Web Start Women

Super-classy handling of the Sqoot debacle by Cloudmine!

Some unfortunate events occurred during the afternoon, related to some very poor and offensive wording in the flyer for an event that we were sponsoring. A short summary of what happened:

An event posting for the Boston API Jam was created containing clearly sexist language. We were listed as a sponsor of the event at the time.

The sexism in the event details was pointed out to us by many followers on Twitter (special thanks to @coolaunterin!)

Before the flyer was posted, we were unaware of the specific wording that was going to be used in the flyer.

We, and other companies, pulled our sponsorships from the event.

All of us at CloudMine agreed that this type of language is not acceptable, and we made an effort to contact the organizers of the event to get this changed as quickly as possible. Sexism in tech is a serious problem. Events like what happened today are, unfortunately, not uncommon. Catering exclusively to men in a sexist manner in your marketing materials is not only wrong, but it undermines those trying to make real progress. It hurts everyone when something like this happens—it can make women feel like outsiders in their own field, and it normalizes this type of behavior as okay (which it absolutely never is, even if there was no intention to hurt).

Having said that, we sincerely apologize for any offense that was caused. We never would have posted something like that, and do not endorse anyone who does.

Since we are no longer sponsoring this event, we now have extra funding to sponsor a different event which is more aligned with our views. We love hackathons—our company born at one—and we’d like to put this money to good use at an event that will bring all hackers (women and men alike!) together. Give us your suggestions in the comments or on Twitter (@CloudMine).

philadelphia Philly fail programming women women programmers sexism sqoot

March 20, 2012

Coding is love

Have you heard that Kaitlyn Trigger learned how to code so she could make a special Instagram filter for her boyfriend, Instagram co-founder Mike Krieger, as a Valentine?

The Lovestagram About page is so. Sweet. It. Hurts.

We also totally agree with Tech Crunch’s Alexia Tsotsis:

“The best V-Day gift of coding skills you can give, is the V-Day gift of coding skills you give to yourself.”

Instagram Lovestagram awesome code women women programmers love Valentine Valentine's Day learn programming

February 9, 2012

Wanted: A few nerdy women

As we get the ball rolling in Boston and continue to grow in Philadelphia, we’re looking for instructors who love geeking out on web development as much as we do.

If you have the knowledge and the confidence to lead a group of smart, determined women on any of the following topics, we should talk!

HTML / CSS
JavaScript / jQuery
PHP / MySQL
Ajax
Photoshop
Git
WordPress
Drupal
Graphic Design
Business (as it pertains to the web, ‘course :-)

Many of the courses already have curriculum created, so your job is just to come in and teach it. For an example of our material, check out the notes from our first class in the HTML/CSS series. Other topics have not been run yet, and you’ll have the opportunity to help us develop that material (compensation will be higher).

Class commitments are usually a couple hours, one night a week or occasionally a half an afternoon on a weekend.

If this sounds like fun to you, send us some information about yourself and your background to instructors@webstartwomen.com.

And, if you don’t fit the description above, but you know a woman who does, please let her know! The more talented, awesome instructors we can find, the more classes we can run, and the quicker more women can start coding their ideas into reality. :-)

http://webstartwomen.com/gigs

October 3, 2011