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Gendering the Internet: Claims, Controversies and Cultures 259

The so-called ‘actor network’ of human and technical actors involved in the
development of the Internet as a technology is almost 100 percent male. In John
Naughton’s (1999) brief history of the Internet only one woman is found, Nicola
2
Pellow, who was involved in the development of HTML in the 1980s. Male dom-
inance in ICT research and development is not likely to change. On the contrary,
the number of women studying and working in the sector in the US has fallen
from 30 percent in 1989 to 15 percent in 1999 (Nua, 1998) and similar downward
trends have been noted in Europe. The image of the IT sector turns out to be a
strong prohibitive factor for women who associate IT work with long working
hours, unsociable male colleagues and a male chauvinist culture. Evidence of the
latter can be seen, for instance, in a recent discussion in the hacker community
about the role of women. In hacker news network, editor Eric Parker describes
women in the hacker community as ‘scene whores’:

They are a real threat. They waste our time, ruin friendships, cause chaos
between hackers, and generally ruin periods of our life. A sure sign after
being compromised by a scene whore, after they are done with you, is when
you go to talk to friends you have neglected during the period compromise,
and they say ‘Welcome back, we missed you.’ (Parker, 2000)

As this quote shows, in terms of texts, representations and communicative prac-
tices the Internet is also not simply a women’s haven. Although there are few
systematic analyses of the representations and constructions of gender on the
Internet, there is enough evidence about (child) pornography, right-wing
extremism, sexual harassment, flaming and other unpleasantness to disclaim
any utopian vision of the Internet as an unproblematic feminine environment.
It is telling that an important women’s movement on the net, that of the web-
grrls, had to name itself ‘grrls’, instead of ‘girls’ because searching on the net for
‘girls’ mainly produces sex sites and very little relevant material for women
(Sherman, 1998). An important source on gender patterns in online communi-
cation comes from computer-mediated communication (CMC) studies. Email,
chat boxes, news groups, discussion lists are all examples of CMC. Several
researchers have analysed the communicative practices in CMC, finding femi-
nine discourse in groups dominated by women: apologetic, consensual and
communicative language patterns are typical for them. Masculine discourse
occurs in male groups; it is found to be factual, action oriented, impersonal,
argumentative, sometimes rude and aggressive. Masculine discourse is seen
in most mixed-gender groups as well, making it difficult if not impossible
for women to participate fully in such groups (for an overview, see Postmes
et al., 2000).
There seems thus as much evidence for the claim that the Internet is masculine
and a male world, as there is for the claim that it is feminine and a female world.
There is yet another claim to the gender of the Internet, and that is that it has no
gender, or better that it is a gender laboratory, a playground for experimenting
with gender symbols and identity, a space to escape from the dichotomy of gender
and the boundaries produced by physical bodies.