[alinajaf]

> Generally speaking men on average will enjoy themselves a lot more if there are pretty girls around.

And I wouldn't argue with that. In the short time I was in Japan I blew I don't even want to think about it levels of money on hostess bars and just about all the other sort of fun you can imagine.

But really, there's a time and a place for that sort of thing and a hackday/tech-conference just isn't it.

> The problem is that what is a perk targetting 90% of the target demographic and appeals to probably 85% of those, happens to be off-putting to minorities some want to attract into the industry.

I'm in an ethnic minority for the industry and I simply do not care about attracting minorities. What I do care about is the mountains of gold in them there hills that are ready for the plundering when we learn how to start selling software to women. Having female engineers will probably help with that.

[CodeMage]

...when we learn how to start selling software to women. Having female engineers will probably help with that.

No, no, a thousand times no. The gaming industry used to think like that. Ernest Adams explained the fallacy of that thinking most eloquently in his article "Games for Girls? Eeeeewww!" [1]

You don't want to "sell software to women". You want to sell software to your target userbase. You want to sell software to people whose problem that software solves. Unless your software is solving a specific problem that only women have, then you're not "selling software to women".

[1] http://www.designersnotebook.com/Columns/004_Games_for_Girls...

[angersock]

"What I do care about is the mountains of gold in them there hills that are ready for the plundering when we learn how to start selling software to women."

I am saddened by the implication here that selling good software that solves problems for everyone should somehow be less lucrative then exploiting cultural norms and stereotypes.

This mindset is something that we, being in a new field, have a unique opportunity to overcome.

[alinajaf]

> I am saddened by the implication here that selling good software that solves problems for everyone should somehow be less lucrative then exploiting cultural norms and stereotypes.

I'm not sure I did imply that. I don't think we're particularly good at selling software that solves problems for everyone to women.

[angersock]

Sorry, I'll try to rephrase my question slightly.

If the software truly solves problems for everyone, why should we have to pick a marketing strategy that segments the population of potential users (previously stated to be everyone) by sex or gender?

[ismarc]

I read their comment as saying that we sell software that solves problems for everyone, but we only sell it well to men. We need to find a way to sell to women as well.