Halley on women and weblogging:
Although the three women on the cover of Time Magazine were not bloggers, the women using blogging tools are doing a variation on daily whistle-blowing as they blog. They are using weblogs to tell their truth. Much of their truth has been silenced and not allowed to appear in main stream press which is dominated by men. I honestly don't believe this is any conspiracy by men, but rather a shocking disconnect from the reality men live in and the reality women live in. Weblogs are not controlled or controllable by any one group. Weblogs are a no-barriers-to-entry publishing phenomenon. Weblogs are giving women a publishing platform unparalleled in history. Women are not self-editing their voices out of existence. With weblogs, women are telling their truth without even noticing. Weblogs are creating a level-playing field for women.
Read the whole thing.
Will post more thoughts on this (and on Shelley's frustration with the level of discourse on technical mailing lists, and Janet's comment on my "women and social software" post, and recent social software gatherings, and more) after I get to Toronto tomorrow.
Halley's comments appear, to me, to apply more generically than being gender-specific. As someone who is slowly collecting rejection notices for my children's books I know the chances of cracking into the publishing world by *anyone* is slim at best.
(Ironically, I'm trying to get into the Children's Book field which is largely controlled by women)
One of the things I like about blogging is that it is intrinsically democratic. It also provides a social forum (in most cases) to promote and/or allow for discussion.
Isn't that something valued by all people regardless of gender?
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