Here I am in beautiful downtown Mountain View, California, home of Google and the heart of the Silicon Valley. I’m here for an “un-conference” for self described female geeks. I thought it would be interesting to go to a tech function where I wasn’t the only female, or one of a very few. It’s different, no doubt about it! The sharing of information is so different between the genders, plus this is a very loose format for a conference. I’m enjoying, but sadly, I’m as bad at networking with all females as I am with all males.

It’s lovely being around so many brilliant women. I’m loving that part. They seem to be a lot more articulate than I am, but I suppose there are women like me out there, too. I participated in a non-profit tech workshop, and then learned about vlogging … watch this space, I suppose I’ll be putting that into practice sooner or later. It looks fun. 🙂 There are women from Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, Mozilla, NTEN, Planetwork, and lots more I’ve never heard of. I got to see some of the eloquent people I read regularly on the LinuxChix list – Akkana P’s there among others. I was hoping Carla Schroeder would show up, she’s one of my heroes but so far I haven’t seen her. A reporter from Wired (which I read) is here, and one from the SJ Mercury news (which I used to read) is here, too. The former is female, the latter is male. I wonder if he feels outnumbered? I’ll ask him tomorrow if he’s there again.

This event is being held at the Computer Museum. I hope I get a chance to actually see it tomorrow. We’re upstairs in the grand ballroom and various other upstairs rooms. I wanted to see Violet Blue today but she called in sick with promises of showing up tomorrow. I hope so, she should be very interesting. http://www.tinynibbles.com/blogarchives/2007/10/change_for_my_talk_at_shes_gee.html

This hotel’s fun, too. This being Geek Central, they supply their guests with big flat panel LCD tvs, free wi-fi, etch-a-sketches, and rubik’s cubes. And retro computer oriented prints on the wall. I love it. Oh, and free microbrews on the way up to the room, or wine if you want it (but I was wined out from the She’s Geeky thing).

More tomorrow.