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This post is dedicated to Jo Swinson MP and Count Packula.
According to the office of National Statistics NB, this is a .pdf download, of the internet-accessing population in the UK as a whole (51% female), 6% of men write a blog, and 8% of women. More women are blogging than men. This is a fact. Of those who state their gender on Dreamwidth, the majority are female, and the same goes for Livejournal. Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Bebo... All these are female-dominated, to a greater or lesser extent. It's harder to find stats for blogger or wordpress, but I suspect they are out there somewhere.
Part of the reason for this is undoubtedly that although the gender breakdown of people accessing the internet is roughly equal, men spend more time at it. More men READ blogs than women (26% to 16%), more men internet shop than women, more men watch TV and download films than women... Yet with the upload of user-created content there is virtually no difference (25 and 24%). So women are putting their views out there, in blogs and on YouTube and in fora, but the men are not listening.
To take an example closer to home, Lib Dem Voice has a daily feature where they link to two notable news stories and two blog posts they feel are worth recommending. The two blog posts are nearly always both by male posters. The people who write the feature are nearly all male. Men link to men. However, having looked at the last 300 posts on Lib Dem Blogs to see what the pool is like that the LDV editors are choosing from, 216 of them are by male posters, 45 by female, 31 by non-gendered pseudonums or group blogs, 6 by the Honourable Lady Mark who defies categorisation, and 2 by fluffy animals with boys who help them type. That's a heavy male bias right there, so even if the editors of LDV are consciously seeking out good female posts, they are going to find it difficult to find them. Now, I know for a fact that there are at least three female bloggers on my f-list who are Lib Dems, and yet have not submitted themselves to Lib Dem Blogs. So there is a self-selection problem here.
But there is also a definitional problem. I had to have quite a long discussion with That Tory Blogger to get him to countinnerbrat as a political blog. She posts about gender disparity and sexuality and things like that all the time, but because she doesn't post about the party politics, she wasn't considered a political blogger. Dan Dan the Wikio Man and I had a similar discussion about The F-Word and various other feminist blogs. Wikio had them listed under
Yet another part of the problem is that although what might be termed initial content (blogs, tweets, etc.) is majority-female, promotion tools, such as Digg, Technorati, blog aggregators like Lib Dem Blogs, etc. are majority-male. So men recommend posts by men to other men. None of this is necessarily a conscious bias, it's just the way things are.
For men... Look outside your bubbles. Ryan, instead of waiting for Lib Dem Bloggers to submit themselves to you, go out and look for them. LDV editors, instead of just scanning through Lib Dem blogs to find stuff that might be interesting, compile your own reading lists and look outside what we can all access through the aggregator anyway. Everyone, cross promote your female friends and fellow bloggers. Make a conscious effort to read the fantastic female blogs there are out there, like Feminist Law Professors,innerbrat, Angry Black Woman, nanila, Geeka Chicas, even our own dear Charlotte Gore, as opposed to just reading the blokes recommended to you by other blokes.
Women bloggers are here. We want to be heard. All we need is for people to actually hear us.
This blog is proudly sponsored by
According to the office of National Statistics NB, this is a .pdf download, of the internet-accessing population in the UK as a whole (51% female), 6% of men write a blog, and 8% of women. More women are blogging than men. This is a fact. Of those who state their gender on Dreamwidth, the majority are female, and the same goes for Livejournal. Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Bebo... All these are female-dominated, to a greater or lesser extent. It's harder to find stats for blogger or wordpress, but I suspect they are out there somewhere.
So why are most of the "top" bloggers men?
Why is the assumption that the blogosphere is male-dominated so entrenched? Why is there a blokosphere?Part of the reason for this is undoubtedly that although the gender breakdown of people accessing the internet is roughly equal, men spend more time at it. More men READ blogs than women (26% to 16%), more men internet shop than women, more men watch TV and download films than women... Yet with the upload of user-created content there is virtually no difference (25 and 24%). So women are putting their views out there, in blogs and on YouTube and in fora, but the men are not listening.
To take an example closer to home, Lib Dem Voice has a daily feature where they link to two notable news stories and two blog posts they feel are worth recommending. The two blog posts are nearly always both by male posters. The people who write the feature are nearly all male. Men link to men. However, having looked at the last 300 posts on Lib Dem Blogs to see what the pool is like that the LDV editors are choosing from, 216 of them are by male posters, 45 by female, 31 by non-gendered pseudonums or group blogs, 6 by the Honourable Lady Mark who defies categorisation, and 2 by fluffy animals with boys who help them type. That's a heavy male bias right there, so even if the editors of LDV are consciously seeking out good female posts, they are going to find it difficult to find them. Now, I know for a fact that there are at least three female bloggers on my f-list who are Lib Dems, and yet have not submitted themselves to Lib Dem Blogs. So there is a self-selection problem here.
But there is also a definitional problem. I had to have quite a long discussion with That Tory Blogger to get him to count
innerbrat as a political blog. She posts about gender disparity and sexuality and things like that all the time, but because she doesn't post about the party politics, she wasn't considered a political blogger. Dan Dan the Wikio Man and I had a similar discussion about The F-Word and various other feminist blogs. Wikio had them listed under General, because
feminism isn't politics. The narrow definition of politics to include only geekery about party politics and the Westminster Bubble excludes women.
Yet another part of the problem is that although what might be termed initial content (blogs, tweets, etc.) is majority-female, promotion tools, such as Digg, Technorati, blog aggregators like Lib Dem Blogs, etc. are majority-male. So men recommend posts by men to other men. None of this is necessarily a conscious bias, it's just the way things are.
So how do we change the way things are?
Well, for women, I would suggest starting to use promotion tools much more extensively. Don't worry about whether or not you will fit in, or whether or not the men want to hear you. Barge into the room and make yourself heard. Submit yourself to Lib Dem Blogs, Digg yourself, join Bloggers' Circle, Technorati and Wikio. Don't assume that people who are interested in your blog will find it by themselves. But also read, comment on, and interact with male bloggers. @reply people on twitter with posts you think they might be interested in (like Dazmundo did to me yesterday). Sponsor my blog, FFS! Nearly all of my sponsors have been male. Put yourself out there. Make yourselves noticeable and people will notice you.For men... Look outside your bubbles. Ryan, instead of waiting for Lib Dem Bloggers to submit themselves to you, go out and look for them. LDV editors, instead of just scanning through Lib Dem blogs to find stuff that might be interesting, compile your own reading lists and look outside what we can all access through the aggregator anyway. Everyone, cross promote your female friends and fellow bloggers. Make a conscious effort to read the fantastic female blogs there are out there, like Feminist Law Professors,
innerbrat, Angry Black Woman, nanila, Geeka Chicas, even our own dear Charlotte Gore, as opposed to just reading the blokes recommended to you by other blokes.Women bloggers are here. We want to be heard. All we need is for people to actually hear us.
This blog is proudly sponsored by
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Date: Monday, October 19th, 2009 10:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Tuesday, October 20th, 2009 12:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Tuesday, October 20th, 2009 01:02 pm (UTC)Current price for a month is £100