bloggers who pontificate on timeless teenage matters such as “evil teachers” and being “grounded for life,” to would-be Martha Stewarts — entrepreneurs whose online pursuits generate more money than a summer’s worth of baby-sitting.

“I was the first teenage podcaster to receive a major sponsorship,” said Martina Butler, 17, of San Francisco, who for three years has been recording an indie music show, Emo Girl Talk, from her basement. Her first corporate sponsorship, from Nature’s Cure, an acne medication, was reported in 2005 in Brandweek, the marketing trade magazine.

Since then, more than half a dozen companies, including Go Daddy, the Internet domain and hosting provider, have paid to be mentioned in her podcasts, which are posted every Sunday on Emogirltalk.com.

“It’s really only getting bigger for me,” said Martina, an aspiring television and radio host who was tickled to learn about the Pew study.

“I’m not surprised because girls are very creative,” she said, “sometimes more creative than men. We’re spunky. And boys ... ” Her voice trailed off to laughter.


More at: The New York Times

.... Then where are the chicks swarming to help us impatient guys over here at Pro?

ar1stotle wrote:

.... Then where are the chicks swarming to help us impatient guys over here at Pro?

That's my fault, my photo was up on the staff pages for quite some time a while ago!!

They probably saw it and...

Oh God, I forgot the staff photo area existed!

Hmm ... not to demean site building of the type their talking about, or even social networking in the way of Myspace or Facebook ... but, really, since when did any of those things the survey attributed to the geek girls of the world really ... umm .. fit with the typical computer geek stereotype?

The *real* computer geeks are in the background of every major corporate website, places like Google, and otherwise too busy playing with some new toy somewhere (or reveling in an old one) to make shiny new icons, or "glitters" ... ...

Oh, and blogging about their own lives? ... (there's a joke buried somewhere in this ... something about ... stereotypical geeks have lives worth blogging about?)

(You should notice, I never attributed gender to the stereotype, as I've been out-geeked by a number of girls in my lifetime. )