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1984 – When women stopped coding

npr.org

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Re: 1984 – When women stopped coding

#11

Post by Wintamute »

purpled_haze wrote: post #6

I have daughters and was not able to get them interested in any computer unless it involves games or social media. But the boys they hang out with are the same way- games only, for the most part. While I played a lot of games on my computer as a youth, I also spent a lot of time trying to program games. Today, I'm a developer. Because of kids' fascination with their phones and tablets, and because programming isn't a…

I think you're right. Back in the 70s/80s/90s kids had to work at using their computers. In order to play a game in the early 80s I had to hook up a tape recorder, fiddle with the volume, tape a 1kb RAM upgrade to the back of the computer and write some code to start playing a game. In the 90s I had to wrestle with AUTOEXEC.BAT and COMMAND.COM for hours to make DOS recognise my sound card. Technical effort and perseverance was rewarded with gaming pleasure. Or rather technical effort and hard thinking were the only way to make that magical screen light up. These days no effort at all is required, games and media on screens is just ambient. It's a very different situation, it'll be interesting to see how it changes the industry ...

Re: 1984 – When women stopped coding

#12

Post by ishener »

ishener wrote: post #10

The actual article is here: http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2014/10/21/357629765/when-...

I think it's important to also show the graph of absolute numbers of computer science students. Maybe the absolute numbers will show that the number of female students did not decrease, but rather the numner of male students increased dramatically, making the female share drop.

Just an angle I would pursue.

Re: 1984 – When women stopped coding

#13

Post by cm2187 »

Crito wrote: post #9
purpled_haze wrote: post #6

I have daughters and was not able to get them interested in any computer unless it involves games or social media. But the boys they hang out with are the same way- games only, for the most part. While I played a lot of games on my computer as a youth, I also spent a lot of time trying to program games. Today, I'm a developer. Because of kids' fascination with their phones and tablets, and because programming isn't a…

Over the course of the next century programming will become a blue collar profession. Children who develop an interest in programming will become about as common as children who are interested in tablesaws or cutting torches.

Programming is more akin to engineering than factory working. Languages are getting simpler and more powerful but programs are getting more complex. 15 years ago a typical developper didn't need to worry about multithreading, connectivity or security. It's fundamentally an intellectual job and will remain.

Re: 1984 – When women stopped coding

#14

Post by facepalm »

I don't believe this narrative of "it's because home computers were marketed only to boys". At least, I would like to see some more evidence for it.

It seems more likely to me that the story starts sooner, there must have been a reason why computers were marketed to boys. Maybe the first home computers were considered part of the electronics hacking scene (radio shack and what not), and that was already more popular with boys? How many women went to the Homebrew computer club were people were trying to create their own computer before you could just buy them off the shelves (people like Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak)?

Maybe girls saw home computers and didn't like them.

I don't know - but neither do the tellers of the "marketing is at fault" narrative.

Re: 1984 – When women stopped coding

#17

Post by jessaustin »

The share of women in computer science started falling at roughly the same moment when personal computers started showing up in U.S. homes in significant numbers... And these... were marketed almost entirely to men and boys.

Great, another travesty for which we have marketing to thank.

Re: 1984 – When women stopped coding

#18

Post by douche »

Crito wrote: post #9
purpled_haze wrote: post #6

I have daughters and was not able to get them interested in any computer unless it involves games or social media. But the boys they hang out with are the same way- games only, for the most part. While I played a lot of games on my computer as a youth, I also spent a lot of time trying to program games. Today, I'm a developer. Because of kids' fascination with their phones and tablets, and because programming isn't a…

Over the course of the next century programming will become a blue collar profession. Children who develop an interest in programming will become about as common as children who are interested in tablesaws or cutting torches.

I'm trying to parse this statement, and what I'm getting is that there is going to be a lot more programmers, and they are going to be overwhelmingly more male than they already are (is that a thing that is possible?).

Little boys love power tools and fire.

Re: 1984 – When women stopped coding

#19

Post by userium »

purpled_haze wrote: post #6

I have daughters and was not able to get them interested in any computer unless it involves games or social media. But the boys they hang out with are the same way- games only, for the most part. While I played a lot of games on my computer as a youth, I also spent a lot of time trying to program games. Today, I'm a developer. Because of kids' fascination with their phones and tablets, and because programming isn't a…

Also, after getting girls interested in programming, one of the problems is how to keep them in tech. Currently, over 40% of women leave tech mid-career, which is more than double the quit rate for men (https://keepwomen.com/info/aboutus).

Re: 1984 – When women stopped coding

#20

Post by saint-loup »

purpled_haze wrote: post #6

I have daughters and was not able to get them interested in any computer unless it involves games or social media. But the boys they hang out with are the same way- games only, for the most part. While I played a lot of games on my computer as a youth, I also spent a lot of time trying to program games. Today, I'm a developer. Because of kids' fascination with their phones and tablets, and because programming isn't a…

Maybe they're just not into it. Maybe that's perfectly fine for a child no to grokk what his parent likes.
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