@garciabuxton thanks for this.
@garciabuxton I remember seeing someone critiquing this dynamic early on when I joined. I looked at who I was following and it was a majority of white guys, although I think it was less skewed than my twitter followings. I wonder what can be done to help address this in positive ways. I’m sure the cost probably does influence things and put many off but I don’t think that explains the skew completely.
@ChrisJWilson That was probably the big discussion last January(?) sparked by @belle (who has since gone on hiatus) and a few others last, and sparked @macgenie’s Diversity and Inclusion at Micro.blog: Where We Are, Where We Want to Go.
@garciabuxton One of the things I’ve noticed is that several of the women who were very active when I first arrived (and were some of my early follows) are not as active any more: @kitt (started a new job last fall, IIRC), @Verso (?), @Aleen (seems to be getting back into things after a move and new AppCamp4Girls role), @belle (on indefinite hiatus), @modernlittleme (moved last year)…I think you, @cheri, @Miraz and @DiplomaticDiva are probably the women who now show up most frequently in my timeline, with @fiona right after that. It feels like there’s a lot of ebb and flow—and I’m sure that’s true with us men, too, but it’s less noticeable because of the imbalance?
I’ve tried to coax friends regardless of gender to the place, but it’s been a bigger challenge than I expected.
The same for me, even those who were bloggers back in the pre-Facebook/Twitter days :-( I’d love to have some of my female friends here—because they’re awesome and would contribute interesting things to the mix here—but I am a terrible salesperson.
@fiona Do you find it as odd as I do that so many young women use "guys" to refer to one another. I think it devalues the differences and normalises "guys" as somehow gender-neutral. And yet, folks is too folksy, and people seems a bit too dull and unhip for many people. I personally hate peeps, but what would you suggest?
@kitt It was one I read and left me with questions not answers. I've just read it again and it still makes me think.
@smokey Thanks for mentioning @DiplomaticDiva; I wasn’t following her (but was the others), but am now. Looks like she posts interesting stuff. I try to follow lots of women, to address the imbalance in my timeline that could otherwise occur.
@dswanson @Miraz @ChrisJWilson @fiona @smokey @jeremycherfas @kitt @ronguest @dejus @RianVDM Thanks all for jumping in and/or reading. Others far more thoughtful than me (particularly @macGenie, @belle, and @vega -- whose post I hadn't yet seen) have written about this topic before, so I hesitated to bring it up again. But I felt like I needed to raise the issue again after my friend's remark indicating that it still needed to be discussed. I agree with Chris that it can't just be the hosting cost; it may be that the social media market, as it were, feels saturated to the average person, I don't know.
I don't know if I have any solutions to offer beyond continuing to evangelize for Micro.blog in one way or another and the occasional promotion like the holiday deal recently offered. But if this keeps the conversation about this alive -- and if this dialogue helps others discover some great women here to follow -- I'm happy.
@smokey You make an excellent point about the ebb-and-flow thing; it could be that with men "it's less noticeable because of the imbalance." I've looked up some of the women you mentioned (and some you haven't) and see they're just off the radar for one reason or another -- hopefully just temporarily.
@garciabuxton I have more thoughts on this, which I'll put into a new post. I actually mention it at the end of Micro Monday with @bennorris this week too.
@macgenie I haven't had a chance to catch the latest Micro Monday interview yet, so I'm glad you said something; thanks! Looking forward to reading more from you about this, Jean.
great post, @garciabuxton! That’s such a tough one to try and pick apart and understand. I was drawn to micro.blog for the indie blogging aspect, and found myself pleasantly surprised by the company. Maybe though, now the platform is well-established, people are looking at it in terms of tone and “tribe” before the blogging aspect. Though there are many pockets of diversity here, you do have to dig for them a bit. But I guess by nature of being diverse, those pockets do tend to get diluted/lost/among the more common sorts of discussions, that sound like they didn’t appeal much to your friend.
@jeremycherfas I prefer it to just about every alternative... “hey ladies,” (nope), “hey people,” (yick), “Folks,” (nuh-uh), “hey gang,” etc etc. “Guys” just seems inoffensive and neutral, despite its obvious origin.
@smokey @garciabuxton I still don't really know how to use the platform, tbh. I have a bloggy-blog and never felt like I couldn't make short posts there. The hole in my life is human interaction, which isn't the primary goal of micro.blog.
@jeremycherfas @herself I definitely have done everything I can to remove “guys” from my vocabulary, actually. I usually just say “y’all” or “folks,” or, in writing, folx.
Folx has just become standard in the XOXO community, and it’s nice!
@jw @jeremycherfas I get what you’re saying! It’s just that none of the alternatives feels quite right to me.
@garciabuxton wow did not realise and looking at other posts, it is so true. Is it a new tech startup thing? All the women I know seem to want to watch in social media and not take part. 🤔
@jw Why the cute spelling? I’m not against folks, but in balance I prefer people. Y’all would sound stupid coming out of my mouth.
@jeremycherfas I've just been googling the hell out of this, because it does bother me that there's nothing else, seemingly, that seemed right to me. "Folks" is the sort of thing your manager writes to your team when they're talking down to you. Y'all is never going to cut it in New Zealand, sorry. But "Hey everyone," sounds quite nice, inoffensive, is inclusive and carries no cultural bias/weight/power imbalance. I reckon "everyone" suits me :)
@jeremycherfas there’s a link in my post for the “folx” part; I think any change like that feels weird at first, but the man I get used to it. ☺️ A small change I can make for the better. 💙
@jw We'll have to wait and see. Few of the other terms they mention broke out of their particular self-identifying garden. Maybe this will be different. At least I can see an easy way to pronounce Folx without having to be instructed. And maybe nobody will be able to hear that that is what I am saying.
@herself Thanks! Truth be told, I got into Micro.blog as a replacement for Twitter before I understood the broader indie-blogging aspect of it. I wish I had known that right off the bat before I set up my self-hosted WordPress-based blog in an IndieWeb-influenced frenzy. :) You make an excellent point about people shopping for social media platforms with an eye toward "tone" and "tribe." Both can be excellent selling points about this place (and in fact, I've referred to this place as my "tribe" once or twice).
And my friend still likes Micro.blog; the "guys" thing was more of an observation than anything else.
@Munish Interesting point about the women you know in social media; I know lots of men who opt to just lurk, too, so I don't think it's a gender thing so much as perhaps a caution thing or simply being uninclined to participate.
@jeremycherfas for me, it's important to be proactive about it. Good to use my privilege for something like this. ☺️
@garciabuxton What a great post and fantastic conversation! I like the community feel on m.b., but I am still finding my feet. I like how people here are so supportive. I’m definitely not a techie though, so a lot of the conversations go over my head. I’m all for diversity!
@DiplomaticDiva Thank you! And I adore your photos here; they always remind me that I am way overdue to travel overseas.
This is a terrific place, and I'm happy to see the conversation continue about diversifying around here. I'm confident it'll happen, but it'll take time as people find out about it and see what kind of community we have here. Also glad to know I'm not the only one who has to tune out occasionally. :)
@kitt @ChrisJWilson Yep, that’s another seminal one (and I’m also in the same place, still questions not answers). @vega’s followup post expounds on some of those structural issues and is also worth a (re)read.
@RianVDM You can also peruse my back-catalog of Micro Monday recommendations; I’ve tried to make a habit of regularly featuring women who are blogging/participating here.
I try to follow lots of women, to address the imbalance in my timeline that could otherwise occur.
Exactly. Early on in my time here (probably around the time of the first big diversity discussion), @kitt made a good post along those lines which stuck with me, and I have tried to be proactive in shaping my timeline.
@smokey I missed this post and it was well worth a read. The comments about “a gun is just a tool” is a great comparison.
@garciabuxton I don’t know how much of it is a real factor, though? I suppose it does make sense, the thinking that if you are going to jump ship, you hope you can land somewhere nice :)
@herself @garciabuxton I am still thinking about this! With no disrespect intended to @manton, his "why I created Micro.blog" post, as well as the /about page, both focus on the tech aspect of the platform. That's obviously going to bring in people who are searching around on that aspect of the tech, or people who move in tech circles and hear about it that way. There's no mention about the social aspect, or about what the Indie Web actually means and why it is important. Controlling your own content is important, and all the reasons Manton lists for creating the platform are important. But I think there needs to be a place where we talk about what it means to be a Micro blogger. What does it feel like? How do conversations work? Why would I actually want to use it over Twitter or Facebook or Instagram if I'm not the sort of person who would tinker with creating their own blog? What's the community like? etc?
// cc @macgenie :)
@herself Excellent points all around. The “why” and “how do you connect with others here” of all this needs to be addressed — that may be what sells this place. A lot of @macgenie’s Micro Monday interviews certainly touch on these aspects, but perhaps a central page(s) of, say, testimonials might make sense here?
@herself @garciabuxton Whilst the official efforts are being worked on, people can certainly do something odd in this age of massive social networks; look to other people! Between individual Micro.blog members talking about these things and projects like the wiki and my own: @til (for example, I'm using the TIL twitter account in a easier-to-find effort to talk about these things) we're all gradually trying to build up communal knowledge of such issues as the IndieWeb, how conversations work, how Micro.blog feels, and so on.
Don't get me wrong, there is still a strong presence of people tinkering with tech and then also talking about that tinkering but there is also the other stuff too. I would like to better surface the other stuff, if I'm honest, and that is taking up more and more of my thinking since I agree that it is a lot more important than tech-centric people might realise.
@garciabuxton @herself et al. ☺️ I just wrapped up a marathon two-day planning session with @manton in Austin. We both feel good about what we've accomplished and are looking forward to executing. You are bringing up the points we actually discussed at length today. We have some improvements scheduled to address these excellent points. Given that Manton put an incredible amount of work into the platform improvements announced this week, I told him to take the weekend off. 😉 (I'm going to need the weekend off myself!)
@herself @garciabuxton Great points, thank you. To add to what @macgenie said, one reason the "why" page needs to be updated is that I originally wrote it in 2015. A year later, I blogged that M.b wasn't finished because "something was missing": a focus on community. The web site should better reflect everything we've learned since then. (Love the idea of capturing what the community "feels like" and the approach to conversations, following, etc.)
@herself Yep! Same here.
For the issue in general, I wonder if one of the hurdles is the fact that a number of people who enjoy the community aspect of Micro.blog so much aren't necessarily looking forward to it becoming popular to the point of being overwhelming; so instead of working on ways to boost the signal they just continue to enjoy themselves in the community and don't worry about it too much? I think of this in the way that Twitter, Instagram, and even Facebook were all exclusive for different reasons in the early days and that added to the allure of those platforms. // @garciabuxton @manton @macgenie
@manton I’m an INFP. Apparently we are all about the feels, hehe. You and @macgenie are amazing, thanks for making this such a great place :)
@simonwoods @herself I was thinking about the issue of growth and scale and whether this might be a concern around here. I guess I can understand the desire for exclusivity, perhaps to preserve the community we’ve got here. But I think the value of bringing in new perspectives can only benefit and strengthen this place. And I’m with you in preferring word of mouth to official outreach; that said, I’d love to see both approaches working in tandem.
Thank you, @macgenie and @manton, for everything you do for this place. I’m excited to see what’s next!
@garciabuxton @herself You had my curiosity up, so I tracked down a test at www.16personalities.com and got, what I think, is an odd result for me. ENTJ-A. Puts me in the same class as Steve Jobs and Whoopi Goldberg. Huh? Maybe I should retake it. :)
@ddykstal Great site! I GOT INFP-T, which lumps me in with Shakespeare, Bjork, and the title character from one of my favorite movies, "Amélie." Pretty happy with that lineup!
@garciabuxton Thanks for bringing in this important topic—I’d like to work more on having a diverse set of peeps to follow as well. I know I also need to practice the ideal and post more, but I’m still trying to figure out what it means to have a central hub again. I’m so used to being a virtual kaleidoscope that it’s hard to piece online self back together. The developing nature of m.b is both an advantage and a challenge in that there is almost too much freedom for creativity.
@garciabuxton What I hope Micro.blog does is (continue to) define a set of values and then nurture and grow a community that is in tune with those values (I don’t mean political views or etc, just values for interaction). This would distinguish it from other social media which is focused on driving growth above all else and then monetizing it’s users’ information. It also means Micro.blog will not be the “right” place for everyone and that should be ok. I think to support diversity within a a site like Micro.blog it will be critical to have effective filtering control because even within the site’s values I believe the people with the predominant viewpoints will run off others. I have already seen this kind of thing happen here and the site lacks tools to help. There’s been some rather heartless interactions lately.
@herself I first took the MB personality type test early in its popularity as part of a initiative at work. It was on paper and the woman leading the session scored our answers. She told me I “failed” and needed to take the test over because my answers indicated inconsistency. I think this largely happened because it asked some of the same questions in different contexts (work vs personal/social life). I tend to have different persona for work and “life”. I should take it again for fun.
@ronguest @garciabuxton They may be political values but some are toxic enough to be kicked out. It’s incumbent upon those with privilege to stand up for those without.
@pratik @garciabuxton This is one of those topics that’s hard to nail down in a few short interactions. I completely agree with the general sentiment you expressed and we likely agree pretty completely if we sat down and discussed it. Within a boundary that we haven’t defined, I really appreciate seeing open discussions of differing viewpoints without someone being made to feel bad for having a minority view. I like seeing the other viewpoints and also seeing things that cause me to think more deeply about my own views.
@ronguest @garciabuxton And I agree in general. But differing viewpoints politically speaking can be "I want a 20% tax rate and not 70%" or can be "homosexuality is an abomination and gays shouldn't be allowed to marry". A person who still believes in the latter in 2019 doesn't deserve my time or attention. If that person gets equal footing as I do in a community, I'll withdraw myself.
@pratik @garciabuxton Like I said, if we sat down and talked we’d likely agree completely 😃 No disagreement from me on your examples or those like it (which to me are hate speech).
@ronguest @garciabuxton And I'm sure we are on the same page based on our interactions 🙂 But often the lines get blurry and especially in these times when preferences are becoming more revealed, it's time to draw a line in the sand.
@ronguest the women need to be fired ... how on earth do you fail a Myers Briggs (assume that is ‘MB’) test? It’s whole point is to understand who we are ... who others are and how we can then best communicate between ourselves. I would also argue that there isn’t .. or at least shouldn’t .. be a work answer and a home answer.
@JohnPhilpin @ronguest That does sound pretty weird, especially considering the answers are all about how you percieve yourself! It may have been that you were borderline with two different poles, but that shouldn't have made much of a difference. I'm apparently in the middle of introvert & extrovert but tend more towards intro...
@herself @johnphilpin My I vs. E tends to be a bit situational. At work I’m an E but in my personal/social life I’m a pretty clear I. In work situations interacting with others is energizing. But elsewhere I tend to find it exhausting unless there is a bond or strong common ground.
@ronguest @johnphilpin Its interesting, isn’t it? Almost as if you have a limited reserve of it that you expend at work and then have to recoup in your own time. I feel that way too. :)
