Hi,
I've been lurking this list for some time and have been getting a bit
depressed by the direction it's taking as of late. It was all cha-cha-cha in
the beginning, but now I've seen references to women not wanting their
children exposed to vulgarity, women and transgendereds needing a separate
list to feel comfortable, and women on Wikipedia being compared to rural
Africa as served by NGOs.
As a chick that likes computer stuff, I've encountered this before in
looking for peer groups and it makes me feel double alienated--I don't even
*like* children and now they're part of a conversation about me as a female
on the internet.
Personally, broad statistics about women nearly never ring true, and that's
a conversation block. Nerdy guys have taught me Wordpress, torrenting, and
heaps of other useful internet skills. In turn, I have taught some lady
friends. It would be more encouraging to get back to what we know and how we
can share it.
I don't edit Wikipedia because I've never taken the time to learn the system
and I'm afraid I'll screw up. I assume it would feel like making a big
mistake in a newspaper and having the whole neighborhood scoff, and I think
that becomes a part of my Wikipedia profile forever and ever. I'd like to
find a YouTube video to walk me through basic involvement. If it's that cute
guy from Portland who is now a Wikipedia community manager presenting it,
well all the better. I could also be encouraged to edit if the community had
an offline component that included meeting for microbrews.
Thanks,
Carissa