Wide World of Women on the Web, August 13, 2007
Summer is nearly over and your friends here at Essential ELements have spent our vacation time on the road talking to women candidates and women voters. Our travels recently took us to Chicago where we discovered a new world of powerful women on the web!
Chicago played host to the BlogHer Conference and YearlyKos this year. First up was BlogHer, a collection of more than 10,000 women bloggers, nearly a thousand of whom gathered to share wisdom, ideas, good food, and to get their political game plans ready for 2008. Lisa Stone of Surfette heads this dynamic group of women along with her co-founders Jory Des Jardins and Elisa Camahort. The bloggers in attendance ranged from mommy bloggers like Cooper and Emily who recently started TheMotherhood.com, to the politically oriented Sarah Granger at Sairy, Morra Arrons at TechPresident.com, and Liza at the Culture Kitchen. BlogHer's women are gearing up for 2008 and spent the conference planning out their agenda at panels like "Earn Our Votes: What Questions Do Women Bloggers Want Candidates to Answer in Election 2008" and "How to Turn Your Blog into a GOtV Machine." Additionally, this year marked the launch of BlogHers Act, a year-long community initiative run by women online to aid a specific international issue - this year's act focuses on Global Health.
We returned to Chicago a week later for YearlyKos at the invitation of Executive Director Gina Cooper, the wonderful woman who almost single handedly puts the annual netroots gathering together. Kos played host to thousands of bloggers – men and women – from around the country who focus mostly on public policy and politics. Though they were fewer and farther between, we met some amazing women who are the leading voices for us in the blogosphere. The list is long but I strongly encourage you to check out the women of Firedoglake, Feministe, Pandagon, Feministing, The Real Hot 100, and Hullabaloo. We also met women whose wisdom graces the front pages of some of the top blogs in the country, including McJoan on Kos and Natasha on MyDD.
Though Jose Vargas at the Post and Ellen Goodman at the Globe have complained about the lack of diversity in the blogosphere and pointed to YearlyKos in particular as a bastion of middle-aged white men, my own experience and the wisdom of Jane Hamsher (See here and here) shows that women's voices are a strong and growing presence in the blogosphere. With a bevy of newfound friends, look for EMILY's List to make its presence felt on the web at a blog near you soon. We came home a little travel weary but very inspired by the work of these women and the enthusiasm and energy they put behind our common goal of getting more women engaged in the political process.
Have a great day!
Ramona