Sex Porn does not belong in the content of technology conferences.

Folks, As a matter of principle,  it looks like I won’t be Regardless of the voting outcome on the session submission, I am going to speak at Wordcamp Boston.

“Getting the Money Shot: Making Screencasts Without Going Insane”

Danielle Morrill – Producing a useful screencast, where an online product or service is demonstrated for the user and they are introduced to the UI of your website, can increase the number of people who convert to customers. This talk will leave viewers with practical advise for creating their own screencast, including a list of tools and resources. It will also outline some of the things to avoid, the pyschology of the editor, and how thinking like a porn director will help you be sure to achieve the “”money shot”". Take 1 Mac, 1 Flipcam HD, a whole lot of coffee, and one really sleep deprived Danielle and hilarity ensues. — Ignite session

Update 1: I am changing my post title from, “What’s Wrong With Using Sex Porn To Sell Your Wordcamp Session?” because porn has no place at a technical conference. It is saying, “think like a porn director”.

Update 2: Wordcamp Boston has posted a response and I have answered.

In hindsight, I should not have shared on my live show that I was not going to attend if the presentation made it in.  That was a mistake.

I should have contacted the organizers first.  My plan was to wait and see because…if the topic didn’t get voted in, the post you’re reading right now would have never left my brain. It is interesting to see that the organizers are still holding onto the logic that the “40%” of women attendees somehow approved this topic with their tickets. I didn’t and I’m speaking up. I want to make it clear that I did not make threats against Wordcamp Boston. I planned to opt-out and not attend.

Timeline of events (all Central timezone):

6:30pm – 8pm Askadria.com show
9:47pm Email from Amanda
10:02pm Reply to Amanda
10:05pm Ooops, cc to John
10:30pm Reply from Amanda
10:57pm Reply to Amanda
11pm Email from Amanda
11:xxpm I start writing the post

What’s Wrong With Using Sex To Sell Your Wordcamp Session?

In a recent development on today’s AskAdria show, I stated that I would not be attending Wordcamp Boston if the above Ignite session made it in. It seems someone contacted the organizers so I received an email asking what was up. I explained my position via email which I will share below:

Amanda,

I am very offended by one of the Ignite sessions and mentioned on my show today that if it goes forward as one of the presentation, I will not attend Wordcamp Boston.  This all just happened today and I see voting ends Tuesday 1/12/2010 so I was going to wait to see who got selected.

The presentation is, “Getting the Money Shot: Making Screencasts Without Going Insane”

Danielle Morrill – Getting the Money Shot: Making Screencasts Without Going Insane Producing a useful screencast, where an online product or service is demonstrated for the user and they are introduced to the UI of your website, can increase the number of people who convert to customers. This talk will leave viewers with practical advise for creating their own screencast, including a list of tools and resources. It will also outline some of the things to avoid, the pyschology of the editor, and how thinking like a porn director will help you be sure to achieve the “”money shot”". Take 1 Mac, 1 Flipcam HD, a whole lot of coffee, and one really sleep deprived Danielle and hilarity ensues.

I don’t find pornography to be funny.  There are 20 year old attendees and speakers coming to these Wordcamps.  I don’t know how Techsmith or the Screenflow folks feel about pornography but I know I am not okay with referencing something that oppresses women and is truly an embarrassment to our modern day society.

I just met Laura, a 20 year old girl who wants to become a programmer.  Her dad, Brad, brought her to Wordcamp Atlanta to meet me.  He has been a regular at AskAdria.com.  I talked with her about her aspirations, provided advice and listened.  Syed Balkhi is 20 years old.  He is the founder of WPBeginner.  He attended Wordcamp NYC and just spoke at Wordcamp Atlanta.  Regardless of how either of these people feel about pornography, I don’t think it’s appropriate to have subject matter in any of the topics at a Wordcamp include pornography, how porn directors work or how to get a “Money Shot”.

I thought at first the person submitting it was a guy (assumption) then saw the name was Danielle.  Either way, it’s not okay with me who is presenting.

I’m upset this made it into the final submission list but I’m not surprised and explain why during the show.

I don’t expect the guys involved in organizing Wordcamp Boston to understand this as this submission made it through so my form of protest will be to not attend.

Now, I’m open to your thoughts and discussion this of course.  This all happened today.

Thanks,
Adria Richards
Organic Technology Consultant

I asked viewers to vote for the other Ignite session topics but that I would wait to see what happened with the results.  Voting ends tomorrow (Tuesday January 12th, 2010 at 11:59pm Eastern) so vote now if you want to affect the outcome of me speaking at Wordcamp Boston.

Amanda replied with the following and gave me an ultimatum to tell them if I was going or not. (I made sure to ask first if this correspondence should become public):

Adria,

first of all, to be clear, John Eckman and Jake Goldman would be the first to tell you, WordCamp Boston has an obnoxiously strong female leadership (me). We have a phenomenal ratio of women speakers vs other wordcamps and a mind blowing 40% of our attendees are women (40%! Usually its closer to 15-20%).  It is where the very first WP event just for women  (#wpchicks brunch) will take place, with great support from all the organizers. We will be giving a substantial amount of money to the WordPress Foundation, for the purpose of advancing women in WP. WordCamp Boston is VERY female friendly.

I’ve rarely seen a cause I can’t support, but I have to say, I think you may be overreacting on this one (but hey- more attention on #WCBos, so thanks on that!).  This talk is very obviously not about porn. “Money shot” is a pop culture term that’s widely understood, and the talk is about something that a lot of people are interested in hearing about:screencasting. I agree, I don’t like the tone of a lot of the female led talks “How to Be a Media Slut”, “I give good blog”, etc… but the flip side is: these are women owning their own sexuality, and its not forced upon them. Bottom line: I think you’re really exaggerating the offense here, and people who just READ the description will see that. It is:

Danielle Morrill – Getting the Money Shot: Making Screencasts Without Going Insane Producing a useful screencast, where an online product or service is demonstrated for the user and they are introduced to the UI of your website, can increase the number of people who convert to customers. This talk will leave viewers with practical advise for creating their own screencast, including a list of tools and resources. It will also outline some of the things to avoid, the pyschology of the editor, and how thinking like a porn director will help you be sure to achieve the “”money shot”". Take 1 Mac, 1 Flipcam HD, a whole lot of coffee, and one really sleep deprived Danielle and hilarity ensues.

I’d just like to raise the point that it might have been more effective to your goal to reach out in a far less volatile way and suggest to us, or the speaker that she consider an alternative, and even offer an alternative. To simply threaten to cause great inconvenience to use, the organizers to fill your slot (without even letting us know directly) 2 weeks before WordCamp seems counterproductive to the greater good.

#justsayin,
Amanda Blum, WordCamp Boston

What is a “Money Shot” Anyway?

Let’s take a look at what exactly constitutes a “money shot“.

Wikipedia says:

The term originates from mainstream feature filmmakers, who used the term “money shot” as slang for the image that costs the most money to produce.^[3] For example, in an action thriller, an expensive special effects sequence of a dam bursting might be called the “money shot” of the film. The Simpsons showrunner Bill Oakley called the “Homer³” section of “Treehouse of Horror VI“, (where a 2d character steps into a three-dimensional CGI world) the money shot.

A money shot has also been used as another name for a cum shot in pornographic films. The shot was so named because if a male actor could not provide this shot he would not be paid. It has also been argued that this is the filmed moment the audience has paid to see. According to Stephen Ziplow, author of The Film Maker’s Guide to Pornography , “…the cum shot, or, as some refer to it, ‘the money shot’, is the most important element in the movie and that everything else (if necessary) should be sacrificed at its expense.” Linda Williams has argued that, “The money shot is thus an obvious perversion – in the literal sense of the term, as a swerving away from more “direct” forms of genital engagement – of the tactile sexual connection.”

The term has gained acceptance in pop culture and is sometimes used in conversation. Borrowing the meaning from the pornographic film industry, the term is used to refer to a highly anticipated or satisfying end, but in a non-pornographic context.

So there you have it.

I am doing what feels right to me.  I am tired of “Booth Babes” at technology events.  I am tired of being mistaken as an assistant vs the primary IT consultant on a project.  I don’t want to see young women growing up to think they’re not anything special unless they have a set of fake boobs and men find them physically attractive.

I’m pulling this up from a comment I left:

Pornography isn’t sex. It’s the scripted and usually demeaning illusion of
sex. It often includes violence against women, rape, assault and a power
imbalance between the male and female actors.

If every single person attending Wordcamp Boston was not a virgin, that
would be fine with me. It’s not about sex, sexual activity and what people
do in their free time. It’s using terms associated with pornography in a
presentation intended for a technical conference.

Back To The Software

Since the actual subject matter is screencast videos, let’s explore that. The main software providers to record, edit and produce videos of your computer screen are:

• Camtasia Studio and Jing by Techsmith
• Screenflow by Telestream
• Hypercam by Hyperonics
• iShowU by ShinyWhiteBox

I don’t know how these companies feel about pornography.  I know I’ve never seen Techsmith use sex to sell their products.  If they started to, I would send an email promptly and express my opinion.

Alternate Sex Free Pitches

So you may be saying, “Well, it does get people’s attention.”.  I agree.

Some alternate content suggestions I thought of included focusing on how famous directors create captivating moments (Think Star Wars) or documentary folks make stories so real you pick up your phone after the movie and take action.

Why Sexy Slides at Technical Conferences Is a Bad Idea

I’ve seen a move with these “camps” to use swear words in the titles to attract attention or use “slang”.  Yes, ok.  For me, this crosses the line to think that a young person would attend this event.  We’ve all seen what can happen when no one stands up to oppose a guy drawing penises with a virtual app where a woman orgasamed at a Flash developer conference in Minneapolis.  Below is a first hand story account from Courtney Remes, an interactive media strategist who attended the conference:

Yesterday’s afternoon keynote is this guy named Hoss Gifford — I believe his major claim to fame is that viral “spank the monkey” thing that went around a few years back.  Highlights of his talk:

• He opens his keynote with one of those “Ignite”-esque presentations — where you have 5-minutes and 20 slides to tell a story — and the first and last are a close-up of a woman’s lower half, her legs spread (wearing stilettos, of course) and her shaved vagina visible through some see-thru panties that say “drink me,” with Hoss’s Photoshopped, upward-looking face placed below it.
• He later demos a drawing tool he has created (admittedly with someone else’s code) and invites a woman to come up to try it.  After she sits back down, he points out that in her doodles she’s drawn a “cock.”
• Then he decides he wants to give a try at using the tool to draw a “cock” (he loves this word) — and draws a face, then a giant dick (he redraws it three times) that ultimately cums all over the face.
• A multitude of references to penises and lots of swearing — and also “If you are easily offended, fuck you!”
• And then, to top it off, a self-made flash movie of an animated woman’s face, positioned as if she’s having sex with you, who gradually orgasms based on the speed of your mouse movement on the page.

How to Encourage or Exclude Women From Your Technology Products and Events

For a while, I didn’t really like Jason Calacanis (he made some comment on Twitter that I replied to comparing “Internet Famous” White guys like himself and Scoble to timeless hip-hop groups like Run DMC and the Beastie Boys… oh, but that’s another blog post) but when I saw in his September 8th, 2009 newsletter, “22 Tips on How to Operate a Trade Show Booth” that he didn’t want to see booth babes at Tech Crunch 50, I made up my mind right then I would attend the next one.

15. Don’t hire booth babes or strippers
=============
Unless you work in the modeling, strip club or porn business, don’t
hire models, strippers or porn stars to work your booth–it’s
insulting to women. Now, that doesn’t mean the folks in your booth
can’t be attractive and well manicured. It just means, have some
taste. At last year’s conference, someone had a bunch of stripper
types in hot pants and absurdly tight t-shirts. It was totally cheap,
cheesy and lame. It’s 2009, people, really.

See, all it takes is just a bit of encouragement to say, “Come In. You are welcome here. We’ve made it nice just for you.”. I now respect @Jason and look forward to going to #tc50 in 2010.

As you know, I dislike DimDim for using sex to sell their webinar software.

I also fault Microsoft for trying to make it cool to surf porn on your laptop and then hide it from your wife.

I was about to make a sad face on Zendesk too but Violet, a sexologist, gave me a new perspective.

Check out HOWTO Encourage Women in Linux written by Valerie Aurora, a Linux kernal developer and consultant who has had a strong voice in LinuxChix and independently raising awareness on why women are missing from open source development projects and how to fix it.

We could also look at this as me “ruining” Wordcamp Boston by ditching out on them at the last minute after I confirmed as a speaker.  I did not change my intentions.  They changed their content and message which I cannot support if that session gets voted in. The weird thing is, I was just discussing it in my live stream and had not truly confirmed I would cancel so that means someone viewing the stream reached out to the organizers.

I had to deal with this when I submitted my entry for John Chow’s contest.  I was offering 500 free hugs for pass to Blogworld but Corree Silvera said she would give good blog for a pass.  I was concerned that her offer would win BUT I got the full access pass!

Once I got to Blogworld, I encountered this again at a party NOT sponsored by Blogworld where there were empty bathtubs with women “making out” with each other. My friend took a photo.

Update: I was mistaken about the have no idea now if The party where I saw the “bathtub babes”  Lavo was NOT sponsored by Blogworld according to Blogworld.  Stefanie was told it was according to her comment below.  It was hosted by Joseph Morin (self described internet marketing, evangelist and jetsetter) and Stefanie Michaels of Adventuregirl.com. Both have said they did not know about the ladies in the bathtubs.

Update 2: I called Lavo and they confirmed the “bathtub babes” are employees who work 10pm – 4am, Tuesday through Sunday.

Why should women attending technical conferences have to see this?

And if we do, where is our equal opportunity with men in hard hats, lifting bricks or men in business suits taking it all off?

I know there is a special brunch for WordPress Chix the day after the conference.  I read in Amanda’s email that 40% of attendees are women.

Just because a porn star owns her own production company and website, that doesn’t make her “empowered”.

What did I actually say?

I realize now… that I cannot say things in passing at AskAdria.com.

People are listening.

What has usually been a small gathering of technology minded folks and business people looking for help has grown.

I should have talked to the organizers of Wordcamp Boston about my concerns before saying something on the show.  Once I did that, things were out of my hands.

At 00:09:12 into the show, I begin to explain about the submission on how to make screencasts like a porn director and how this is inappropriate and even more so because there are young people attending.  I say it’s going to be a dealbreaker if it’s selected for the final round of sessions, I won’t be attending or presenting at Wordcamp Boston.

At 00:12:41 I describe meeting Laura, Brad’s daughter.  Brad has been a regular viewer at my live show at AskAdria and he wanted his daughter to meet me so she could get her questions answered about what her next steps were in development or programming.

Brad stopped in so I asked him the following question, “Would you feel comfortable sending Laura to a Wordcamp where one of the sessions had to do with pornography?”

I then read off the title and description of the session.

A father should not have to answer this.

I give my answer tomorrow today.

photo credit: Graham Ballantyne