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Women Buy More Tech Than Men
Computerguy5 writes "According to a Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) study, released at this past Consumer Electronics Show (CES), women accounted for $55 billion of the $96 billion dollar market. 40 percent of women surveyed responded that they were treated better when accompanied by a man. CNN reports on the findings."
Yeah, but those electronics usually involve the settings: Slow, Medium, and Fast! :D
Men earn money, women spend it.
If I didn't have a woman to remind me, I wouldn't even remember to buy food!
Men use duct tape, thus extending the life of certain pieces of equipment that thus don't require replacing...
Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
I'm sure that there must be SOME link between the headline and the article... but I'm buggered if I can see what it is.
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PGP Key ID 0xCB8FF658
that tells me that the men are finding the better deals.
I see women buy technology all of the time. Most of the time, they're not sure what it does, so they buy it anyway. I could see a lot of women walking into compusa and buying somthing they absolutely have no use for.
In other news woman talk about their feelings more then men and men watch more football then woman.
Oh and the sky is blue. News at 11.
http://saveie6.com/
If you have not done so yet, get a woman in your product design team.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Tech salespeople would rather sell to a man than a woman because women don't go all glassy eyed and impressionable around bright, shiny things.
"Academicians are more likely to share each other's toothbrush than each other's nomenclature."
Cohen
What /.ers consider "Tech" is a small subset of "Consumer Electronics"
then why the crap can't I find more geeks to date?!?
But don't women buy more than men in general? So this isn't too surprising...
This doesn't make any sense. Yes, the store clerk may think the man is a Geek but as we all know - geeks have no significant others.
Therfore I conclude that many women take their BROTHERS to the stores to get better service.
Wierd huh?
I refuse to believed this. I go to Radio Shack fairly often and you rarely see any women in the shops.
I think there is an agenda behind this "Report",
Help fight continental drift.
One more reason to start looking for a girl friend, and pretty soooooon too...
I don't buy a ton of tech stuff - but I have it. Gifts, building my own stuff, whatever. My fiancee buys a lot, though - laptop, PDA, camera, etc.
Her sister walked into Best Buy and despite my specific instructions, let the salesguy talk her into a much worse digital camera for $100 more. On another occasion, she was talked into a TV tuner card and a "special cable" that she couldn't use without an additional upgrade from her old video card... I wouldn't be surprised if she ended up buying Mac software for her Windows XP box.
It's not just tech, either - lots of women are conned at car dealerships or other sales places. Even if she's smart - she's probably too trusting.
The article is unclear as to whether the tech bought by women is for themselves or their families (husbands/sons).
.. and then says that Sharp now has 50% market share. But, how do we know there is a connection? ..How much of the market share gain do they attribute to the AQUOS line and/or female oriented advertising?
here's a quote:
"women are involved in almost 75 percent of all electronics purchases, and they are increasingly interested in gadgets, from DVD players to digital cameras, for themselves or their families, according to the survey, which was based on telephone interviews with 1,002 U.S. adults in October and done in association with the independent market research firm Rockbridge Associates Inc. "
Involved in purchases?? What's the percent of men? For themselves or their families? What percent do they buy for themselves?
Only thing I conclude from the article is that women pay more for tech. Yes, they purchase more technology. But is the tech they buy is for their husbands and/or sons?
Also there's a part that talks about how Sharp introduced a women oriented product (AQUOS)
Stereotypes exist in the whole product world. Ladies and Gents watches for example. Now, will the 12" powerbook be a ladies one and 15" a male one? Does size matter to make a tech product female or male like it does in watches? The whole notion is bullshit, but equality is a political idea. I mean there is a difference between female and male pants.
They were all gifts for men.
Nearly three-quarters of women surveyed by the industry group complained about being ignored, patronized or offended by sales people when shopping for electronics.
At least the sales staff a Fry's Electronics don't discriminate; they'll ignore you reguardless of your gender :)
Hon, can you go to the shop and pick me up *insert gadget/techno babble here*
0110100100100000011000010110110100100000011000100
we DO spend more time shopping and finding sales [/gross generalization]... and buying technology isn't like buying cars... it's not like there's a lot of haggling going on, so I'd think it's fair to say they'd get the same bang for their buck. I don't walk out of best buy feeling cheated, although I have experienced the "oh, you're a girl, you don't know what it MEANS when I say 4.2 GHz or DDR or anything FANCY like that... here let me show you the pretty PURPLE computer..." phenomenon. Trick is... ignore the sales-people, or bring a male for decoy-work.
This might be a surprise to those here but sometimes girls will buy stuff for guys.
A guy who buys a girl an electronic gift is being "insensitive".
A girl who buys a guy an electronic gift is a total babe.
So maybe all that extra spending is just gifts.
According to the article, 57% of tech shoppers are women, but only 1% of women perceive tech marketing executives as having them in mind. Skillfully using calculation, I've reasoned that if marketers actually start having women in mind, and drive 50% of the female population to think they do, then 50 times as many women will buy tech goodies, and hence they will make up 93% of the market. MoE: +-93%. But more realistically, my point is that which ever ad exec starts really playing with this market some is going to find it extremely profitable, given that it seems to have been ignored and yet still buys tons.
Just because they sell "personal" massagers at The Sharper Image, that doesn't make them tech.
Yes when it is the ibrator
It's possible that a large percentage of the disparity could be accounted for by the gifts that we buy for each other. We're buying them jewlery, they're buying us MP3 players...
Most of them are actually engineer by Women believe it or not! Unlike many other inventions that women wear sucha s: The High heeled shoe - invented by men for women to be tortured by! The Pushup Bra - invented by men so women would have nicely "pushed up" boobs! etc. etc
----START SIG---- It is better to know that you have lost than to not know that you have won! ----END SIG----
As a consequence Lego will now ditch the silly little colored blocks and design more Adult like products. Inflatable dolls for dad and longer more sturdy colored artifacts for mom.
Help fight continental drift.
57% is hardly a major statistic? And tech shops havnt got to the same point as clothes stores where they have special areas for us guys to sit and stare into space in peace. :P
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
Women probably buy more cell phones than men; and I'm sure that cell phones make up a large portion of the tech market.
40 percent of women surveyed responded that they were treated better when accompanied by a man./em?
I have a classic household. I earn the dough, she runs the house. We work together with the kids (now 18 and 16). We are both happy with this arrangement. I am a geek - Linux, Windows, C, Java, that is my territory. She runs the house - including plumbing, electricity, and all that it takes to make the house work. We have had extensions to the house - we agree it, she gets the contractors to do it, I pay. All fine.
Except, will the contractors, or any workman we call in, listen to her? Will pigs fly? Over and over again I have to relay *her* orders to the contractors - because they won't obey a female voice. It makes my blood boil, over and over again, when I have to phone some stupid contractor to tell him, in a bass voice, what my wife has told him contralto, and been ignored.
OK, our household is eccenrtic (for a lot more than is in this post). But WTF cannot contractors respect the pover of the the chequebook (checkbook) and DO WHAT THEY ARE PAID FOR!
Consciousness is an illusion caused by an excess of self consciousness.
People tend to be pretty sensitive about their purchasing experiences when shopping. With cars, there are usually a lot of competitors within easy driving range. If a woman feels peeved that she's not being properly treated, she simply won't shop at that store. The free market should take care of things, to be honest.
I'm not married, but I suspect that if I was and was talking to a furniture salesman at an interior furnishings store with my wife, the wife is more likely to be addressed by default. I suspect the salesman would end up speaking more to whoever is asking more questions, in the end. I don't find the concept of this particularly offensive or irritating.
My guess about the feature list: as Slashdotters love to note about tech items, many technology products have bullet points and specs listed that are not particularly useful in actually judging the limitations and capabilities of the product. For some reason, some quirk of the male and female psyche, I rarely see females proudly enumerating, showing off products to their friends based on bullet points. I *do* see guys doing this. Hence, different bullet points being handed to the men. It's just something that the salesman (or -woman, given the context of this article) hopes will sell an item more effectively.
May we never see th
I make my GF buy all my tech stuff, not like I buy much of it though, just because I hate taking stuff back to the shop evan if its broken, where as girls generally don't care about taking stuff back and getting refunds/exchanges ect.
I few years ago my fiance was shopping for a new computer, which she wanted to buy from Dell. I told her that she shouldn't buy a P4 because the performance advatage was minimal and the Rumbus ram was expensive.
She bought the p4 anyway, because it came in black.
I actually know quite a few gadget girls. But I've yet to find one who could link up their GP32 with mine.
OMFG. YOU FAILS IT HARD.
If you ask the quality compared to the quantity from man and woman, you'd get a big difference. I'll bet a large chunk of the stuff women buy is crap due to lack of knowledge. Might sound sexist, but it's true. Men will do more research just out of interest.
ogg
Black cat, searing pain, flames...? I must be in Heaven! - Homer Simpson
Well of course, Women buy all sorts of vibrators and assorted love toys... :)
i think it's true that women buy more than men.
personally (male) before i put my money down for anything, i need to think over and over again, because i just read on Slashdot that version 2 of xx is coming out soon etc etc.. so with all these sources of information, i usually end up buying nothing.
my wish list so far:
1. PDA (palm or PPC? WiFi, CF, SD...?)
2. DVD-Writer (which brand? how fast?)
3. Mini PC (get 400MHZ FSB or wait for 433)?
4. LCD (15" or 17", what response time, what res?)
5. CPU (AMD or Intel? 32bit or 64Bit? 128K or 256K cache?)
6. CPU Fan (80mm or 120mm?)
the list can go on, and i haven't bought any of the above yet, although the list started about 2 years ago.
"Nearly three-quarters of women surveyed by the industry group complained about being ignored, patronized or offended by sales people when shopping for electronics."
Probably three-quarters of men would complain about the same thing.
"40 percent of women surveyed responded that they were treated better when accompanied by a man."
Does that mean that 60 percent were treated better when they weren't accompanied by a man?
sig's not here
Well isn't that some sad, stereotyped shit(?) According to the article, women complained about being patronized in tech stores. But what the hell kind of image of women do the tech manufacturers have?
1. "Well, these 'women' are always in the kitchen, right?!"
2. "True dat, so why not refit our gadgets so they match kitchen cabinets and stuff!"
3. "We've got it! Profit!"
What's the word I'm looking for
668.5
So in a few hours im going to post how many fucking times the word 'vibrator' came up.
men buy more jewlery. Go figure ;-P
My other Beowulf cluster is... er...
good for me to POOP on! AHAHAHAHAHA!
I've just had a quick scan through the initial (100 or so) responses to this story. It seems there is little variation between the responses; most of them fall into one of the following categories:
None of these responses really makes any serious attempt to address the issues behind the story. Instead, they appear to regard the story as an attack on their technical savvy, and by association an attack on their manliness. This may explain why so many responses proceed to trash either the figures quoted, or women themselves. Is it any wonder why so many men on /. complain about not getting laid?
Tubal-Cain smokes the white owl.
I for one welcome our new techie Amazonian overlords!
Interestingly I am often treated better when with a woman.
More women approach me when I am out with some friends who are girls.
Whether it is at the pub, or shopping.
I think one reason is that girls are less afraid, and guys are attracted to the women.
As for women being treated better with a guy, probably something similar is happening. For some reason couples are just treated better.
Or it could be that the people serving hate women. Or women are worse customers to the servers. Or all of these reasons and more.
People treat me a lot better when I don't have a beard too.
The world is a strange place. Lick a mirror with your tongue.
Lameness filter text.
Maybe some geek chic picked up about 5 Cray YMPs fully loaded for their original list price, along with service contracts.
Wow, look at all the flamebait here - Could use up all my mod points on flamebait alone!!!
We have a saying around here, stolen from the movie 'The Boiler Room'... and that is Don't Pitch the Bitch.
Crude, but women are such a fucking hassle when you're trying to sell stuff at a higher price than they think its worth. Men are a lot easier to cajole, and don't keep throwing up concerns or calling you every day to see why you didn't do what you promised yet. Men are definitely a lot easier to scam.
exactly here. You must be new here...
There is a very old asumption that wemen are just less technical than men. They can't do computers and can't repair cars. They shouldn't be allowed to vote etc.
The world didn't end when wemen got the vote.
My sister is a trainned automtive macanic.
And.. this.
The simple truth is wemen are held back artifically by certen addatudes. When they attempt to get a class in computer programming or get involved in anything technical someone is there to crush the girls youthful enthuseasum.
iPOD or iPAQ?
My DVD player, TV set and stero system is all called "My Linux workstation".
An iPOD produces suppereor sound than your avrage PDA but when your on the go you just won't hear the quality becouse of all the other noise. Anyway once you have your PDA/CellPhone combo why fork it over for an iPOD?
A woman will know this as much as a man would but after a woman is denied the technical experence she may be a bit shy of shelling out for a PDA to turn it into a cell phone and MP3 player.
So a woman may take the "safer" route of buying consummer devices not becouse she couldn't do it the "hard way" but becouse she's been made to be unsure of herself.
However it is at least encurraging that they are sure enough to buy consummer devices.
Eather they aren't being harrassed as much when they express an intrest in technology or they are more resillent to the nonsense.
I'd hope this means at some point they'll get as much chance as men. Or am I being optomistic?
PS. It won't matter there still won't be enough 30 year old geek girls to sute me.
I don't actually exist.
One way of stopping them putting in for tenders is to stipulate: no black keyboards ;)
Is that I am more of a tech nerd than 95% of the guys I know, and every time I walk into a computer store, jiffy lube, or hardware store, the people there treat me like a slobbering 2 year old.
I swear this conversation happened about 3 weeks ago:
[sales rep-tile] "Can I help you?"
[me] "Nah, I'm just looking for a network card."
[sales rep-tile] "This is a good one, and we can put it in for you."
[me] "Oh, I'll just put it in myself."
[sales rep-tile] "Now sweetheart that's very complicated, are you sure you should try that?"
Sometimes it's difficult to refrain from telling them to kiss my ass.
- Kate
"DNA is life. The rest is just translation."
real men use Yoda dolls instead. I'm actually sitting on one at the moment...
Its also full of electronic gadgets from microwaves, TV, DVD, Video, Sat, ovens, washing machine/dryers, dishwasher, burglar alarms, WIFI/cable, dimmers, coffee/tea makers, breadmaker, mixers, fridge, freezer, printers, blenders, grillers, icemakers, water coolers, games consoles and air-con.
Now we geeks may think that after spending 5 hours evaluating various models of MP3 players before we make out informed decision that we are kings of technology: think again. In sheer tonnage the wife's purchasing decisions in electronics (or rather stuff that uses electricity) easily outweighs and out-costs the few gadgets we get left to decide to buy. We're just the grunt labour who have to cart this stuff home and install it and truthfully being a geek, I prefer to work out how to install something that someone else has bought as the shopping side of things can burn you out.
Nuff said as I still have to adjust declination on sat-dish as its not tracking all the arc right and still haven't replaced the soap dispenser on the dishwasher and the SCART switcher has lost audio on one socket. Labour saving ? A husband's work is never finished !
but who buys more sex toys?
Women suck cock.
Anything that is more than twice as powerful as what you could get for the same money three years ago. Alternatively, anything that costs less than half what it did three years ago.
WARNING: there is a trojan on your
all those dildos they buy up
Umitigated drivel....
As an avid consumer of all technology, the one thing I find in life is that I don't have to compete with persons of the female gender to purchase my goods.
I have to fight tooth and nail to get the next piece of of wireless, game playing, media streaming, home cinema, media center technology into the house. How do I get it in - color coordinate it with the furniture.....
Who does this research... Are there the same percentage of comments on this page. Is the web flooded with females (apart from chat!) No no and no.
Women like to see things physically before they buy them. It's been a big thing with online shopping the past few years. Women have just recently started to outnumber men in ecommerce sales. I don't know about the stuff you buy, but I can normally find a better deal online from places like NewEgg than at the friendly, local Best Buy.
bring back gaotse.cx sign it at www.petitiononline.com
The men have already bought all of their toys.
My step-father on the other hand, can't change a light globe and when asked by my mother for a Hammer Drill for her birthday, didn't know what one was and I haven't taught him how to use the memories or key-lock on his mobile phone because its too complicated for him.
That said, my father makes an excellent salesman, whereas my mother (when she tried it) was average at it.
Sometimes people don't fit into the stereotypes - sometimes they do - stereotypes can make things easier (the first question asked when getting presents for children is "boy or girl?") but also limit the options you have.
I wonder if the the fact that some women have problems dealing with technology sales people is because most of them are male, and are typically used to dealing with males in technology areas. This is changing, but it won't happen immediately. The stereotypes may be plain wrong, but still take a while to change.
The submitter must be young. Anyone with *experience* knows that pouring fuel on the gender wars is like throwing a bucket of gasoline on a campfire
SB
It's old. The more humans I meet, the more I like my cats. At least they are honest.
"TVs in a kitchen"..."CD players for the kitchen"...GAHHHHH
My tech purchases have to be approved by my wife, who does the accounting in the family. Most of our tech purchases in the last year have been initiated by her anyway, or had to be approved by her... So I'd agree with this information in my personal experience. :-)
Holy moly is this place awfully sexist or what?
Don't get me wrong. I have a sense of humour, and I enjoy jokes about the stereotypes that are associated with men AND women, but I'm suprised at how unsympathetic most people posting here are.
When my girlfriend goes out and gets treated poorly at a computer or electronics store, it pisses both of us off. It's totally unreasonable. We both make a living as programmers, but she's the one with the Master's degree in CS, while I have a lowly Bachelor's. There's no reason to treat us differently. She knows as much as I do. (More, obviously, given our educational differences.)
I've never really understood how people can put up with widespread sexism. These women are our wives, daughters, mothers and sisters. When they get treated poorly, I get angry about it. Don't any of you care that if/when you get a girlfriend, some retarded drone that works a low-paying retail job in some warehouse store thinks that he's so much better than the person that you've decided is a worthwhile human being that you like to spend time with that he's going to insult her intelligence?
C'mon. Stop with the 'go make me a sammich, beyotch!' jokes. They're an insult to men and women alike.
Or is she made of plastic?
With much respect.
I dunno, when it comes to buying new boxen, every (male) geek friend I know spend endless amounts of time (only online though) on research, comparisons, searching for deals, etc. Although the same goes for the, sadly few, geek women I know. But then, if I was offered a 4.2 GHz, that's an impulse buy right there ;)
668.5
the biggest issue isnt so much a stereotype... it's that the vast majority of women want nothing to do with cars and computer internals. In the same way men who know britney spears social life or who watch soap operas are also unexpected.
Cahnces are many ladies will assume i know nothing about lots of "pop-cutlture" stuff... and will be surprised if i do.
And most men who do techy jobs, tend not to see to many women with any degree of know-how above ctrl-alt-delete (sometimes even thats a stretch)
Not that any moron you be con-descedning... but if youve ever done half the support calls i have.... most women i help are far less prone to knowing where the run menu is... how to type into the command line.... etc...
Is it biast? partialy... is it right? no.... but is it understandable why someone might expect that you may not be inclined towards tech given their experience? You say 95% of the guys you know are less skilled at tech... but how many of them (percentage wise) wouldnt know what/where "run" is?
this is not to be confused with good customer service, the rule of thumb there is to let the customer show you how ignorant they are BEFORE you talk down to them.
--Idiots, Every single one of YOU, A flaming mass of conglomerated morons, hey wait a second, isnt that how RAID works?
Do they really know what their buying? Ducks.
;-)
But seriously, take my family. There is myself and my father who read computer related pulp and bits for hours a day. My sister knows how to turn on a computer and gets the basics, my mother is almost nerdy (in a tech fan sort of way) but *loves* to deffer to my "vast" knowlege. Women to some degree are perpetuating these stereotypes and men do seem to love the mechanical.
Is this news or hyperbole?
Quack, quack.
Statistics show that 94.52% of all surveys that do not give details on sample size and sampling methods are bogus. Trust me.
Women are the more substantive consumers over man. Who do you think they're buying the "tech" for?
A man wouldn't refrain.
There's your problem.
(Of course, if you want to be extra manly, pop 'em one in the jaw for insulting a lady. It is, after all, the chivalrous course of action in when faced with such discourtesy.)
Microsoft Windows is, fittingly, the official Desktop OS of Olig
Isn't that an antonym like "Military intelligence" or "Microsoft Works"?
Hate me!
Here is a clue, I have a Master's in Computational Physics and I spend a lot on tech gadgets and computers. Imagine that a 42 year old, little old lady who does something besides buy gadgets for her husband.
I have been so patronized in tech stores I do almost all my tech shopping online now.
"No I do not need a large LCD to draw pictures on, I need it to see physics simulations."
"No I don't need a pop-up blocker, I use Linux and OSX, I out grew Windows when it was on version 3.11"
"No I don't need your over priced warrenty, if it breaks I'll fix it myself."
If it is true that women do most of the spending on tech stuff, then I expect like me they are doing most of it online and these patronizing boys will before too long all be unemployeed.
Following this startling revelation, electronics stores in conjunction with hardware manufacturers responded by advertizing new special offers to their new target market majority:
- buy this CPU upgrade and receive 50% off any pair of shoes at Nine West;
- 20% off coupon at Babies R Us with the purchase of 100-pack of TDK DVD+Rs;
- FREE pedicure if you sign up for optional extended warranty service on all multimedia cards!
"But honey, I thought you needed this 1GB Sony memory stick for your computer! You always complain that it needs more memory... How do my nails look, by the way, guess how much I saved?"
It may be the other around but she takes the paycheck. At least this way my computer stays running AND I get food as needed.
Can you tell me of a better deal than getting someon else to pay for it?
It is insightful. Too bad I am not moderating.
Just goes to show they who posess the TECH are dammed,
Remember the Sliders episode ?
At issue here is that there are a large group of people that on occasion get at best dismissed and at worst harassed when buying tech products.
Ask me how many times a sales guy can't look me in the eye cause my tits are too distracting, or how many times my product choices are second guessed simply cause I'm wearing a skirt, and I then have to go and recite all the specs of the product from memory IN ADDITION to the competing products to prove that believe it or not, I'm not an impulse tech shopper and fully research and plan all of my purchases. (actually, I enjoy that part, cause the sales 'dudes' then shut up fast and realize they've been outclassed, hopefully learning it's bad sales strategy to have any preconceptions of their customers).
Also fortunate in this sense, bricks and mortars RARELY have the best prices and online stores have yet to discriminate in the least when I purchase all the tech products for my document imaging business and my personal armory of gadgets.
Motivational quote for the day: Try thinking of women as more than brainless bank account draining bimbos and maybe you'll find one that's not.
. . . but I can learn! Are they hiring?
My whole life is computers. I have been taking apart/breaking/tinkering with/programming computers since my father brought home a Commodore 64 all those years ago. It pisses me off to no end when some slick haired little sales moron assumes I know less about computers than my boyfriend, who doesn't even understand why he needs to keep up on the latest XP patches and wondered why his computer kept rebooting after leaving it on his school's network without patches or a firewall.
I finally got fed up years ago when, while browsing laptops, some sly salesguy looking for his commission paid more attention to the guy I was with, who was about to run over to the console games section and had no interest in computers, than me, the potential sale. He instead pointed me to the dayglo ibooks and wouldn't answer any of my questions, all while chatting it up with my friend about processors. I made it very clear to his manager that I was very ready to make a pretty large purchase at his store, but since his salespeople weren't willing to give me the time of day I'd be taking my business elsewhere. About a week later I faxed the store a copy of my invoice for a $3000 custom job, plus oodles of accessories and software. I got an apology and a ~$10 gift certificate about a month later. I gave the card to my dad and optioned not to return.
but the fact of the matter is that most of them don't know how to use it. Then they ask their boyfriends, husbands, or friends for help with them.
Dear Oprah, I do not know if this will get to you or not. I am not on this site to comment on guest or Moni. I simply need you help. I'm sure a lot of people are always writing you for financial help, and I am not sure this is even appropriate but I thought I would give it a try anyway because I know the type of person you are. I am a 41-year-old, black female who lives in Nashville, TN. I have recently been diagnosed with major depression, anxiety and agoraphobia. I have 3 children, ages 19, 14, and 10. My 19-year-old attends college at Fisk University on a scholarship. She is studying child psychology. My other children attend the metro schools. My husband is disabled from a back injury he received on the job. He is receiving Disability payments. Oprah my recent bout of depression, anxiety and agoraphobia have left me unable to do my job as a medical transcriptionist. For the past three months I have not been gainfully employed and my mortgage payments have fallen behind. My husband and I are buying a house in the Madison area of Nashville. Oprah I desperately need financial help to catch up on my mortgage payments. I have filed for Disability payments on behalf of my mental ailments, but I just recently applied and it takes probably about 4-6 months before the Social Security Disability people make a decision as to wether or not I am approved. In the meantime, I need to know that my family will not be out on the street and my house will not go into forclosure. We have been paying on our house for 13 years now and we would like to keep it. I have asked for assistance from various help agencies in our community, but have found not help yet. Oprah could you please find it in your heart to help my family financially (pay our mortgage payments) until I can get back on my feet (mentally) or hear from the Social Security Disability people. Thank you. May God Bless You. Sincerely, Angela Gaines: 1103, Gibson Dr. Madison, TN.: Phone 615-865-4719: e-mail address: againeseun@comcast.net.
No, I'm New Here
hmm, not sure.
well then, not interested.
How many women do you know who DON'T have a cell phone?
The term "outside the box" is squarely within the box at this point.
Gawd - I can't recall the last time that a Slashdot discussion has so little of value in the follow up posts.
Surely anyone in the tech business should be considering why the 50% of the population without testicles is treated so shabbily. I mean, even car dealers eventually figured that one out and ditched the "little woman" attitudes.
I take great pride in watching my wife in big box electronic stores, dealing with sales drones who obviously know significantly less than she does. And it's not because she's a super tech geek (sure, she can upgrade gear but mostly she just wants every new toy and gadget), it's because so many of those guys don't have friggin' clue and make their living by bullshitting the customer.
Think about it - if the retail electronics culture consistently insults female customers, it's likely that the same attitudes show up at the corporate level. How about we survey a few dozen female execs and see how often they've walked away from million dollar tech purchases because the sales guys treated them like Barbie.
Three Squirrels
Maybe, but keep in mind:
"Nobody I know voted for Nixon." --Pauline Kael
Although you haven't seen many women there, other stores may have more of them as customers.
Then again, maybe the statistics come from:
The message here is that you sell electronics to the entire family.
Good general sales/presentation rule: Play to your entire audience. If you make a joke about the old man with the funny shirt, he might be the only decision maker in the crowd. Ditto for talking over the wife. She might hold the purse strings. And the whip.
Irene KHAAAAAAN!
Go make me a sammich, beyotch! Stop posting on /.!!1 :)
Pretty soon men will be redundant, I believe protests are in order
If all these women are into tech stuff...Then WHERE THE HELL ARE THEY HIDING?!?!?!
Prevent email address forgery. Publish SPF records for y
Sounds the real problem is pinhead low-wage social maladroits who think they're tech gods because they fiddle around with with some PC. Hell, I'm a man, with an MIT C.S. degree, and I've gotten that crap--because I mentioned the "Mac" word, instantly branding me as a techno-incompetent by these fools' standards.
Of course my wife is a brilliant cold-hearted bitch who's a crisis counselor and a psych student. You should see her manipulate those kind of weak-minded fools; it's better entertainment than any reality TV. She gets what she wants, and they don't even have a clue what just happened--they think they just met a really nice girl and helped her out. hehe
By the way, she just asked me to say that the 90% of you here who can't get laid don't deserve to get laid. You can continue to self-service. Oh, and we're on our way upstairs right now...
Disclaimer: I am totally not sexist. In fact, I am very liberal and pro-womens (and everyones) rights.
But people who are uptight about things like this really irk me. There's a reason many stereotypes exist, and that's because they're mostly based around at least a portion of truth.
It is a statistical (and biological) fact that men are more inclined to be adept at technical things. This in *NO WAY* suggests that there aren't also many, many adept women as well. But going by numbers alone, given a male and a female, odds are much higher that the male is more technicly adept then the female.
The converse is also true. If I walk into the appliance department of Sears with my SO, guess who the salesman goes after? Not me, thats for sure. Same with other household amenities.
No, I don't get offended when the salesman approaches my SO instead of me. And I wouldn't be offended if they assumed I knew jack shit about it either, because they'd likely be right. Just like someone would likely be right assuming my SO knows jack shit about computers.
Truth is, most people *want* to be helped when purchasing this type of stuff. The salesman is just doing his job. Hell, half the salesmen in the PC sections treat me like a fool as well. Maybe because most PC buyers don't know anything about them?
People get offended too easily nowadays.
sex toys! Oh, baby!
I don't know about your house, but at mine, the woman buys all the gifts. Christmas, birthday, weddings, etc. And since I'm a geek, a lot of my friends are geeks, too. So tech stuff is a good bet when it comes to gifts. I imagine that women do BUY more tech, but I would like to see a survey on who USES more tech!
--If you don't test it, it won't work. Guaranteed.
It's a wonder you're still alive.
SB
It's old. The more humans I meet, the more I like my cats. At least they are honest.
You remind me of Tina the Brittle Tech Writer from Dilbert.
How is that "sterotyped shit", exactly? These are MARKET DRIVEN products. The marketers KNOW demographics. They have enough data and numbers to make your head spin.
And, apparently, Sony at least, has data that points to that "sterotyped shit" as the truth about the demographic.
I guess it never crossed your mind that, perhaps, that could actually be the demographic Sony wants to appeal to? No, of course not. You were too busy stomping on your soap box because you have too many poorly conceived notions and are overly sensitive of this sort of thing.
Alito: A vote for Alito is a punch in the eye to put that bitch back in her place!
All this tell us is that women are more likey to fill out those useless registration cards than men.
You know, for a second there, I thought I'd posted something without remembering it.
I conclude that we're not exactly business' ideal consumers (..he writes on an ancient company-borrowed IBM T21 [750 MHz PIII], because he has researched his new system for over two fricken months now when his old one died...)
What moving targets they are, those gadgets..
668.5
CEA study? I'm sure this analysis was unbiased and only considered opinions from appropriate participants. Plus, kdkgjdjig
Whoops, sorry, I got an orgasm while washing my hair.
The previous posters will not have any problem keeping a woman entertained.... although should they continously buy gifts that meet the afore mentioned speed settings... they may not keep them long.
You forgot sex slaves. Heel! Wpsssh!
Obviously those folks taking polls haven't been to MY house!
No matter where you go... there you are.
I'd say 100% of customers (male and female) at Fry's Electronics would report at least one of those responses from sales people.
Hmm, and I've had rude sales people at Radio Shack, Circuit City, Best Buy, and pretty much all of em. I'm sure that sales people are more likely to be patronizing to a woman buying technology - but I think the 75% mistreatment number is a bit of misleading hyperbole because it fails to account for the fact that low level retail sales is generally carried out by surly teens who hate their job.
[Set Cain on fire and steal his lute.]
Sometimes it's difficult to refrain from telling them to kiss my ass.
In the interests of finding out what people think, I'll not add my own opinion, but I encourage others to post a "yes" or "no" in response to this post.
And then I would encourage Kate to go out and act on this (or not act, depending on the results.) Just be careful and have a great come-back from Taming of the Shrew perpared if you get into any trouble.
~squidgyhead
Check out this Sample Size Calculator.
In a nutshell, for 150,000,000 you need a sample of about a 1000 people to get a representative result.
Three Squirrels
Damn. This is the best troll I've read in a while. Brilliant! I wish I had some points left to give you.
Maybe it's because Women usually give men electronic gifts and that they tend to shop more. For example I often ask my wife to buy me the gadget I want once i have throughly studied it online.
Maybe females should learn about the awesome powers of pricewatch.com and newegg.com, instead of buying those expensive Apple computers.
Men don't force woman to dress sexy, in fact
when were dating them we often prefer then
to dress down in public. Woman dress
sexily because they are competiting with other
woman for men attention, often male attention they
don't want.
I went in UE once, and after that, I vowed to never come back.
Why? The salesmen virtually stalked me. Everywhere I turned, some salesman would come up to me and say ``Can I help you?''. This happened about every 20 seconds. Perhaps less. The salesmen in the store outnumbered the customers by about three to one. From what I saw, they did this to both men and women in the store.
Quite frankly, I'd rather be ignored than harrassed.
I support the Center for Consumer Freedom
Don't just relay her orders. Tell the contractors to obey her orders without question or they're fired. Make certain that they know that the next time you have to tell them to do something she told them to do because they ignored her, they're gone.
If you have to keep relaying her orders then they'll keep on ignoring her and just keep listening to your relays.
I support the Center for Consumer Freedom
It's clear that more or less, you're an idiot. A sexist one at that. It would take too long to respond to the massive amount of drivel that you clearly spent a lot of time typing, but I will correct one particular point.
'Materialism' is a desire to have physical things - materials. 'Material' is derived from the latin 'materialis' (and the french 'materia') meaning 'stuff'. 'Mater' means 'mother'.
That's the problem with people like you. You never actually do your research, and are content to merely blather on mindlessly with no idea of what's actually going on.
I'll leave you and your misogeny alone now.
When I was younger, my Mom used to pay for all my tech stuff...
Much as it would be convenient, indeed fashionable, to believe that large numbers of women are being sexually discriminated against by retail stores I`ve yet to come across any evidence of that.
A number of women have posted, as well as some male partners, stating that they concur with the the content of the article. I find this strange as having been alive for a few decades and visited retail stores I have yet to see or hear any women being patronised or slighted.
In fact I would like to know where are all these women who are actually interested in technology ? In my own family _none_ of the female members have the slightest interest in the workings of computers, software, plasma TVs, camcorders, etc., etc., etc. . For whatever reason they just don`t care. When I studied computing at college again, few women were on the course - because most women just don`t seem to be interested in technology. At an ISP forum I visit regularly (for years), with around 8,000 members, the number of women I`ve seen post can be counted in single figures. While we can all drag up examples of women of are an exception to the norm (like some of the posters here) the simple fact is - most women are not interested in technology. So in the vein of the article _don`t_ patronise me with highly dubious claims of hoards of technology obsessed women being harshly dealt with.
Every era has its fashions in terms of what the populace finds acceptable in the way of discrimination and bigotry. At the moment it is acceptable to write puff pieces that inflate womens` egos, painting them as hard done but at the same time noble and heroic, while men are treated as a sort of sub-human species. This article is quite typical of the sort of thing we have come to expect from the "modern" (although _so_ old fashioned regarding the popularising of discrimination) media.
Let's face it. Most of the guys who work in stores like Best Buy or CompUsa are really not experts, but they desperately try to sound as if they are. So how do you behave when you're projecting a false persona? Often you become arrogant, and come across like a jerk.I think that's the real explanation for why the women reported being treated worse when they weren't shopping with men. If you're working at one of those places and know that you're not exactly an expert but are trying to conceal that fact, you sometimes will see a female shopper and think "AHA! Now THERE'S someone I can feel superior to." Of course, the irony is that 90% of the people who shop at electronics/computer/tech whatever stores aren't all that well informed either, no matter what gender they are. There was a place in Nashville where I went many times named-- maybe I'd better not name it. Oh, what the heck, they're closed now. Javanco. The people who worked there were the worst possible example of what I'm talking about. They loved to sound so superior and so arrogant (that was with the male customers. I can't tell you what they were like with the female customers because there weren't any. Now at the time, I was still suppressing my inner geek, so I would just stand there quietly with a geek boyfriend and look purty. :P It wasn't until a couple of years later that I learned the staff at Javanco almost never knew what they were talking about!! They'd learned a few things, and stretched them to sound like grand expertise, which they most definitely weren't.
Anyway. I think that's what's really behind it. I don't think it's actually pure sexism so much as the fear we all have of admitting our weaknesses, and our lack of knowledge. We go to great lengths to hide these things. Kinda sad.
MMMhmmm, perhaps you should take a look at that nearly 50 year long case of penile envy we so fondly called the cold war and then tell us about matriarchy vs patriarchy.
The women are buying these things as gifts FOR the men? After all, when my wife buys me something, it's usually tech-related.
It must suck being so stupid.
// begin obvious
// end obvious
// begin disclaimer
// end disclaimer
// begin snickering
// end snickering
who in here has a significant other?
no, no, I know that _some_ slashdotters have mates.
*snicker
Actually, the modern high heeled shoe was develped by a woman-Catherine de Medici. She used them due to her short stature, and introduced them to the European aristocracy, who found them fashionable. Popularity declined temporarily in the 17th century when the English Parliament punished as witches all women who used high heels to seduce men into marrying them.
More primitive types of high heels were used widely in ancient Egypt, classical Greece, and medieval Japan. For more details see this article.
The pushup bra was invented by a man-Howard Hughes commissioned a team of engineers to assist his actress for a role in a Hollywood movie.
However, the vibrator was invented by a man, for men: Joseph Mortimer Granville invented the vibrator in the 1880s, initially for male skeletal muscle treatment. There was the even less appealing 1918 "Prostate Gland Warmer and Recto Rotor," advertised as "the latest and most efficient invention for the quick relief of piles, constipation, and prostate trouble." Male doctors treating women for "hysteria" adapted the invention to their own needs with much greater success. Physicians ranging from Hippocrates to Freud believed they had to coax the wandering womb back to its proper place or size with "massage treatments." The Greek physician Galen (AD 129-c. 216) noted that: "Following the warmth of the remedies and arising from the touch of the genital organs required by the treatment, there followed twitchings...From that time on she was free of all the evil she felt."
Doctors used vibrators to automate medical massages of the "hysterical region" because not all women are hot. As James Marion Sims put it in 1884, "If there was anything I hated, it was investigating the organs of the female pelvis." Sims was an Alabama slave owner who experimented on slave women (some purchased expressly for this purpose) in his own backyard "hospital" during 1845-49. While doggedly pursuing a cure for vesico-vaginal fistula, he operated unsuccessfully and without anesthesia on dozens of slave women before inventing the speculum, which allowed him to operate with much higher rates of success.
Read more here and here.
According to Betty Dodson, feminist author and sex therapist, vibrators were also commonly used in barber shops as a treatment for baldness ("Trust men to use it on the wrong end!" she says.) Dodson maintains she was the first feminist to publicly introduce electric vibrators to women solely for orgasmic benefits. "My boyfriend first introduced me to the Oster vibrator in 1966. He was getting his scalp massaged by a barber when he thought, 'This would be great for clitoral stimulation' and he bought one from a Barbershop supply store." In 1971 Dodson began to teach masturbation workshops, focusing on how to use a vibrator.
But it was women, not the patriarchy, that objected-Dodson claims she faced opposition by some of the more mainstream feminists, who didn't like her reliance on a sex aid. She explains, "They wanted to have true love and romantic orgasms with Ms. or Mr. Right, not independent orgasms with a damn machine! However, there were many housewives in the city and suburbs who were more than interested in what I had to say about female masturbation."
We even get some contributions from the experts-Candida Royalle, best known for her feminist porn films, has created the Natural Contours vibrator, a curved device designed to mould itself to the shape of the vulva.
Unfortunately, the vibrator still remains controversial. In 1998, the US state of Alabama passed a law banning vibrators. It was deemed obscene to sell or manufacture a sexual device which was considered to be "harmful", with 1 year hard labour or a $10,000 fine as punishment. This law was similar to those in 5 o
How did they get these stats?
Apt handle you got there.
...? One Sony word to serve as a small counterpoint: Betamax. Strategic decisions and number crunching can make their heads spin as well, apparently.
..because they do their homework, they really understand...are you still keeping a straight face over there?
Seriously though: market driven, know demographics, data and numbers,
Male electronics: functionality, empowering features, etc.
Female electronics: kitchen environment, petite design, fancy colors.
I don't know what dictionary you use, but it's pretty fucking textbook.
But maybe you're right, companies never fail, make stupid shit, or take shortcuts wherever there's a buck to save or someone outcompete
Drop a hot semi-nude chick in close proximity to whatever generic product X: research shows it's effective on men! It is, nevertheless, sad, stereotyped shit. Same goes for fancy colors and kitchen settings. It's just not as blatant.
668.5
If it rattles and it shouldn't, then use duct tape. If it is suppose to rattle and doesn't, then use WD-40.
When I worked in retail, it was often the woman who made the decision as to what would be purchased. But let's tell the truth, men and women have different concerna about technology.
I would spend several minutes answering questions from both parties, the man would ask about upgradeability, or future expansion. Women were usually uninterested in such matters. They were usually more concerned with whether or not they could run educational software for the children, "can I burn CDs with this setup?" or the way a new PC would match their existing furniture.
I never once had a female customer ask me why L2 cache is important, or how a 400 Mhz PII could be faster than a 400 Mhz VIA/Cyrix chip.
Unfortunately many salespeople allow these patterns to cause them to assume that ALL WOMEN are unfamilliar with technology. It's important to treat every customer the same. Feel them out to find out how much they understand.
Never assume that a man does know everything that you know and never assume that a woman does not.
This philosophy is what lead me to consistantly being one of the top two salemen in my store(not department, but the entire store).
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
These "stats" don't really mean anything. Look at how easily they are twisted:
The last 100 tech purchases of my household were made by me. My wife was there 75 of those 100 trips. Presto, my wife has now been involved in 75 percent of all electronics purchases.
Remember kiddies, every statistic is backed by money. Every research dollar spent has had some sort of agenda behind it. We can easily see this one is about female empowerment in the digital age.
As many sociologies can tell you, when American pop culture tells you women are being barrated/ignored, what will untimately end up happening is the females still won't get treated like men, only men will get more neutral treatment (everyone gets the dumbed-down approach). Remember the "glass ceiling"? Instead of women earning more in the market place, the real reason female and male earnings are getting closer is because the male earnings have decreased over the last 15 years. The average American had more buying power in the 50's than they do today.
The point is that in the end these sort of studies do nothing to promote equal treatment in the form of raising the lower standard to meet the higher standard, whether it be treatment, pay, etc. Historically speaking its been the other way around.
"On a scale from 1 to 10, people are stupid"
These "stats" don't really mean anything. Look at how easily they are twisted:
The last 100 tech purchases of my household were made by me. My wife was there 75 of those 100 trips. Presto, my wife has now been involved in 75 percent of all electronics purchases.
Remember kiddies, every statistic is backed by money. Every research dollar spent has had some sort of agenda behind it. We can easily see this one is about female empowerment in the digital age.
As many sociologies can tell you, when American pop culture tells you women are being barrated/ignored, what will untimately end up happening is the females still won't get treated like men, only men will get more neutral treatment (everyone gets the dumbed-down approach). Remember the "glass ceiling"? Instead of women earning more in the market place, the real reason female and male earnings are getting closer is because the male earnings have decreased over the last 15 years. The average American had more buying power in the 50's than they do today.
The point is that in the end these sort of studies do nothing to promote equal treatment in the form of raising the lower standard to meet the higher standard, whether it be treatment, pay, etc. Historically speaking its been the other way around.
"On a scale from 1 to 10, people are stupid"
That last paragraph only serves to further cement my point. They KNOW how to sell their products. Yes, of course they screw up. But, let's face it. There are sterotypes that hold very well:
Men like semi naked (well, all naked, but the FCC would get pissed) women and it's a good way to get their attention in commercials.
Men like beer.
Men like sports.
Guess what? None of these are necessarily flattering, and not all apply to me (well, the sports one anyway.. I watch football now and then), but I'm not so arrogant to say they're not largely accurate. I like jiggly breasts and firm figures. It's possibly debase, "immoral", etc. to ogle such things, but it's just part of being male, especially, and this is critical, in the CURRENT SOCIETY.
Do you know why tissue boxes have pretty designs on them with flowers and whatnot? Because, largely, WOMEN are shopping at the grocery store and buying them. Stereotypical? You betcha! Inaccurate? Fat chance!
Sony is not stupid. I have to say that I'm largely in agreement with their take on women and electronics. I've met few women who are tech-savvy in computer and electronics fields. In fact, I've known more women who could install a radiator than install a hard drive.
Now, of course, you might be right. However, if you are, then the market is changing, and it's only a matter of time before the marketers catch up.
Sony is not stupid. They are not going to lose sales to a huge potential market segment over some silly sterotypes. Money is probably the only thing that's blind to race, creed, sex...
Alito: A vote for Alito is a punch in the eye to put that bitch back in her place!
(I'm gonna get flamed, but it's late, I'm cranky, and a little venting of one's spleen can be therapeutic)
Can't agree with all of what you had to say, but your reference to the constant propaganda against men that passes as "advertising" is spot on.
I wish I could be trusted to give cold medicine to my kids or feed them dinner, but according to the message I get from the media I'm just a stupid man that should know better than to try to do a Woman's job.
Give this a try, next time you see an ad on TV, mentally switch the gender of the subject from male to female. Funny how easily and quickly the word "sexist" springs to mind....
Does anybody else notice that the only people posting comments are men trying to explain the phenomenon? Maybe the reason they buy more is the same reason they don't go to this site: they're not nerdy enough to know what's truly worth buying
68.3% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
is that the stereotypes we have based on appearance (gender, race, weight, whatever) don't come into play.
/RANT
As a relatively tech-savvy female, I find it interesting that people online generally assume that I'm male b/c I have a competent attitude and know enough to be able to help other people with their problems. I'm not sure whether to be flattered by their confidence in my abilities or insulted by the idea that in order to have those abilities one must be male.
Once this happened despite the fact that the profile next to my BB posts explicitly said "female". And when I corrected him, he said the reason he assumed I was male was b/c I wasn't helpless around technical subjects.
I wish I could say that it never ceases to amaze me, but I am all too aware of the biases and prejudices that still exist. No, they're not as severe as they were 50 years ago, but we have a long way to go before the only assumptions people make based on gender are about, well, one's role in the reproductive process.
I feel fortunate to have a mother who didn't dress me in pink and refused to encourage me to play with dolls when I didn't show an inclination for them. I have grown up feeling absolutely comfortable with doing traditionally male things, from liking algebra in grade school to learning about programming and digital photography to being comfortable with a screw gun. In some cases it has made me feel like an outsider in a world that has different expectations of me, but that is outweighed by the benefit of being able to do all of these things that I enjoy and that permit me to make the most of my abilities.
I only hope that in the future social pressures will not exist to drive girls and boys in these separate directions, and that raising a child without gender biases won't involve any special effort. I know it won't happen before I have kids, but I can always hope for my grandkids.
Well isn't that some sad, stereotyped shit(?) According to the article, women complained about being patronized in tech stores. But what the hell kind of image of women do the tech manufacturers have?
If I saw an ad for something that was set in the kitchen, and it was an item that I would expect only women to be interested in anyway, I would find it to be "stereotyped shit..." i.e. "gee, this is a woman's thing, let's put it where women are."
But if you're trying to sell something that's traditionally marketed to men, putting it in the kitchen makes a very clear message about who you're talking to... because, sure, there are men who cook, but most of the ones *I* know are gay. (After a couple years of training, my husband occasionally knows about stuff that's in the refrigerator without me telling him.) So this is a way to get a woman's attention and communicate that this ad is not talking to the guy over there.
Is it the *best* way? I dunno. But in a case where you're trying to dramatically shift the focus, it makes some sense.
Don't you wish your girlfriend was a geek like me?
In my experience, the normals ask geeks for tech buying advice to reach out to geeks, not to get help. Most people are so intimidated by tech that when they finally feel confident enough to bring new gear into their lives, it's a breakthrough. So when they talk to a geek about it, they're trying to get social acceptance in what they think are the geek's own terms. "Should I get X?" really means "do you like me now that I like X?". Geeks typically don't decode short sentences, especially when the immediate meaning is simple among geeks. So we talk about the tech, when the normals are really talking about the people. Combine that with the common geek insecurity when talking about people, and it's no wonder these conversations go nowhere.
--
make install -not war
I've seen people spend a lot more money than that just because they want to be extra neat, and have things "just so." She might have had problems with smudging on CDs. Maybe she has a lot of money to burn. She could've been prepared to spend hundreds of dollars, and your sales guy only settled on letting this couple spend less than $200.
"Yeah, I hate complicated stuff. Finishing up my master's in EE damn near killed me, and you wouldn't believe how complicated THAT got. Of course, now I can get a real job that doesn't involve wearing a nametag."
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
...have the settings "Low", "Medium", and "Who needs a man?".
Well, it appears as if the survey folks must've not included geeks in the survey, then.
I guess most geeks are too feminine to be men anyway, so... maybe that has something to do with it.
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
You obviously letting off some steam. Chill out. It probably makes very little difference to anyone if you sold anyone AOL, and "whacking someone with a clue stick" sounds passive aggressive. Feel free to gently inform the ignorant, and take a deep breath.
An OS thats strong enough for a man, but PHP balanced for a woman.
Frink: Nice try floyd, but you were designed for scrubbing, and scrubbing is what you shall do.
Good stereotypes are usually right.
Thanks for the in-depth analysis, but my GF was only asking you if you'd recommend the 9600 over the 9200PRO.
My boyfriend got me a nice new soundcard for my birthday, and I gave him mass lovings for it. (But I got it to work with my Linux. A girl's gotta have her pride.)
Anything can be sold to almost anyone, using the right technique. But the one thing no salesperson wants to see is an educated buyer.
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
If females are supposedly so interested in technological devices, why do relatively few female undergrads volunteer for this data collection?
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Who do the women buy the tech gadgets for? More likely than not they are buying them for husbands/boyfriends/relatives/etc, I think the survey should be revamped to see the percentage of women that buy the tech gadgets for themselves.
This doesn't mean squat. I sell to women all the time but typically they're not buying for themselves even if it's "personal." Qualify the sale and ask a question and I've got a company engineer on the line.
Ultimately, who really cares. Then too, most of what's being bought is crap.
And of course since it is on her card, if there is something wrong, she has to return it because I don't even come close to looking like her.
I've got her trained to take a Knoppix disk with her to check out the laptops and a bunch of recorded DVD -r and +r disks to check out the DVD players - and she knows I hate any screen with less resolution than 1600x1200 and .23 dot pitch.
I even have her trained in the art of selecting patch cables for the video system and how to tell a good USB cable from a bad one - you know, the little things that can cause aggrevation when you actually get to putting things together. In fact, she actually figured out on her own that the digital 8 camera should also read the old Hi-8's we still have - I'm proud of her!
Hey - what do you guys get your wives to do? Cook? Clean? Go for pizza? - get creative - and screw up their statistics even more ;)
Been there, done that, paid for the T-shirt
and didn't get it
)women accounted for $55 billion of the $96 billion dollar market
No surprise here; women spend more on everything than men.
That that is is that that that that is not is not.
women buy tech for men, how many men buy tech for women?
Who says that just because men aren't "buying" more electronics that they're not getting the same amount? And don't kid yourself that Linux still has a primarily male usership; most women I know aren't so much worried about performance speed and stability as they are in software that does something interesting. Heck, that's (paraphrased) a proposed motto of a feminist programming group I worked alongside. (Though, I'm not sure it ever got beyond a printout taped to the wall).
When the retail store you work at makes $50 dollars on every AOL disc "sold" (i.e. checked out and username created, customer installs and tries out AOL, or MSN, or NetZero, or Juno, or Earthlink) then yeah, it makes a hell of a difference. Hearing about not doing it enough in weekly meetings for 2 hours after an 8 hour shift is cruel and *usual punishment for the lax AOL-pusher.
i can see the number of ratio will turn the other way around.
oh, well, if we men can stop being lazy for one second. :)
Man spends money on the woman. Woman has money to spend on more things.
What exactly does your aunt do? A jigsaw with power measured in "horses" is one damn big piece of equipment! The world's best jig saw, the Bosch 1587, draws 5amps, about .25 hp. Electric nail driver? Pnuematic is the only way to go, much faster and lighter. But needs a compressor. And finally, the "easier to do it by hand" bit is sad. When I started woodworking, I got power everything too. Then I discovered that hand tools often are easier, faster, and more satisfying than power tools. Lighter, quick setup, more control, so on. Get your aunt a couple nice hand planes (Lie-Nielsen, Clifton) (jack and rabbet block to start), chisels (Two Cherries), and some sharpening stones, and a *good* quality rip and crosscut handsaw set. If she's really into woodwork (as it sounds), she'll love you. People do it backwards these days. They should buy the power tools only after learning the skills by hand. I wish I had.
Larry
I've been a long time (like over a year+) slashdot lurker, and this topic has so moved me to create an account and post.
I am a female, I have a network of four linux-loving computers, and comparatively, my boyfriend (bless his little lovely heart)... is largely computer illiterate. But I really need him at times to be taken seriously, both at stores and with phone tech support. I order all my computer parts online now. The one recent purchase I've made at a store, I became very hostile with the salesman at Best Buy who was treating me like a child, despite my repeated firm protestations of "I know exactly what I'm looking for, please back off already." He finally backed off only when my bf who had been in the game section turned the corner and asked, "Hon, have you found what you were looking for yet?" The attitude women reported in the article is very much obvious with tech support too. I've had harrowing experiences with tech support over a lemon laptop. Ironically, in all the months it took that to be straightened out, the only time I was taken seriously was by a woman tech support person (although a few years back I had a dead sound card, told the male tech support person exactly the problem and how I arrived at it, and he simply said, "I love people like you, we'll send the replacement out today"). Now, even when dealing with tech support I make my bf take the phone and he tells them what I say, because they tend to take him more seriously than me saying the exact same thing. Having me sitting next to him relaying my commentary rather than being on the phone myself makes that significant of a difference. And I resent it. I know as geeks we all hate dealing with tech support and pushy electronics store people... let me tell you, it's a thousand times worse and more insulting when you are a female and they treat you like a baby because of it. After dedicating so many years of my life to developing my computer skills, that treatment infuriates me. I seriously like to live by the philosophy that there is more difference within the sexes than between them. Unfortunately, that view is not held by most of the world... particularly men when it comes to women in technology.
I can tell you that we only provide support for Windows (98 and up) and Mac (8.6 and up) because there are too many operating systems out there for us to be familiar with all of them. What's better, to have a help desk staffed with people who are familiar with all the supported operating systems, or to have a help desk staffed with people unfamiliar with most of the supported operating systems?
Note, this is not to say that we can't do some really, really basic support for unfamiliar OS...ie, these are the server settings. But we simply cannot be familiar with all the operating systems out there.
Now, I've never had a call from someone running an unsupported OS yet, but I'd imagine that said person knows what the heck they're doing with the OS and can figure out what they need to setup.
If it's an issue with the connection, we might be able to do something, but we can't touch software configuration because we don't want to take the risk of screwing things up. And with the lawsuit-happy society that exists right now, we don't have much choice.
Women Buy Everything More Than Men
Gosh, divorce didn't go well, eh?
A quote from the article
"Last Mother's Day, a Circuit City ad prominently featured one of the sleek TVs in a kitchen."
On Mother's Day, I think one of the last things a mom would want to be reminded of is the anount of time spent in the kitchen.
Article X: The powers not delegated... by the Constitution...are reserved...to the people
But how many women actually know how to use the technology they buy?
Chah-Ching, right on the money, it's nice seeing that even a normally leftist group (techs) are comeing out against the cancer known as feminism.
I've found that in the case of tech toys and such, us guys are usually the ones that are impulsive.
I have the horrible habit of buying tech toys and computer parts impulsively, I'll see something, the price might look good, and I'll buy it.
Right now I'm a young adult ( second year University ) , and this sort of thing wont get me in much trouble right now, but I need to work on this.
It seems the roles are somewhat reversed, I've found that my mom is very smart when making large purchases and shops around properly, which are often tech or something along the lines of a car.
I have a feeling that I'm going to end leaving all of the major money management to my wife once I'm married, the worst thing she could do is buy $300 shoes, whereas what I could do is come home with a $1,000 video card, or worse.
First off, I'd like to go on the record as saying I sincerely doubt the accuracy of this survey, and hope people don't use it for anything significant.
Now then, I'd say it's not about making your larger audience feel welcome, it's about paying attention to those who demand attention... I dare say that most of the women I know well, will buy a product based upon looks, rather than technical details.
I seem to rember a story a while back saying that iMacs were bigger sellers to women than men. No wonder, that.
So, the women are far less likely to be swayed by the technical specs of the device, and more by things that can't be pitched to them.
In cars, conveniences need to be pointed out, and you can talk about how easy it is to handle, how little maintenance is needed, etc. With electronics, there isn't quite so much of that.
Besides, if you talk down to a man, it's entirely likely you'll get punched in the face... No such risk with women.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
That article was a waste of my time, please don't post anything like that again. Thank you.
Women = 52% of the Unites States' adult (18+) population
Women were responsible for 57% of the money spent on consumer electronics (whatever that really means)
It's "common knowledge" that women do 80% of the shopping.
Hardly seems surprising to me.
What I want to know is what were the questions asked in the survey, what did they consider to be consumer electronics, and who and when they called. Results like this have a tendency to unravel when you start looking at the method of polling and the questions asked.
Anyone have access to the CE website and care to post the plain-text study document here?
Article X: The powers not delegated... by the Constitution...are reserved...to the people
Sad, but probably true. I don't object to your point that the companies can shift product (hence my initial "1-2-3-profit!" Troll Fu). But I can't agree to being in the wrong or even being arrogant when laying some well-earned, sarcastic criticism on their conduct (although, in all fairness, I was painting with a pretty broad, high-contrast brush in my first post, thanks for reading this far btw).
I mean, I'd be lying to say I never check out fine looking women - in ads or wherever - without feeling the world's in a sad state (on the contrary), or that I don't at least partially match any male stereotype, etc. Wasn't the point I was aiming for.
The main reason I think it's sad is that it's all a feedback loop. Marketing and media are an increasingly big, unavoidable presence in all our lives. It's not something that's just reflecting our lives, or catching up to our needs and our behaviour. It's taking every chance it gets (and with the billions spent, there are plenty of chances) to shape and dictate what, who, where, even why.
We're handed our G.I. Joes and Barbie's real early, and on it escalates.. The stereotypes become increasingly hard to distinguish from the individuals. Now, of course men and women are different. But which differences are important, which are even "real" and which ones are manufactured(?) To use a term close to home: I feel like we're being "hacked" by a lot of this shit. The glaringly sexist, racist, or otherwise stupid crap, we nowadays identify immediately and don't accept in our societies. But more nuanced 'gender/etc. memes' can quickly become gospel.
We geeks seek knowledge, right? Preconceptions, false or untested premises, bias, etc., obfuscate truth, and makes it harder to find. I get very uncomfortable when I start to suspect I'm getting 'riders' snuck into the reality I experience.
Ok, I'll shut up and go to work now. Thanks for reading my ramblings.
668.5
Women buy more than men. What's new? I sign my paycheck over to my wife because if I didn't, at the end of the month I'd have a lot of empty beer cans and a bunch of bills. Point of fact: Women are much better with money and bills. This alone is a good reason to get married. Plus, sex all the time.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
I think it's quaint you can decry women with a technical background being misconstrued as Jessica Simpson clones, but men who cook well (or take an interest in) are usually gay.
Pot-kettle-black. Sexism rides again.
*Why yes, I can change my own oil, assemble my own computer, and make a pretty functional roux. What's it to ya*
My God, it all makes sense now.
Im dreaming ofa big bndwdth, That can resist the
espically when it has to do with vibrators for joysticks..;)
The lunatic is in my head
FUCKING HELL i just lost a bet on that. now i have to install debian on my spare machine for a week, it'll be more even more useless than *BSD which is dying.
Word.
Somehow I was expecting that on /. of all places I'd find slightly more enlightened responses to this story than a bunch of vibrator jokes and 'ha ha, aren't women wasteful ignorant airheads' comments. Honestly I'm kind of shocked.
...maybe the male tech market is saturated? Perhaps we already have all the tech gadgets we want, and now the majority of the market is now women playing catch-up?
These useless surveys really do p**s me off at times, they seem to assume that everyone will spend money at a constant rate, but forgetting that people do reach a point where they have enough stuff, at which point another demographic might appear to take up the slack. Perhaps the RIAA should work out that one reason why their CD sales have dropped is that most people have replaced their old vinyls and cassettes, and really aren't that interested in getting modern stuff, especially if it's the brainless pap they are trying to shove down our throats these days.
"Life is like a sewer - what you get out of it depends on what you put into it" - Tom Lehrer
Don't forget changing toilet paper rolls. Remember the one where the man bapped at it with his hand like a neanderthal until the woman provided the pearl of wisdom and changed it for him? Yeah, that one. See, men don't understand spring-loaded cylinders, noooo...
that this would help us get dates. Oh the terrible loneliness.
just thought i'd share this, i'd like to shake his hand, giant hairy cajones...
What kind of advice is 'wait 6 months and things might improve?'
If someone is buying on results, speak to them in terms of results.
If they're buying because of process, let them know why things are the way you say they are on a mechanical level. (these are the smartest folks)
If they're asking you because they trust you, take them to the store or just tell them what to buy with a simple explanation.
If they're social people (sounds like it) then they'll just do what everyone else does and your opinion is like a drop of water in a bucket. You are not an expert to them, you are just 'one of the crowd.' And no matter what they say, it's the crowd that's important.
___
It's the end of my comment as I know it and I feel fine.
Who is using the electronic Women buy ? Is it the same as for the flower Men buy (i.e. : not for them but for their female companions)? Are they using the electronic they buy or do they gift it ?
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
As a friend once said - if she drives a white jeep cherokee paid for by her ex husband - you don't want to know her.
Women by more tech to compensate for preceived inequality in the work place. They are social creatures and they understand the "gadget culture" and the gadget status hiarchy. All you have to do is look at the cosmetic industry to understand this. Interesting, they are often the first person a male colleague will demonstrate a new gadget to.
I love how this quote implies the idea that women don't need anything. If I was going to make a generalization, I'd say less women work and have time to shop for stuff, which then both women and men use. So they probably spend more money than men, who are stuck in the office all day, a wonderful product of the housewife phenomenon.
In addition, I see men getting conned just as much into the sales (my dad buys stuff that's useless... but cheap) and the shinyness, for example remember the very recent commercial where the guy buys a huge flat screen just to watch a football game and stupify his friend? Funny thing is how stupified the friend (man) gets by that pretty shiny thing. Then there's the guy on television that want's 5 blades on his razor instead of... less. I don't wanting more or spending less really governs either sex either way.
I agree that at this time, more men than women are technologically educated (there are 10 girls and 150 boys in my second-year physics course), and that this might influence their buying strategies, but wouldn't knowing less about technology make one just as likely to get the cheapest thing they possibly can? And IF this was a gift for your husband and he didn't like the cheap/expensive piece of crap, isn't there a thing called a gift return? And once more, don't less women work, thus having more time to shop? This is what we women like to call "logic"
Of course, you could say that some people are interpreting these results based on their biased views that women and their silly unreasonable little minds just can't handle that tough decision-making process between the good printer and the cute printer.... which would bring me to the place all these stereotypes come from: the ancient, yet enduring belief that women are less reasonable than men, and governed by their emotions. Thank you Aristotle. The only difference between the idea of the typical woman in modern America and ancient Greece is that the stereotype is less popular, it's supported by fake-scientific psychobabble thought up in the Victorian era, and today, people tend to think that emotions are a good thing, although many of them think that logic, which men must possess as opposed to emotion, is better.
In conclusion, if all women are getting conned, or less actually want a flat screen, or actually are getting gifts for their hubbies, or whatever you people want to believe, even this would have to do with CULTURAL CONFORMITY, not with the fact that all women in the universe want pretty new things rather than fixing something old (everybody can be poor), not that they're all so stupid to believe that expensive=better (everybody can be poor), not because they're genetically more emotional and less reasonable, not because women recycle less, not because women are money-grubbing spend-thrifts that desire a different i-Book for everything in their wardrobe (rich men AND women today are just as obsessed with fashion) and NOT because the quote I"m replying to is true. Actually my experience is that my dad buys crap on sale, my mom buys expensive stuff she needs. I always thought this must generally be the case until I decided maybe women and men can't just be shoved into these stupid categories so easily.
Quoth xRelisH: "...the worst thing she could do is buy $300 shoes, whereas what I could do is come home with a $1,000 video card, or worse."
;)
Quick tip: before you *do* get married, check out the current going prices for handbags and jewelry. Then re-think.
Nalfy
-- Despair is an operating system that ANY human being can run, sort of a psychological JAVA --
Story: -1 Flamebait +4 Funny
I love you
I read slashdot. I care about Linux and SCO issues. I build my own computers, link my PDA to the wireless network I've set up in my house, and argue kernels with men.
I DON'T watch anime, play Counterstrike, download pr0n, or try to out-class my fellow geeks by way of computing power or unnecessary bandwidth. These tend to be, though not always, hobbies of male geeks. I DO like jewelry, shopping for shoes, romance, clothes, cooking, chatting, and cute guys. Because of these traits, many people underestimate my technical knowledge.
One nice thing about the liberation of women is that I can appreciate technology without trying to be your typical male geek. I can go try on sixteen pairs of shoes, then come home and program my heart out.
I don't see that in many of these replies. What I see is that because we like to buy things other than technology, or because we like to use technology as a means to socialize or have fun (as with cell phones), we can't possibly be as tech-savvy as you slashdotters assume YOU are. I can see the brain waves now. "Oh, these women! They must be buying little TVs for their kitchen, pink vibrators, presents for their geeky boyfriends, or electronic beepy collars for their fuzzy kittens!" Why? Why can't you accept that we see technology just as you do? That we're out there looking for the newest video card or USB hub?
Watch out, guys, the boundaries of geekdom are expanding. Women are discovering the utter coolness of technology. We can afford it. We can buy it for ourselves. And we can understand how to use it.
Honestly, I'm embarassed. I thought the slashdot community was more enlightened than this.
What do you expect? They always steal our money.
Sig: "how democracy should work: http://ElectionMethods.org"
Should be a link ElectionMethods.org
Some related comments, re. Arrow's Theorem on Voting
~Morosoph
Fact is Women spend more than Men. Period.
How is this possible since Men earn more than Women on average you ask?
Ask a married man and you will have your answer.
I find most salespeople treat everyone like idiots. The women polled simply have the perception that it's directed toward them.
When my wife and I shop together, we get treated better, weather it's for electronic gear or furniture. Couples must agree on the big ticket items, so if you're there alone, the salesdrones probably assume you're just browsing.
I don't mean to imply that there's no sexism out there. I'm just saying it may not be as bad as the survey indicates.
... they buy more... except they spend my money :)
Mater is a common indoeuropean term which means mother in latin, but means woman in other languages which cannot be expressed with the roman alphabet. Most accept that it likely meant woman in more ancient latin, and is used that way some poems as a play on words.
What is the root word of materialis? hmmm??? can you answer that?
No, because your nice english dictionary doesn't tell you the etymology of latin words... only english ones.
The real root word of materialis is "matter", and amongst ancient people it was believed all things were created in a sexual fashion. The entire world was thought to have been born from some great pussy.
Haven't you ever read fucking Homer? The Iliad and the Odyssey are entirely about this concept! Who starts the war? Women. Who keeps getting in the way? Women. The entire theme throughout Homer's stories is women prevent men from living the life they want to live. It is a guide on how to deal with the parasites we call women!
The reality is you are a pussy whipped slave, who looks forward to a life of always preserving the vaginal bottom line. You won't be a great artist. You won't experience the enthralling obsession of painting a great picture, or sculpting a great statue... You will never experience the glory of battle, the thrill of victory, or the rage of defeat.
You will live your life in service of your master, catering to her every whim until the day you die.
When you are an old man, and you look at how many decades you have wasted, you will think of this post. You will think of what could have been. Your last moments will be spent dreaming of the adventures upon which you never embarked. You will die with nothing but regret in your heart.
By the way, its spelled misogyny. You couldn't take the time to look up that word on dictionary.com huh?
I don't read or respond to AC posts
Actually, I DID think of the root of 'materialis' being 'mater', but it's a misleading implication to say that 'mater' and 'materialism' are from the same root and thus women are all out to be materialistic and spend money. Material is what makes us up, and is the 'mother' of all of us. It has nothing to do with how women like or don't like shopping.
:P
As for the glory of battle, the thrill of victory, and the rage of defeat, I manage that just fine when racing, thanks. I did my share of fighting when I studied martial arts. I don't need any more of it.
You're right about me never being a great artist, though. I'm shitty at that stuff. However, how many great artists were inspired by women, or had women in their lives and still went on to create great things?
And, for the record, I DID look up how to spell 'misogyny', but I forgot to change it. Whoops.
Anyway, you're a pretty impressive troll. Does it take you long to come up with this stuff, or is it natural talent?
I can almost understand the labels. Cover up the CD logo, leave lots of whitespace for writing large text. I might even do this myself (hell, a lot of people buy labels and just print off little text descriptions without cool graphics anyhow). Non-labelled CD's work too though.
I can't justify selling Jaguar to an XP user. Not that it isn't an upgrade over windows, too bad it won't work (work be a hoot if you could upgrade from XP to Jag though). I wonder if Apple will make a Mac OS for a PC, maybe just sell it at an increased price to offset the hardware sales-loss?
It's more like a $75 item over a $50 one.
However, she'll only wear it once a month or less when she's wearing something else from her wardrobe that co-ordinates.
This isn't a joke, though. Do you think a man would get away with "Yes dear, but I need the green laser pointer because it goes with my shirt, and this red one for my other outfit"
The closet I get to co-ordination is making sure my CD-ROM matches my computer case (not black with white or something very obvious), and stuff in my car.
Women definately tend to be portrayed as less technically adept than males. I think that in a general sense this comes from a few personality characteristics common to the genders though:
Woman: Will try to figure something out. If she can't will ask somebody who probably knows it works
Man: Will f*** with it, swear at it, and eventually either get it working, break it, or screw it up so badly that the woman hires a professional when he's not looking.
It's somewhat like the "asking directions" thing.
Unforuntunately, women shortchange themselves in this area as well. Many defer to men as the "authority figure." Maybe this is because many men are intimidated by a capable woman? Personally, I'd love to meet more women who could help me pull apart a car/computer/etc.
It's funny that when a female actually does watch the process, I know she's probably thinking "I could probably do that," whilst many non-technical guys are simply thinking "fr*cking geek crap."
Another big problem is gender-placement in retail. You don't really notice it, but let's look at the following: fast-food/restaurants. Men are often in the back (cooks, etc), women are the front line. Yes there are male servers, but especially in fast-food women tend to dominate (except for later hours, in which case the men get more shifts).
Now shift to a large computer or electronics store. Salespeople: men, cashiers: women
I don't know if it is because they consider women less technically adept or simply because they're not as agressive salespeople. I myself wouldn't mind having a nice female salesperson in the computer department who knows what she's doing. Also, is there a better way to get geek buyers than having a female geek in the electronics section? Still, I wonder why women tend not to get these positions, so far in the local shops they are there, but tend to hold positions either at the register, the returns desk, or the camera dept.
I have a (female) friend who has a big subwoofer in her car, progams quite well in various languages, and is in the process of doing a rather sweet case-mod on her computer.
I'm actually seriously thinking of pointing her at this slashdot article and asking how she is treated at a computer store. She also recently held a tech job before returning to school (practicum), I wonder if she was treated differently as a female tech
Personally, I'd like to see more women in the technical field. However, if people insist on promoting the "women can't program the VCR" stereotype then it's not going to happen anytime fast. Technology is not a man's field, frick I know any number of women who would do very well at it if they gave it a go. Yet, in my college course less than 25% of the students were women, I rarely see female retail salespeople (except cashiers) in a computer store.
I think that men here need to drop the superiorist complex. If you want to keep perpetrating the idea that women are technically inferior, then you really shouldn't be surprised that you're hugging your pillow at night. Can't find a smart girl who's interested in tech stuff like you... maybe it's because people like you scare them away and make them feel like morons. Who wants to learn when it makes you out-of-place?
Also, if you're going to insist on pounding your chest and insinuating that women are better off pounding keyboard at a secretary desk than a coders one... don't be surprised when the smart techie girls out there either ignore you or dump your asses when they find out how ignorant you are.
Many women are less technical because people make them feel technically incompetent, so many simply don't try. Grow up, listen to the parent and go make your own damn "sammich" you dumbasses.
> unzeitgeistful? ;-)
I would use unzeitgemaB (unzeitgemaess is the correct spelling without umlauts and eszetts, although slashdot things else). But then there is no equivalent to zeitgeisty in German, so unzeitgeistful might be "correcter" English, even though it sounds utterly wrong to my ear
OK. Let's picture the average younger male geek. He knows a lot about computers, but crap about computers. When a male customer comes in who can talk about computers/stereos, he talks it up and go for the sale. Heck, when he meets somebody anywhere who talks tech he mind find it interesting conversation
Now picture this... that same person has very little ability to converse with the opposite sex. Now throw this a bit farther... maybe the female is cute. Now we have a socially inept male geek trying to communicate with a cute female geek. Hell, is he going to do well even outside of the sales setting.
What will he do? Maybe he stumbles a bit, but makes a sale without ending up looking too much like an idiot. But maybe... hey, what do guys of any colour do? Guys with muscles flex them... maybe geeky male sales-staff try to act all-knowing and "helpful" but end up sounding obnoxious, superiorist, and pushy?
Throw this a bit farther. The girl has a boyfriend. Now the geek can avoid even talking to the girl. Moreover, if he's having a problem keep his eyes above neck level, perhaps he decides to talk to the guy just to avoid conflict?
I'm not saying it's true... I don't think like this, but I could think of at least a few guys who would. Maybe it's not so much that the female purchases are technically inclined but that the male sellers are socially inadept with females? Maybe we need more female salespeople.
Thinking about your average salesgeek and their performance with women out of the work environment, I wouldn't be surprised if it contributes to lack of performance in it.
I tried to make it a link when I first put in my sig a year or two ago, but I was unsuccessful. Apparently links don't work the same way in sigs as in the body of a comment. Please correct me if I am wrong.
I watch Brit Hume on Fox News
When you give a gift, the thought counts. If you give a gift certificate you show that you didn't give the gift much thought. If you cared enough to think you could get a gift, might not be as useful as the certificate, but you put some thought into it.
Face it, children with no money will take all the gifts they can get. Adults that want or need something will buy it if they can afford it. If they can't afford it, it means they value their time away from work (sometimes a different stressful, but high paying job) too much to do what it takes to get it.
Put some thoughts into your gifts.
Let's see... guys I know who cook: best friend's husband, not gay. Friend from school, gay. Other friend from school, gay. Family friend since birth, gay. His partner, gay. Father-in-law, not gay.
Now, if I'd said, based on my own personal experience, "Most men who cook are gay" you'd have a point, but I did specifically say "most of the ones *I* know are gay." This is a true statement. What's the problem with that?
Don't you wish your girlfriend was a geek like me?
Anyway, you're a pretty impressive troll. Does it take you long to come up with this stuff, or is it natural talent?
I am just a man who feels great concern for his lost brothers, whose lives are tormented in endless slavery for a master they have been trained to believe doesn't exist. They are raised by their mothers, 95% of teachers are female, 70% of university professors are females. The majority of managers are females. The average man who graduates from high school, goes to college, and gets a nice white collar job almost always is under the authority of a female.
It is the eyes of said men I am trying to open, so I suppose it comes naturally.
However, how many great artists were inspired by women, or had women in their lives and still went on to create great things?
You men besides the pathetic whining of 50 years of rock music? I would say none. Do you think Mozart was truly inspired by a woman? Beethoven? Michaelangelo? Da Vinci?
Women are not Muses. Muses are Muses. To confuse one with the other is to mistake the Devouring Void for the Seminal Light. Earthly Women and the Muses are ancient, sworn enemies. The battlefield is the Creative Male. On the one side is the encampment of Discordia, of Diana, of Venus located in his Heart and in his Groin. On the other is the Bastion of Calliope, Clio, Erato, Euterpe, Melpomene, Polyhymnia, Terpsichore, Thalia and Urania, in his Brain and in his Mind. The Muses are tolerant and understanding of border raids, skirmishes, and harassing maneuvers. Throughout the history of the Male Light, there have been few painters, few writers, who have not had a She Who Must Be Accommodated. For some it was their mothers. For many their wives, their mistresses, their girlfriends. For many it was their daughters, a favourite waitress, a stripper, a whore. To the Muses, they are all one. Mother, whore, wife, daughter, stripper, waitress, mistress, girlfriend.
Women inspire men to do great works
And then distract us from carrying them out
Oscar Wilde
It is up to each individual Male in whom the creative fire burns, in the words of Pater, "as a hard, gem-like flame" to decide whether to maintain that radiance, whether to settle for a wavery, uncertain light, or whether to extinguish it altogether. The individual Male decides for himself which side in the ancient battle is the better armed, who gets the best reinforcements, the most effective weapons, whose barricades are solid and well-fortified, and whose are makeshift and ramshackle. John Lennon maintained through his House-Husband years of baking bread and minding the baby that he had "lost his Muse". Untruer words were never spoken. He drove his Muse from him. The forces within his Groin and his Heart, armed to the teeth, legion upon legion upon legion, surrounded those forces in his Brain and in his Mind, and the battle was lost. John Lennon was a triumph for the malignant forces of Discordia, of Diana, of Venus.
I don't read or respond to AC posts
Over the years, I've come up with a pretty much foolproof way to deal with condescending salesmen. First of all, I usually give them a chance to get through at least part of their sales schpeal; after all, they sell these things for a living, which makes it at least (barely) possible that they might know something that I don't about what I'm intending to buy. If they begin to annoy me, I then begin to ask questions. Specifically, I begin to ask them the kinds of questions that nobody but an engineer (or a serious hobbyist) would even think to ask (or be able to answer). It's very important to ask these questions in a very innocent and serious tone of voice; you don't want to come across as *deliberately* trying to show them up. This usually has one of two results ~ (a) they suddenly remember something urgent that they've got to take care of on the other side of the store or (B) they run off and get their superior, who is usually older, more polite, and actually knows what he (or she) is talking about (the more rare option (c) involves them dropping the BS-attitude and asking questions about the questions that I just asked). Maybe I'm just a little bit more sadistic than you, but I've always found this type of situation to be more entertaining than annoying. Most macho tech guys seem to find it absolutely humiliating to be shown up by a little blue-eyed blond. Of course, the kinds of tech purchases that I usually make are so specialized that the salespeople generally assume that you're an engineer if you're even trying to order them (and aren't made in retail electronics stores), so maybe I just think that the whole Sexist Salesman thing is funny because I don't often run into it. Personally, I find the salesmen who try to hit on me to be MUCH more annoying.
MMMhmmm, perhaps you should take a look at that nearly 50 year long case of penile envy we so fondly called the cold war and then tell us about matriarchy vs patriarchy.
That is actually the ideal state of control women wish to impart upon men. It is the ILLUSION of war which they most love. Women love a man in uniform, a man who is strong, agile, a warrior. They hate war. Yet they appreciate how war can motivate men.
Perhaps you haven't read any Homer in a long while, so I will remind you of the story of the Sirens... who could control a man merely with their voices. Women have evolved specifically to control men through their appearence and voice. Ever wonder why so many girls look like they could be 12? Ever wonder why so many men find that sexually desirable?
Men evolved first to strongly desire to protect children, and later women took on those attributes to receive the same treatment.
Girls learn from a very young age how to use their divine gifts to control daddy, and are at a huge advantage when the game begins in the teenage years. Most men are not aware of this form of psychological warfare until it is too late.
Men have evolved to be both creators and protectors, warriors and artists.
The cold war is a prime example of how the heart of every man was exploited as a tool of social control, but in a way that pleases women. You have the benefits of a war, men sacrifice more and more to serve their females.. but you don't have the real benefits and detriments of war. There is no blood, there is no death, no glory, no suffering.
It ends up being empty, just as our society today is thoroughly devoid of humanity.
Would the souless corporate world in which we live have been possible WITHOUT the cold war? What if all those men did not feel compelled to be a part of that society, for their very survival?
Real war, masculine war ended in 1945. Everything since then has been the refinement of WWII technology and the illusion of war.
Capitalism and Communism are both two corrupt systems based in the Female concept of value, the MATERIALISTIC concept... that the most shit for the most people is the standard of value. The only way to get men to accept such inhuman life is to manipulate them.
Now the game is up. 5% of the male population is imprisoned at some point in their lives. Violent video games are the norm. Gangs are still growing strong despite the lack of media coverage. There is nothing left to keep men organized in this society except for fear.
I don't read or respond to AC posts
Specifically, as you put it, it was in the context of a product designed, in your opinion, for a woman. So where is it placed: in the kitchen.
So exactly how do kitchen items translate into something you would only expect a woman to be interested in (what, does it have beefcake written all over it? What defines it as being specific to women?). I have yet to run across his and hers cutlery sets. I'm not even certain that you can define a product as utilitarian as a kitchen product specific to any gender. It seems to be a prejudice in your own head.
And if I were to turn it around and say most of the women *I* know haven't got the foggiest concerning tech products, what's wrong with that?
Well, several of your other posts basically point out (and rightfully so) that there are women who are technologically capable and they shouldn't be treated as otherwise, so knock it off already (three times fast).
Just like how there are men who enjoy cooking (bar-b-que anyone), and perhaps some savvy marketer might place an item specific to a guy in the kitchen, if they were that certain of their target group.
Hard to say, because most marketing does tend to be lowest common denominator (in which case you justify every prejudice because that is where the numbers lie. Some may be offended, but they ain't the majority, so who cares). Condemn Mad. Ave. for promoting a stereotype, just not your stereotype. Yeah right.
Let me tell you about my experiences purchasing a sewing machine... are there even surveys that cover the opposite extreme? No? Excuse me if I cite bias and disregard it completely then.
If you go searching for monsters, you are most certain to find them. Or as the bard pointed out, evil to him who thinks evil. Good day.
I'm afraid I'm having a lot of trouble following this post.
Nothing wrong with saying that most of the women you know haven't the foggiest notion about tech. Same is true about most of the women I know. I'm in a pretty small category. Same as when I was in high school and was the token female at the RPG gatherings on Friday and Sunday evenings. The problem is when people make the logical leap that they should assume women don't know about technology, and don't *want* to know. I used to do phone support for a small division of a cable network... there were people who wanted someone to magically fix everything while they're away at lunch, but some wanted to know *why* it broke, and what they could do to fix it next time if it came up again. Most of them were female. I was perfectly happy to accomodate the user, whatever their level of desired knowledge was.
I don't assume that men don't cook. I know men who cook. Most of them are gay. I know a lot of gay men, possibly because I live in a city which actually has a rainbow logo on the side of the cop's cars (or it might be the other way around... it's not like it's all my neighbors that are the cooking guys). My husband is almost laughable in his reluctance to get involved in food preparation. It's slightly ironic, because while his mother hates to cook, his father discovered many years ago that he loves it, and has become quite the gourmet.
Let me tell you about my experiences purchasing a sewing machine... are there even surveys that cover the opposite extreme? No? Excuse me if I cite bias and disregard it completely then.
I can imagine it was pretty... annoying, to put it mildly. You're in a unique position for having some clue what women go through shopping for electronics. Of course, more people need home electronics than sewing machines, and the gender crossover is probably much higher for gadgets.
Don't you wish your girlfriend was a geek like me?
...and then, from what I've seen, have a man set it up. And then, from what I've seen, the man (embarassed and secretively)...calls someone who MIGHT know what they're doing.
oregonnerd...a nerd in Oregon, of course
..and wow, it was hard to train the MCSE guys I worked with to try listening to what they called "the ditzy secretaries" for a change. My tickets went down and my sector of 1500 computers+ was measurably quieter. All from listening and doing 5-15 minutes of training.
I currently shop online not just because the prices are better, but because I'm sick of dealing with the MCSE techs at Best Buy, CompUSA, etc, who think just because I'm there with my husband discussing specs, they need to contribute to the conversation. But to my husband's credit, he's good about laughing in their face and turning back to me when they are being obnoxious. I'm also the one walking up with the box to the cashier--little pet peeve of mine.
What -I- run at work:
Several iSeries mainframes
Several Suns
Several HP-UXs
Several AIXs
Several Linux
LOTS of Wintels
What we have (collectively) at home:
An AS400 (mine)
Several Suns
A DEC Alpha
A wireless network
Various PCs with various OS's
C64
I think the real problem here is sales people. Face it, they know jack shit about the product they're trying to sell but have to sound knowledgeable anyways. I can't begin to count the number of times that I've dealt with sales people where I already know about the product and just spute a bunch of BS just to make a sale. They're notorious for doing this at future shop where all the sales people are paid by commission, and if you don't make enough sales then you are fired. Plus with the rare chance that they actually hire someone thats knowledgeable in a sales position. It just doesn't make sense sometimes. We're closer to the world of dilbert then anyone realises.
>Radio Shack's customers have shifted from 20 percent
>female seven years ago to 40 percent female today.
I refuse to believed this. I go to Radio Shack fairly often and you rarely see any women in the shops.
I think it has to do with how the collect data.
I'm buying batteries. "May I have your phone number, your name, your SSN and your mother's maiden name?"
Me: "No, kiss off".
Wife: 123-456...
So, I'm automatically excluded from their database, which I'm assuming they used for their data mining.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Dunno, I can't say as I've ever felt like I was being treated like a moron just because I'm a chickie-boo. Not even when I ACTED like a dumb little chickie-boo doing undercover work to scope out the competition for the computer company I work for. OTOH, there have been several times I've wanted to throttle the shit out of some noodlehead at Circuit City, Best Buy, Nobody Beats The Wiz, etc. because they didn't know SHTML from shinola...
Please excuse: I have had the benefit of reading other posts (some of which are yours) and my response is perhaps an amalgamation. It is not specific to who cooks what, it's cited as an example of mentality. For example: my purchasing a sewing machine. It is unknown whether I was acting like a cad, the gender of the sales person, or where this took place. It is an isolated event, and people draw their own conclusions. Would it make any difference if the sales person was male, if I were black, or if this took place in Alabama? They study suffers from the same problem, because the "why" is never investigated; it is assumed (and everyone takes their own personal experiences and fills in the gaps). Kind of like guys cooking, women and technology, or even the gender of the sales person. For all the women who suffer at the hands of a sales person, there are some who don't. The possible reasons for this aren't explored (except for when being accompanied by a man or an inherent bias of a manufacturer; that is the only explanation given). To even put forth a study that is that specific and yet anonymous kind of denotes an agenda. Do guys experience similar problems? Do blacks? Do Spanish-speaking people? These questions aren't answered because they are never asked. Beyond your personal experiences, I cite sexism.
Ah, I see. Good point. The lack of a control group for comparison (at least, in the reporting of the study) does leave some questions. It would be very interesting to see the complete study, which probably does address at least a little of this.
Don't you wish your girlfriend was a geek like me?
I believe that women are buying more tech than they used to... and no, it's not the things that go buzz in the night.
Consider:
- in 1985 you could get at Radio Shack: Parts for your stereo system, electronics kits, RC toys, and the TRS-80 ("Trash 80"), which was not compatable with the PC, the Commodore 64, or the Apple II+; and like the other machines, had completely proprietary software that appealed to geeks.
- in 1985, if you owned a computer, you were probably a hacker in training, or a hobbyist using the ports to control electronic software.
- if you were organizing your schedule, you did it with the Day Timer, which conviently gave you a two month trial kit to get you hooked.
- you made calls from home or work, on a corded telephone after picking up your messages from a machine with a tape which you had to replace occasionally... from Radio Shack.
So, today at Radio Shack, you can buy a cell phone, a surround-sound system that will plug into your DVD player, satillite radio, a palm-sized computer that will track your schedule, a computer that is fully compatable with the Wintel standard, and software that will let you run and entire office, whether at home or work. In other words, you no longer have to be a geek to use (and enjoy) technology.
I think then, it makes sense that fewer women are turning the chore of buying technology over to men in their lives. And non-geek men no longer have to pretend they're geeks to buy technology.
I also believe that it's true that tech companies sell more when they display tech that's integrated into a real life... I don't want a tv that goes in my kitchen, but I'm very interested in flatscreens. Why? So I don't have to hire movers for the TV next time I move.
Benzapp:
I'd like to know more. About this, about multiculturalism, about... everything. About you. How do you know all this? How do you see all this?
Email me. Let's talk.
Disclaimer: IANAL. This post is, however, legal advice, and creates an attorney-client relationship.