Ask HN: Why were there so few women at Startup School? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Why were there so few women at Startup School?

#21

Post by KMinshew » Tue, Oct 23, 2012, 3:59 PM UTC

truebecomefalse wrote: post #3

Has anyone considered that women just aren't as interested in tech entrepreneurship as men are?

Totally agree with matthewowen's comment above. Also, as a woman in tech, I hear all the time that "women just aren't as interested in computer science as men are," yet in my experience that's not at all the case. In India (where CS is not seen as something that predominantly boys do) 55% of CS degrees go to women. In the 1960s people said, "women just aren't as good at playing instruments as men because they don't have the lung power;" when blind auditions were introduced the number of women accepted into major orchestras tripled overnight. There are a lot of examples of people assuming women "just aren't interested" and that changing very rapidly when cultural barriers and discrimination is removed.

Re: Ask HN: Why were there so few women at Startup School?

#22

Post by marquis » Tue, Oct 23, 2012, 5:58 PM UTC

xoail wrote: post #16

Women in general take less risk than men. Women in programming/hacking are far less compared to men. Women who are married/with children find it hard to get themselves around startup scene. I do not have any source to back all that, just my personal view. I see things are changing and see more women in hackathons, programming meetups etc. But it will take at least a decade to bring balance.

>I do not have any source to back all that, just my personal view

Your view is welcome but please take care with comments such as 'women in general take less risk than men'. The second statement you make may be a fact but your first statement comes across as a cause for this fact, and there is no data that suggests this. My personal experience, as a woman, would be quite the opposite: women make more risks than men. Would that because of my gender bias and who I spend time with talking about such things as risk, on a deep enough level to for to consider it substantial? Quite probably, which is why I would never make such a statement to back up a fact.

Re: Ask HN: Why were there so few women at Startup School?

#23

Post by jlees » Wed, Oct 24, 2012, 8:27 PM UTC

jwise0 wrote: post #18

I was there, and the #1 thing I noticed was that of 11 presenters, exactly one was a woman; and of the CEOs telling stories, zero were women. It was, uh, not exactly an experience full of female role models. The 'fewer than one in ten' ratio may be true of startups in general, but the way to balance out the gender divide is to provide more role models, not to magnify the status quo: I was pretty unhappy to see such a…

I wasn't offended by ben's shirt - I thought he had the best presentation of the day, and content outweighs slogans.

The issue with role models is a great point though. But how to fix? If there are no female YC alumni with great stories about working all nighters, how to get someone on stage without risking positive selection?

Re: Ask HN: Why were there so few women at Startup School?

#24

Post by jlees » Wed, Oct 24, 2012, 8:29 PM UTC

truebecomefalse wrote: post #3

Has anyone considered that women just aren't as interested in tech entrepreneurship as men are?

It's an intersection of (people interested in tech) & (people interested in entrepreneurship), both are male dominant though one could argue for a close to equal balance in the latter if you consider any side business entrepreneurship - many women silently start lifestyle businesses and never get recognition for doing so the way rockstar CEOs do.

Thinking about it YC's focus on hacker-founders adds another % into the mix too, the percentage of women programmers - I think it's simply math, multiply through and you get the absurd weighting seen at SUS.

Re: Ask HN: Why were there so few women at Startup School?

#25

Post by HelenaP » Thu, Oct 25, 2012, 9:40 PM UTC

We have a chance to change that! This is a shout-out to all the women out there who are working on startups-- apply to YC!!

Re: Ask HN: Why were there so few women at Startup School?

#26

Post by perfectbeauty » Thu, Oct 25, 2012, 11:04 PM UTC

truebecomefalse wrote: post #3

Has anyone considered that women just aren't as interested in tech entrepreneurship as men are?

i highly disagree that women aren't "as interested". I, myself with many of my girlfriends, read techcrunch, hackernews, pandodaily, etc. consistently and find us fascinated with this information. However, it's hard to "fit in" with a group of hacker guys. It's like writing with your left hand if you're right handed. Is it doable? yes. but everything feels more awkward and uncomfortable because the community isn't what you're used to. i'm not sure what it's going to take for women to feel more welcome, but understand, that women control more than 1/2 of the purse strings in families, are the social media addicts, and generally like to shop. if you don't create products that cater towards this population, you are missing out on a great market.

but it's not different from being a minority in any other situation. you're going to have to work twice as hard to prove yourself, and there's going to be twice as much pressure to be that 'role model' for others.