Women! You too can be 'cool' and 'fun' if you work in tech!

The kiss of death

Having an EU bureaucrat extolling the virtues of something is surely the simplest way to turn most people off it.

Let's face it, most people are NOT COOL - just watch them dance if you need proof. Most people don't even try to kid themselves they are cool and the ones who do usually end up worse off than if they'd done nothing to "improve" in that area. So why should "cool" be considered an attractive or aspirational property?

The basic issue is that thinking has been demonised. Most of the publications (both printed and web) place far more importance on appearance than content and most newspapers tabloids never have a good adjective to say about anyone who demonstrates an IQ over 100. TV follows the same path: with the most popular programmes and channels being the least intellectually stimulating.

What we (in IT) need is the sort of publicity that sport has got. Even if most people are still couch potatoes and only ever exercise their channel-changing finger, they do still talk about and show an interest in physical activities. If you want to motivate people, a sporty role model is often the way forward. The question is: how do you get abstract, intangible ideas to become sexy? How do you make theoretical analysis interesting? How is it possible to persuade "the man in the street" to talk about philosophy, mathematics or op-codes when he's in the pub?

Maybe those are the issues Neelie Kroes could work on, once he's solved the gender inequalities of IT

Missed the point?

Why are the EU trying to make out that ICT is a 'cool' industry? Most of the time it definitely isn't.

Sitting and staring at a screen for 10 hours trying to find the misplaced period in your code is as far from cool as you can get.

What it can be is fun, yes but more realistically it is more often interesting, its challenging, and can be well paid (but it isn't as well paid as it used to be).

Why aren't they promoting it on its actual strengths? Rather than trying to make out that women only go into jobs if they're fun or cool?

Woman's view point

What does El Reg's very own Ms Stob make of this?

Sorry petal...

... the cool and fun bit bolted a while back.

You should've been quicker, luv.

Rather than trying to get more women into ICT, can't they try and get more talented people regardless of gender? There are far too many people coasting along and dragging teams down

I can't help but think that if ladies like the above really did work in IT, the only thing they'd attract is more blokes.

"The study reckons that if women held digital jobs as frequently as men, EU GDP would be boosted by around €9bn a year."

Bullshit.

If the split was 50/50 there would still be the same number of jobs, just less held by men, therefor the amount of money made would remain the same. Or are they saying that people are willing to pay more for software written by someone with a pair of tits? If they are I can point out several male devs around me that should be on a higher hourly charge out rate.

Europe is facing a shortage of ICT workers

Brid-Aine, if it’s anything like most of North America, Europe is facing a shortage of ICT workers at current salaries would be more accurate.

"Give coding a try, see how fun it can be!"

If steelie thinks coding is fun, I'm not going to one of her fun weekends!

But when you introduce women into the office, I can't swear, fart, belch, shout, etc....

So no keep them out, unless they are not the sweet princess type! A woman that knows how to handle a screw driver is my type of girl. Legs to the their false eye lashes and 25mm thick makeup we don't want.

I love the way...

That that have reduced the whole of the ICT to sector to "coding apps".

Fucktards.

Last thing you want to do...

...is to encourage anyone to get a job in IT. Shit managers, shit hours, under paid, under appreciated, over worked, crappy bean counters who won't invest, crappy users, crappy suppliers, crappy software, danger of being outsourced ; the list goes on.

After 23 years working in IT as a developer and as an IT manager for the last 3 years I'm thoroughly pissed off with it and regret the day when I was a teenager I decided my career was to work in IT. Damn the BBC's Computer Literacy Project in the 80s.

I'm so trying to encourage my son to head into almost any other career.