I have a confession to make. The tech industry drives me up the wall. All too often topics that diverges from their myopic worldview in the valley are either ignored or flippantly discounted.
Recent developments in the online fashion and women’s space has been greeted with a kind of suspicion and ignorance that I find appalling. Like.com’s launch had geeks scratching their heads over why Munjal Shah would stake his future on clothes and accessories (ummm maybe because they are products people buy guys, to the tune of billions of dollars a year?) and the proliferation of style sites has met with an even more frustrating grunt from the high priestess of tech naval gazing himself. Ugh Mr. Arrington? Ugh? It is your attitude to which I say Ugh.
Why is it that the fastest growing, highest revenue potential of the online spaces is ignored by the Valley? Fashion is an industry that is geared toward one thing: selling expensive products. In a nation in which eighty percent of the purchasing decisions are made by women and untold billions are spent wooing them, why is it so hard to imagine that the Internet should be made more friendly to subjects women find amenable? And boys, why is it that fashion seems like such a waste to you? Don’t give me any guff about it being frivolous and anti-intellectual, computer games aren’t exactly Proust either.
Furthermore who cares, if it makes money (and let me tell you fashion does) then the only arbiter is the bottom line and I don’t see Gucci hurting for profits. Monetizing Youtube maybe a problem for the next ten years but fashion sites are the easiest things in the world to monetize and I don’t just mean just via advertisements. A comment by one Susan Doran on Techcrunch regarding a post called Women, Style, Clothes, Ugh sums it all up for me.
Susan Doran
December 23rd, 2006 at 7:15 pm
And while this is a dissenting view, and dissenting views can be dealt with harshly on social sites, I just wanted to say I actually didn’t like the title of this article “Women. Clothes. Style. Ugh…� I know it was meant to be tongue in cheek and edgily non-PC, but it made me sad.
And I was wondering whether anyone who asks why women don’t present more at conferences–or generally put forward their voices more assertively in forums like this–sees a connection between that phenomenon and the fact that a prominent member of “the community� feels confident giving a blog entry a title like one written by a squeamish 10 year old boy about icky yucky girls.
And for the women who let it be known that they’re not one of “those girls�…I understand the impetus to do so (i.e., letting it be known they’re not of the bubblehead ilk so that maybe the guys who rank in the social hierarchy expressing this opinion will like them; and conveying their approval of gadgets over fashion signaling they should be taken seriously), but it doesn’t do any of us any good.
And for people who say lighten up, or “we don’t know you anyway so your opinion doesn’t matter to us,� that’s ok! The above just needed to be said.
My question then to everyone on this blog is what can we do to repair this divide? Tech doesn’t like us and we don’t much like tech but in the future we need to work together. Fashion sites see very little in the way of tech money and the sites that do get funding are ridiculed or discounted, leaving most of us to build on shoestrings and alienated from Silicon Valley entirely despite excellent reputations in our respective fields. Thoughts, comments, questions, and rebuttals are welcome. I would sincerely like to hear Mr. Arrington’s thoughts.
Yeah, I think that Computer Science & Information Technology are currently very inbred disciplines. The focus is largely upon the tools themselves with little substantive attention given to the intersection of Technology and other disciplines (there are exceptions). The end result of this inbreeding is that a number of folks with entirely Tech backgrounds don’t have the developed understanding of the human predicament that comes with Liberal Arts study and its heaping dose of Humanities. So, when “outsiders” use Technology (that the geeks have poured over, fixing and perfecting) for their own unique ( read evil) purposes, what is a geek to do other than squwalk and say “Eeew” and “Ugh”?! Hack into your server maybe?
As far as Arrington’s post is concerned, I think he is trying to drum up some controversy that isn’t there. One thought is that he is trying to write what he would expect his reads to think about fashion sites. Either way, in order to move forward in this “discussion”, we have to remember that some Tech folks may be reacting not to users’ genuine interest in fashion, but to their own previous experiences of fashion qua social-tool-used-to-exclude-others (unfortunately fashion has this rep, although most fashion lovers know the connection between fashion and being-a-manipulative-social-tool is contingent and isn’t essential to what we find endearing about fashion). So, I think giving “the geeks” credit where credit is due is important and also not belittling their hobbies or interests even though they may continue to roll their eyes at ours. Ultimately, Computer Science and Technology education needs reform, but until then we’ll just have to help “the geeks” become more socially-aware folks by reminding them that we’re not out to force our interests on the world; we just want a piece of it, too.
Well, I think you hit the nail on the head. Fashion is frivolous and non-intellectual, just like the video games you brought up – but if you enjoy video games, you enjoy them, and if you enjoy fashion, you enjoy it. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard people scoffing about video games, and it’s probably a lot more than I’ve heard scoff at fashion.
It’s not that they’re bad pursuits, but you have to be into them to appreciate them, like stamp-collecting or anything else that doesn’t add social value. But at their heart, and despite the rather common hobby of video games, tech geeks tend to be pragmatic and are more interested in technological advancement than style. *shrug* It’s the nature of the beast, I’m afraid.
Jessica-
I think it sad but true what you say here “Either way, in order to move forward in this “discussionâ€?, we have to remember that some Tech folks may be reacting not to users’ genuine interest in fashion, but to their own previous experiences of fashion qua social-tool-used-to-exclude-others (unfortunately fashion has this rep, although most fashion lovers know the connection between fashion and being-a-manipulative-social-tool is contingent and isn’t essential to what we find endearing about fashion)”
Years later when we are all grown ups are we still in the old social patterns of high school? As fair asI am concerned the discussion should be focused on issues such as business viability, novel use of technology applications for varied purposes, and frankly the utility the targeted user base gets from a site or application. Rarely do I ever see those three topics adequately addressed. Fashion sites all have incredible business viability, many have done very novel things with social technology, and their targeted user base is very happy. Hard to say that about many of the other products that Mr. Arrington pimps on a daily basis.
Like Yitz says you can’t discount fashion because of some silly idealogue notion of it being unworthy or frivlous, so is most of tech. So let’s stick to the issues of business shall we?
Hi all,
I think Arrington’s article is simply one that matches the attitudes of most of the audience on Techcrunch. A site where people upload pictures of what they’re wearing that day simply doesn’t make sense to most of his audience, as there is no direct use for the site in their daily lives (unlike a new feed reader or something like that.)
I’m personally not sure if the VC route is really a good idea for many fashion oriented sites. First of all, we have Glam.com poisoning the well for us by putting up essentially fake traffic numbers. Second of all, most VC’s want some sort of patent or IP that is defensible, which many businesses lack. And thirdly, many ideas are new and unproven business models in a *very* traditional market.
I would recommend going directly to the fashion and retail industry and working with them if you need financing. Unless you have a killer feature on your site, or you have thousands of users, you will not get a VC’s attention. I managed to briefly get some attention the first time I showed someone shop by color, but that quickly went away once new and better implementations happened.
-Chris
Hi,
The thing for me on this is that I know Mike somewhat well from a business relationship standpoint and I can truly say I don’t honestly believe he meant it in this way. I would be the first to say if I felt he was trying to be condescending or disrespectful to our industry, but I know how he is about fashion (he has zero fashion sense and jokes of it) – he’s joked with me one day when I mentioned having boots delivered to my office because that same day he got some tech stuff and thought it was a funny difference. I just don’t believe he meant it the way some have been taking it. I see Munjal copied on this thread and I believe he also knows Mike – maybe he has a different take on what Mike might have meant with it? I’m not sticking up for Mike – I just honestly can say knowing his character and personality, I just don’t believe that this is the take he intended with it.
I’m not sure what everybody’s background is on this thread – you all may have different interaction with the industry than I have, but I can say in the seven years I’ve worked in technology/internet business, including the two years directly working in it with StyleDiary, I haven’t really encountered any disrespect, discredit or anything really negative at all from anybody. I’ve talked with some pretty big players in the space, also a lot of VC, journalists, analysts, etc., since we launched StyleDiary and all have been very respectful and cool with me – some are huge advocates now for us and support what we are doing, give me advice and insight, etc. on a continuous basis. I have a lot of great contacts in the business and Silicon Valley specifically, and all have stemmed from reaching out to them initially about StyleDiary (including Michael Arrington). I believe it is in part because they were willing to listen long ago despite that we are a fashion-focused business.
I can say, however, that I have encountered plenty of people who were not willing to listen or who didn’t have interest, many who clearly aren’t familiar with our business or the role the fashion niche plays online (particularly in driving commerce) and some who don’t understand that there’s value in this market segment. But, none have ever made light of our accomplishments or value within the business community. In the past two years we’ve owned StyleDiary, nearly everybody I’ve reached out to has taken time to talk with me at the very least. In this, though, I have found few really understand the online fashion business and I’ve had to share a lot to help educate some of them. J.
I think it’s worth noting, though, that we are also in a very unique phase of internet use and deployment, and some of the issues we’re discussing can more than likely be credited to this as well. A lot is new to the internet/tech industry, even for as wise and well versed it is, and up until last year, pretty much every aspect of the web had been ignored (as few companies have wanted to put money into it following the dot com bust). We’re luckily in a second wind thanks to shifts in consumer usage, internet speeds, convergence, etc. – we feel it’s going to take time before the top level action trickles into the specific niches. Happily, the movement we’ve been seeing (funding, new start-ups, duplicate sites being created, etc.) shows that people are at last noticing the fashion/shopping sector.
Also, your site (as does mine) falls more into media platform in the eyes of the industry and few VC firms in the Valley invest in these type of businesses, which could also be playing a factor in response. I also believe there’s a lack of awareness and a little uncertainty of what will happen next on the web overall, and that may also be playing a factor. Many simple want to wait and see how things shake out, there’s little proof in what works/what doesn’t, etc. I don’t think it can ever be expected that an industry which is predominately male and comprised of engineers to necessarily understand fashion
but I can say from at least our experience thus far, they do understand when you speak their language about it.
But, I also think it’s important to understand that fashion is one niche and shopping another. Both play into each other, but stand alone they are very different. Few consumers take the time to put together an outfit everyday or even care about the current trends, but nearly everybody buys some kind of apparel every year. Fashion does drive a part of online commerce, but how much isn’t really known by anybody, and I think it’s going to take time for business/tech to recognize any part it has in it. Even still, for some it just may not be worth the investment. We actually had a call with a fairly large investment banking firm not long ago and they had mentioned during our briefing that they researched the fashion/style internet market and found that all of the sites (i.e., glam, style.com, etc.) underperformed in comparison to other internet markets (and they therefore do not invest in it). They quickly added that they understood it’d be valuable to specific companies but that it wasn’t enough for them to personally put money into it. I think this will change as numbers grow and consumer access to fashion/style increases, at least somewhat. But for me, all of this – what I’m sharing here – points to a variety of reasons why tech/business may not be fully recognizing the value of the fashion niche – or why to some degree, some may never delve into it.
Not sure if my oddly long response shares any insight, but that’s my 2 cents.
Tech employees in general don’t dress up for work unless they are in sales or work for a PR firm. During an interview for a well-known tech company, I was explicitly told that I didn’t need to wear a suit to the interview(!). Inf fact, this attitude is being transferred to NY. There’s an article in the Times about Google setting up shop in Chelsea. The writer notes that there’s just one woman who dresses up to work (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/31/fashion/31google.html)
As tech is based in Silicon Valley, I think it’s a reflection of the laid back, lifestyle of (Northern) California that differs from the east coast. There are fashionistas here, but I think it’s more subtle. I rarely come across someone who is dressed to the nines let alone someone who wears designer labels conspicuously–except for designer denim of course. However, I think the contradiction is the conspicuous display of what the they drive, being the car capital of the world.
In my last job, though not a tech firm, I was known as the office fashionista. I was known for wearing a suit one day, jeans and tennies the next, or even my Prana sugar mini and polo top looking like Maria Sharapova. There are days that I wish more people took fashion seriously, but it’s nice to have options and not be told what to wear. For example, I still refuse to buy skinny jeans or pants despite being slender.
I would point out that the San Jose Mercury News does have a fashion writer on staff and that Bloomingdale’s recently opened in San Francisco with 340,000 square feet of retail space.
Lastly, I have one blog dedicated to fashion another where I provide commentary on the technology business.
It’s great that we’re having this ping-pong about techie infiltration, as eye C it from Paris…! The problem is that geeks are not ignoring us, they’re imitating us! It’s a fine – yellow – line between boosting our blogs by making them more e-savvy & having geeks create faux blogs with faux personal blog attitude. I have a guy called Chic Type on my blogroll (probably a cool pr outfit “antenna”) who sends me tony stuff with faux-real-blog captions. Some of the material is fun, so I run it. But, that’s not what we’re about… is it?? I’d rather work with geeks in a creative after-work / sideline perspective, which I actually do do quite often…
it adds beauty.
unfortunately, I think i’m feeling a similar frustration within the world of fine arts. very few want to place investment or thought into one of the beautiful worlds of thought and culture that is visual art.
the starving designer=the starving artist. rare for one to thrive these days…
this, however, doesn’t mean we give up!
Oh nooooo! Whatever you do, don’t give up Ginger! I get e-info from Argentina, China, the whole planet… in your field! It seems that the harder the circumstances, the harder people try to build bridges & break boundaries with new media!
Ginger thanks for popping into Da Scaree Fash Post. Though I must say I’m puzzled! You say you wish you spoke “my language” when commenting on a post about the closing down of a Paris Fashion Week hotspot, as we rev up for the Haute Couture collections (namely the rambling rue de Rivoli apartement / office of London’s Daily Telegraph)… a newzy fash byte that’s actually written in English. Okay, okay everybody & nobody speaks “scaree fash” as my blog’s a deliberate mix of franglais & spanglish. But, I’m still puzzled! Hope you’ll drop by again. I luv arty blogs!