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Anil Dash: “Web 2.0 is pretty much made of white people.”

Anil Dash tells what it’s like at Web 2.0:

First, lots of people at these events are regulars of the circuit. These folks show up at events like these throughout the year, around the world; When people talk about there being an insider’s circle, these are the people they’re talking about. But, that’s not to say that this is an all-powerful clique, because for every one who’s a high-powered venture capitalist with a giant portfolio, there’s some number of professional conference-goers. Some of these folks are really smart and talented, but some don’t seem to have any discernable reason for popping up at every conference.

Web 2.0 might be made of people, as Ross Mayfield said, but judging by the conference, Web 2.0 is pretty much made of white people. I’m not used to any event in a cosmopolitan area being such a monoculture.

Now, the folks who organized Web 2.0 are good people whom I genuinely believe want their event to be inclusive. But the homogeneity of the audience doesn’t just extend to ethnicity, it’s even more evident in the gender breakdown. There are others who’ve covered this topic better than me, but it’s jarring to me not merely because the mix was such a poor representation of the web that I know, but because I think it’s going to come back and bite the web in the ass if it doesn’t change eventually.

This entry was posted by Nick Douglas on Saturday, October 15th, 2005 at 12:01 am and is filed under Anil Dash. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

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