The history of Information Technology and the perception of women by Chiin Tan and Brian Byrne.

The history of Information Technology and the perception of women

An open innovation discussion at Mozfest 2017 led by Chiin Tan and Brian Byrne.

Transcript

1. The history of Information Technology and the perception of women An open innovation discussion at Mozfest 2017 led by Chiin Tan and Brian Byrne. Chiin Tan and Brian Byrne
2. Despite many women playing a significant part in the development of computer programming and early computing there is little recognition of women's contributions. Why is that still the case in the 21st century?
3. What practical steps can we take in the Open Source community to change that perception of women? What must be done to involve more women and underrepresented genders in technology?
4. What do we mean by “the perception of women”? How women see things, themselves and how they are viewed. How women are seen, from the outside.
5. Introducing Chiin Tan Chiin is a Cambridge graduate, organiser of the Artificial Intelligence (AI) Club for Gender Minorities and a start-up entrepreneur. She cares deeply about gender equality. Twitter: @AnalyticsPanda Chiin Tan
6. Introducing Brian Byrne. Brian is a freelance IT manager. He organises Linuxing In London, co-organises London JavaScript community and Covent Garden Pi Jam. He studied history at Queen Mary. He’s been strong advocate for open source and Linux since the 1990s. Twitter: @BrianLinuxing Brian Byrne
7. We welcome everyone’s contribution, but first.
8. A quiz!
9. Question: Name these individuals and rank their contribution to computing?
10. A
11. B
12. C
13. D
14. Question: How do you rank them and why?
15. There is no correct answer, but Grace Hopper wins hand down, without a doubt. For innovation, originality and persistence.
16. Grace Hopper invented the idea of compilers, subroutines and “de-bugging”. Not forgetting how she invented/co-authored three computer languages from scratch. She had a Phd in mathematics from Yale. During WW2 she worked in ENIAC and the Mark 1 In 1952 she developed the A0 language, FLOW-MATIC in 1955 and COBOL (1959). She died in 1992.
18. B. Steve Jobs of Apple. Famous for the Apple II, the Apple Lisa, the Macintosh, NeXT and iPod, iPhone and iPad. Clever, but all of his work was derived.
19. B. Gordon Moore, Intel. Devised Moore’s law, the observation that “the number of transistors per square inch on integrated circuits has doubled every year since their invention”. Co-founder of Fairchild Semiconductors and Intel. Smart but an observation is not “law”, it's statistics.
20. C. Bill Gates, Microsoft, MS-DOS (in part), Windows, MS Office. Wrote a BASIC interpreter for Altair 8800 in 1975. Got lucky with IBM in 1980 rebadging 86-DOS as MS-DOS. Famous for the “blue screen of death”, so beloved by early Windows users. In the right place at the right time.
21. One woman was more original and fundamental to computing than 3 men, that is Grace Hopper.
24. Your thoughts?
25. A traditional history of modern computing
26. John von Neumann Alan Turing IBM PCs Bill Gates Intel -MS-DOS/Windows 1980s->2000s
27. John von Neumann - 1940s
28. Alan Turing - 1940s
29. IBM PC - 1981
30. Intel 8088 - ~1983
31. MS-DOS - 1981
32. Windows 1.0 - 1985
33. Question: What is missing from there?
34. 51% of the world’s population
35. The constant focus on men, even when they are ill suited to comment. All male panels!
39. What are we missing? Women’s fundamental contribution of computing and technology
40. Ada Byron King (aka Ada Lovelace), first coder
41. Hedy Lamarr, inventor of Spread spectrum technology (frequency hopping), used in Wifi, etc
42. BizTech - May 2012
43. We forget these key figures.
45. ENIAC’s “Computers” ENIAC, 30 metres long and programmed by six women.
46. Summarising the discussion
47. To review Hedy Lamarr (1913-2000) ENIAC’s “Computers” (1940s) Hidden figures (1960s) 200 influential women in tech
48. Resources and links http://eniacprogrammers.org/ http://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/eniac.html http://www.wmm.com/filmcatalog/pages/c929.shtml https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2W6j5bts_c https://www.women.cs.cmu.edu/ada/Resources/Women/ https://biztechmagazine.com/article/2012/05/mothers-technology-10-women-who-invent ed-and-innovated-tech
49. Resources and links https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/10/we-need-more-women-in-te ch-the-data-prove-it/280964/ http://discovermagazine.com/2002/nov/feat50 https://techcrunch.com/2014/12/20/transforming-the-conversation-on-women-in-comp uter-science/ http://fortune.com/2014/09/18/walter-isaacson-the-women-of-eniac/