Girls vs. Boys
Finally, an article about something I’ve suspected for ages:
Significantly more girls blog and create or work on their own webpages than boys.
Apparently, boys are more likely to post video (in theory to impress others) but girls are more likely to own and operate a website. I feel like I’ve definitely seen this personally in the years that I’ve had a website. I always find it intriguing to find a personal blog operated by a guy. I mean, sure, tons of guys run websites and tons of guys blog, but I feel like a lot of them are tech blogs or gadget blogs or portfolios, not personal websites.
The gallery over at Perfection reflects this phenomenon. We have a few standout sites by guys (neonglow.net comes to mind) but the vast majority of websites featured there are managed by girls.
The only real complaint I have regarding this article (other than citing a 13-year-old who says making “glitters” for MySpace is, and I quote, “really hard”) is that they extrapolate this into majoring in computer science. Working with HTML and CSS is not computer science, it is web development. Computer science is programming. Languages like C# and Java.
I mean, I was one of those 14-year-old girls at one point! I did not major in computer science, but I did major in web design and I now work as a web developer. I’m not saying that some of them don’t go on to major in computer science, but you’d think the logical next step is web development – that’s what they’re doing anyway! Just weird. It’s like comparing apples to oranges.
What do you think? Have you noticed this too, or am I just missing all the well-written blogs by guys out there?
4 Comments
No, I think you’re right. I’m into surfing the web, and occasionally offering up my comments. I no longer have the time, nor energy, for blogging or development or site maintenance any more. I think that there are a few guys that stand out, but the field now days is mostly women.
I’ve noticed that. Most of the male bloggers I see nowadays are tech blogs and gadget blogs too. Perhaps it’s because girls are much more comfortable with being “personal” on a website than guys are?
I can’t speak for all guys, nor probably most geeky guys, but I get far more pleasure from coding a blog engine than writing one. I guess most male bloggers tend to blog about a narrow and specific subject range, hence for a guy to blog he needs to be quite passionate about something. Whereas I think women take a more holistic approach to their blogs.
Boys are all robots; blogs are basically e-gossip and only girls can do that!
For the record, my boyfriend only blogs because I beat him with a cane every night. (Joke.)