We’re happy to announce that, as of today, DreamHost is an angel sponsor of the The Ada Initiative.
The tech industry, and perhaps to a greater extent the open-source community, is predominantly male. Of that we are quite sure. It’s evident from the job applicants we see, the industry events we attend, and the current smell around the office.
There’s a real gender difference here, and it exists for no good reason.
The Ada Initiative is an attempt to change all that. Their goal is to help women get careers in open technology through recruitment and training programs for women, education for community members who want to help women, and working with corporations and projects to improve their outreach to women.
It’s a solid goal and we support their efforts! The Ada Initiative is just getting off the ground right now and they’d appreciate your support too.
You can also keep track of them on Facebook and follow @adainitiative on Twitter.
May 2nd, 2011 at 5:23 pm
I wouldn’t be in the career I am in today without the chances my GrandMOTHER took in the 1960`s (yes, the 60s) to get into technology. I love this!
May 2nd, 2011 at 6:29 pm
That’s great – I’m so happy to hear you’re supporting this!
May 2nd, 2011 at 7:53 pm
This is why I’m a lifetime member of SWE, the Society of Women Engineers. I know I’m a guy, but there were — and still are — several reasons besides the obvious why I would join and remain a member of SWE.
Here here, DH!
May 3rd, 2011 at 2:25 am
As a developer who has been involved in more than one hiring process I have to admit I don’t think the huge difference in numbers is (entirely) due to prejudice. I can’t suggest anything other than that, but there are far fewer women involved in software dev wherever you look, and it’s hard to believe it’s a result of suppression of an interest/pursuit which drives many people to do huge amounts of work in complete isolation (including teaching themselves) with no immidiate / clear reward.
It’s hard to think of a hobby which would be leas susceptible to bias / prejudice when there is often so little interaction and the drive comes from within.
Just my 2c, I wish this initiative all the best
May 3rd, 2011 at 8:23 am
Thanks, Dreamhost! More reasons to love you.
May 4th, 2011 at 1:20 am
Agreeing with Anon above. The subject today smacks too much of the sunshine candy thoughts approach that neglects fundamental facts: men and women are NOT equal (in the sense of sameness) and more than just superficially.
I hope the Ada Initiative recognizes this and is exploring why, rather than as so many other initiatives before it simply assume equality and try to wedge and thrust women into a man’s world blindly, without the facts.
Men and women are different (until casual DNA modification becomes all the future rage), and the more we discover about the differences and embrace them, rather than pretend they don’t exist, the sooner we discover what, if anything, can draw not just women, but much more diversity into this field of ours.
May 4th, 2011 at 6:32 am
Great news!
People who aren’t so sure about this stuff: please take some time to read up on male privilege, maybe grab some feminism books from the library. It’s not about, hey, there’s a bunch of jerks doing all the hiring who think women should stay in the kitchen (though people like that do exist). It’s a societal problem. Women are brought up with the knowledge that women usually don’t work in a certain field, so many don’t pursue that field, never knowing if it would have matched their interests and skills. As a result, there are less women going to college to study for that field. As a result, there are less women applying for jobs in that field. As a result, there are less women working in that field. The cycle continues unless we choose to do something about it, and that’s where organizations like The Ada Initiative come in.
May 4th, 2011 at 10:29 pm
Women are underrepresented in these fields because they want to be not because of “male privilege.” Most people interested in all this tech stuff are men so strangely enough it becomes a male dominated field. I am sorry to see that an otherwise fine company is perpetuating the idea that women are oppressed in a society where men suffer most of the violence, die earlier, are required to sign up for the draft just to get college loans or government jobs, and get less degrees than women.
You guys want to be socially responsible don’t waste your money getting women into a field they dislike, just fund some scholarships to help young men earn 49% of the degrees. Or perhaps send a few dimes to programs that encourage men to go into teaching – or are some disparities more equal than others?
May 5th, 2011 at 12:21 am
Hi DreamHost,
I am a representative for the Nurse Bobby Foundation, an initiative seeking to finally make equal men and women in the field of midwifery.
It is for no good reason we realize there exists a gap in representation of midwives of the male gender and we are committed to change that!
We don’t care for what reasons or why this gap exists, we just know that it must be bad because politically correct society says so! So please, please also show your compassion and donate to our cause in thrusting men into the field of midwifery because we believe the gap shouldn’t exist, and we’re experts on gaps!
May 5th, 2011 at 9:27 am
Hey Dreamhost: I was expecting a donation box on this page, where we could donate to the project and you’d match (or double or triple!) our donation….
May 5th, 2011 at 9:38 am
I think there should be an “Initiative” to get more men into the Nursing field. Or perhaps into the Makeup sales field.
Trying to make people work in areas where they wouldn’t normally want to is a bit absurd isn’t it? Can’t women just work where they want to? If men aren’t stopping them, then they could just go to college and prepare for a life behind a computer monitor, and then get a developer job or something. Nobody is stopping them at all, so what is this Ada going to change?
Let people choose what they want to do. Don’t try to force things on others, or waste money in the pursuit of having exactly 50% of men and women in every single field of work.
May 5th, 2011 at 11:34 am
@Porky D.: Charming blog you have there.
May 6th, 2011 at 4:24 am
Dear Dreamhost, thank you for supporting a program like ADA and understanding that this is a complex societal problem without a simple solution. The condescending tone and ignorant remarks floating around your comment section demonstrates exactly why programs like this are so important.
May 6th, 2011 at 6:05 am
Great Dude!!!!!!!
May 10th, 2011 at 2:48 pm
Why is it important to have more women in IT? Are women better than men? I’d say no; we are equal. Let the people who want to work in IT do that, but don’t prioritize groups because they are smaller or you will have to explain why these groups are more important than, usually, white heterosexual men.
As is usually the case with groups of this nature, the historical accuracy suffers at the hand of ideology. Ada Lovelace was not the world’s first programmer; she may have been the second or the co-first, if we assume Babbage’s “Analytical Engine” to be the first computer.
Babbage, having invented the engine, was obviously the first to see what could be done with it. It is doubtful if this could be called programming however, and what Lovelace is supposed to have made the first “computer program” for is the calculation of Bernoulli numbers. Even this was created by Babbage, but corrected by Lovelace and published in her “Notes”. This would make them co-first programmers, if this to be considered truly the first computer program.
Of course the “Analytical Engine” was never built and only ever existed as drawings. Even if it had been built, there are plenty of other, earlier, contenders for the title of “First Computer”, and the name of the “First Programmer” will most likely never be known.
But whatever, if Dreamhost thinks sponsoring a feminist initiative will give them more customers, it’s their money to waste. I disagree, and I would much rather have (even) lower hosting charges.
May 13th, 2011 at 4:49 pm
Sponsoring initiatives like this is more about finding more women to hire than it is about getting more customers. If we get more customers out of it then great, but that’s not really the point.
May 25th, 2011 at 8:52 am
@stefan: You have to admit “Ada Lovelace” is a much nicer name for the world’s first programmer than “Charles Babbage”.
I didn’t mean for my comment earlier to be a launching point for some of the things which have been said since.
I would love to see more women in the field (for sexist reasons like “I think they’re friendlier”), and absolutely evaluate everyone according to their abilities.
My comment was just about how I don’t think it’s discrimination that causes the skewed numbers.
The numbers are skewed in isolated, one person open source projects too (perhaps even more so).
I did read the Ada Initiative website but I really wasn’t very impressed at the justifications (some of which are sexist in themselves) or the “geek assaults”, and I went in with a pretty open mind.
June 20th, 2011 at 8:08 pm
I think I’ve seen Ted Mosby. Lol~