Feminine gamification viewpoint: wogrammer
Wogrammer.org aims to break the stereotype about software programmers and they share stories about ladies and their achievements in their career. The site was started by female software engineers who were fed up being asked about what it was like to work in technology and whether they had any horror stories relating to the much shared ‘brogrammer’ industry attitude. Instead they want ladies to share and be proud of the technology they built.
There is a story about Barbara from 67 Games, who is encouraging Africans to build their own games with African landscapes and African activities. The idea being that by having local role models, they can see themselves doing it too. Another story about Ashwini who works as a hardware engineer at Apple, where she is proud to fix problems and makes Macs run smoothly. Seeing them all around being used gives her the added satisfaction and pride of working on something meaningful. Yan Xu is proud to build augmented reality games such as for example Nerd herder where you herd nerds through a distracting office space.
If you are a lady in engineering you are invited to share what you are proud of in your career. I encourage you to do it, we definitely need more role models of ladies in technology doing great work. The challenge the women encountered is that women don’t as a rule brag about their achievements in the same way as their male counterparts in similar roles. Women are more likely to share that they are proud to be a mother or mentor than share their achievements in their career endeavours.
What did you achieve to date? which lady has inspired you and your work?
