More on the SCALE Women in OSS Mini-Conf
I was a little disappointed in the Women in Open Source Mini-conf. Perhaps I had the wrong impression of what the goal of mini-conf was. Instead of providing a platform for women to present on technical topics (which some of us did), there were a suprising number of talks which focused on the classic “where are all the women?” topic. I lost count how many times the FLOSSPOLS report was cited.
Not that there is anything wrong with asking this question or talking about this issue, but why not take advantage of the attention and talk about something technical? Afterall, isn’t that what we’re trying to do — get involved, get noticed, and get recognized? Sure, someone has to talk about these issues, but a single session on the topic is sufficient. Don’t preach to the choir and beat a dead horse.
While hanging out in the KDE booth today, I had a lot of people come up to me to either talk about my presentation or expressing regret for having to miss it for one reason or another. As I mentioned yesterday, I was surprised by how well it was received and in the quality of questioning. There are still many people in the OSS community who have yet to hear about usability, yet alone adopt it as a project goal. I just wish I could have reached more people.
This all makes me feel like I should have presented as a regular session rather than hidden away in a mini-conf. I doubt there would have been any hidden sexist forces preventing me from doing so if I had known when the CfP occured. As far as I know there were no women speakers in the regular sessions.
Anyway, what I have to say matters, and I don’t want it hidden behind feminist separatism.
Tthank you for all the work you are doing for the KDE project; thank you for taking the time to prepare such a great presentation; and thank you for answering my questions. May be I will have the chance to express this in person tomorrow at SCALE if you will still be around. Oh, wait! It is already tomorrow :-).
Keep up the good work!
Gus.
Maybe there will be more technical talks next year. Woman & computers/FOSS is still relatively new as a topic, so it’s an issue in itself and ppl want to discuss it…
@superstoned
Sure, and I understand that. I’m just expressing my disappointment from being too presumptuous and expecting a technical mini-conference, not a focus group on women’s issues.
Well, hopefully the organizers will listened to your concerns and will make changes to include and recognize the importance of the work you and other women are doing.
Will we see you next year?
I’m open to presenting in normal conference sessions, I am not interested in participating in any more special interest activities for women.