Watch the Future of VR Discussed at a Conference with a Speaker Gender Balance from the Mad Men Era

This year's Silicon Valley VR conference is happening today and tomorrow, and you can watch the stream of speakers live here:

Ebbe Altberg, CEO of Linden Lab, was just on discussing Sansar and Second Life, but unless I missed it, no huge revelations were revealed. But keep watching to hear more from the men running the VR industry today.

And I do mean men: Out of the 61 speakers I'm counting here, only 6 are women: Layla Mah, Jody Medich, Evelyn Miralles, Denise Quesnel, Mary Spio, and Nonny de la Peña. The work of de la Peña, by the way, was praised by VR pioneer Jacki Morie in my interview with her last week, in which we discussed how male heavy the VR industry has become, even though, during VR's first wave, a majority of the VR experience developers were women. Now, however, as you can see for yourself from the live video stream, that gender balance has entirely changed.

I should note that I discussed the gender imbalance with the SVVR coordinators last year, and can confirm they're aware of the issue. If I recall who spoke last year, there's actually a few more women speaking than last year. But the breakdown is still pretty bad.

I can already hear someone mansplaining a reason: "That's only because the tech industry in general has such a poor gender balance. That answer only raises more questions, but putting those to one side, a key question remains:

How does the VR industry plan on gaining mass market adaptation of their products, when the people building those products only looks like half their target market?

Please share this post:

Tweet

 

Comments

[Shockwave Yareach]

Here is a idea - why not go directly to the source for your information? There are lots of women in SL, which would mean those women are at least somewhat interested in technology. How many of those women are in engineering or programming? And those who aren't, why aren't they?

You'll get much better data this way. you keep trumpeting about a gender imbalance in high tech. Rather than fussing at us inside the garden, how about asking those outside the garden why they aren't inside? I'm curious myself.

[Steller Sunshine]

Very Informative article hammy )..I would like to think next year ebbe will be able to share so much on the new platform then today.

Phillip on High Fidelity a no show or just to busy it seems.

[Orca Flotta]

@ Shockwave: being a resident of SL doesn't say anything about girls being "interested in technology". Not in the year 2015, not anymore. Just ask around about how most connect to the SL grid these days: wireless on cheapo 300 $/€ laptops, or even worse on fukn tablets or smartyphones if possible. Ask how many are modding their GUIs and their graphics settings or if they have even bought hardware specifically for the use in graphics heavy SL environment. I bet you're met by blank stares (as if our avies could stare any differently, LOL).

Not even our host here on this bloggy is any wiz kid in that regard, as his misfortunate adventures on Alienware "gaming" laptops show.

Or see the wall of indifference/hatred I walk into every time I talk/post about Linux OS. SL at the fucking forefront of VR, as pioneering area of technology is long gone. SL is friggin mainstream these day, they just missed the jump into the primetime.

Actual clue about the technology, server and client side, is very rarely to be found among the female population of SL. But that goes for the boys too, so I guess the reason for so few women in tech jobs is very simple: they just can't be bothered.

[Orca Flotta]

@ Shockwave: being a resident of SL doesn't say anything about girls being "interested in technology". Not in the year 2015, not anymore. Just ask around about how most connect to the SL grid these days: wireless on cheapo 300 $/€ laptops, or even worse on fukn tablets or smartyphones if possible. Ask how many are modding their GUIs and their graphics settings or if they have even bought hardware specifically for the use in graphics heavy SL environment. I bet you're met by blank stares (as if our avies could stare any differently, LOL).

Not even our host here on this bloggy is any wiz kid in that regard, as his misfortunate adventures on Alienware "gaming" laptops show.

Or see the wall of indifference/hatred I walk into every time I talk/post about Linux OS. SL at the fucking forefront of VR, as pioneering area of technology is long gone. SL is friggin mainstream these day, they just missed the jump into the primetime.

Actual clue about the technology, server and client side, is very rarely to be found among the female population of SL. But that goes for the boys too, so I guess the reason for so few women in tech jobs is very simple: they just can't be bothered.

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

@Orca: SL users indifferent to Linux, that's probable. and understandable. Why shouldn't people who don't use it be indifferent to in in the same way I'm indifferent to Windows. But actual hatred? I don't think so.

[Orca Flotta]

@Crono: Well, maybe I overdramatized a bit here, but then, as a female I'm allowed to throw a hissy fit every now and then, no? But you must know I'm not just a quiet Linux user, I'm actually posting about it from time to time in my bloggy. Obviously not to everyone's liking. But worse it's in YouTube comments.

Why can't I just shut up and live in peace and harmony? Stupid beach me :(

[melponeme_k]

The simple reason is that male VR designers don't want women in their playground. They don't make the job atmosphere conducive to a mixed workforce. Why? Oh because, they might end up with a product that could compete against the ONLY VR on market called SL. They hate SL. Because it isn't the VR they want. It doesn't cater to whatever they think VR should be.

For whatever reason, they don't like the idea that VR people (both male and female) like to make Barbie dream houses then sit in them and chat. It makes them break out into a rash. Why should we want that when we can go out and LIVE Call of Duty!!!

Just take a look again at the fiasco called Garrisons in WOW. Instead of an immersive environment they gave us the Cinderella drudgery experience. NO, picking out wall paper for you! But here go grind for a couple of million times before you get anything interesting.

Male tech VR people want us to have VR but they only want to give us the VR they want. Which leads again to my first paragraph. Women get in the way.

[Shockwave Yareach]

Evelyn Miralles spoke there about VR today. We at NASA used VR as way back in the 90s to give astronauts simulations of what they were going to see and do, before sending them to the NBL. And Evelyn is not an engineer there in bldg 9.

She is the Chief Engineer, and is in charge of the entire VR group, top to bottom. She hires and she fires, she decides what hardware to use and when to update. PhDs and astronauts do what she tells them to do.

But please, continue to tell me about the good old boy club keeping women down.