Posts Tagged social networking

Google+ has a gender problem

Google+ is the hot new thing in social networking (the jury’s still out for me on whether it’s a positive addition). But the first thing I encountered when I went to sign up for the site sent up my gender flares and painted it in a negative light from the start. And I’m not talking about the possibly erroneous claim the site has a huge male majority.

Users are required to provide two pieces of information: their name, and their gender. And the gender options are Male, Female, and Other.

Facebook’s gender policy has been criticized for a long time because of the lack of options, but at least putting a gender marker on your profile is optional. With ...

Google+ is the hot new thing in social networking (the jury’s still out for me on whether it’s a positive addition). But the first thing I encountered when I went to sign up for the site sent ...

Girl Scouts Research Institute releases new findings on girls and social media

Last night, the Girl Scouts Research Institute celebrated its tenth anniversary with the release of Who’s That Girl? a new study about girls and social media. I’ve written about the GSRI and the wonderful work that they do before, and I’m so glad that this study has been done. Here are a few quick numbers for you. In a study of about 1000 girls between the ages of 14 and 17:

In person, girls say they come across as smart (82%), funny (80%), kind (76%) and outgoing (55%) as well as fun, cool, a good influence and socially confident.

Online, the words girls most frequently use to describe themselves are fun, funny and social. ...

Last night, the Girl Scouts Research Institute celebrated its tenth anniversary with the release of Who’s That Girl? a new study about girls and social media. I’ve written about the GSRI and the ...

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Not Oprah’s Book Club: Share This!

I recently had the pleasure of reading internet extraordinaire Deanna Zandt‘s newly released book, Share This: How You Will Change the World with Social Networking. You may have read her Feministing interview recently, but I thought I’d give you a bit of a better idea of what Share This offers its readers, and why you should buy the damn thing.

This book is not an instructional how-to on how to use social networking. It isn’t a step-by-step guide on how to use hashtags. What this book offers is a perspective into how social justice and the internet can be intrinsically connected, how they may conflict against one another, and most importantly, how we ...

I recently had the pleasure of reading internet extraordinaire Deanna Zandt‘s newly released book, Share This: How You Will Change the World with Social Networking. You may have read her