Nice piece yesterday in the Sunday Times showing how the internet is no longer just the place for spotty male geeks to gather. Not that that stereotype is necessarily warranted, but check out how Libby Purves referred to my blog a few months back!!!
The Pew Internet Project in the US recently found 35% of girls compared with 20% of boys have their own blogs, and 70% of girls aged 15-17 have embraced social networking and built their own page on Bebo or MySpace compared with 57% of boys.
Hitwise backed this up in in January, reporting that 55% of UK social networkers are women too.
The upshot of Kate Spicer and Abul Taher’s piece is summed up nicely by their main subject, a 12-year-old girl from Surrey who spends much of her time one her PC doing homework but also gossiping with friends on Bebo or Facebook.
When asked if she’d want a career in software development in order to create such experiences in the future she replied:
“Girls are creative, they are more into history, English and art – it’s the boys who are more into the techie things!”
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I have to comment on the ratio of boys to girls who use the internet to gossip. A new site called GossipReport.com allows users to anonymously gossip about anyone – and the gender ratio is split right about down the middle. Boys use the site just as much as girls. They both – I agree – use the internet and sites like GossipReport to collect information about others – and in this case – to share information. Let’s make sure to give credit where it’s due – girls are clearly getting more involved – but boys are enjoying it just as much! It’s all very reflective of what sociologists will tell you – boys and girls gossip equally in the real world – it makes sense that the same would be true for online gossiping.