Comments on: SphinnCon Israel coming up…and not a woman to be seen (on a panel)

By: Sphinncon Israel: overview and my presentation on WordPress as social media and SEO hub | illuminea marketing and media

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 07:50:39 +0000

[...] any women panelists or speakers, and although I thought the event was great, that bugged me and I wrote about it. For some magical Google reason, if you search for the term Sphinncon Israel, that post is always [...]

By: Miriam Schwab

Miriam Schwab — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 12:47:51 +0000

Dara – There do seem to be less women in the technology industry than men. However, there are still women out there, and they should be represented according to their percentage. In any case, my rough estimate from the conference is that at least 10% of the participants were women, so at least 10% of the panelists should have been women. Even just one woman would have been enough.

Apparently this is a global issue. See Jeremiah Owyang’s post on this, and the comments there too.

By: Dara

Dara — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 21:55:14 +0000

It would be interesting to see demographics of those in executive positions in Internet companies. If the pool of applicants for women is dramatically smaller than of men, the speakers will be proportionally as small. However, I suppose not having a single female speaker is a little absurd.

By: Tzvika A

Tzvika A — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 23:32:57 +0000

Hi all,
First is first- Miriam thanks for the compliments,
You made an interesting point, it is sad we don’t have more women representatives on the panels.
As you mentioned in the post and i most agree, my amazing partner Orly Izhaki is definitely pro enough to join such a panel. Her English skills are excellent and i find no reason or capability for me or any one else to speak “instead” of her.
As a fact I am sure she as other women in the web marketing filed (yap great marketers just like you Miriam..) have much to contribute to the conference as much as any other male.
I most say i would love to hear some of the female pros you mentioned in the post above, including my own partner, and i would love to do so strictly due to their professional experience and know how and not due to the fact they are women.
But Miriam i think you missed the main sensation: “SphinnCon Israel coming upâ€¦and not even one black Isro-African to be seen (on a panel)”…what better proof does one need to prove racism?

By: Eli Feldblum

Eli Feldblum — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 15:54:31 +0000

Hi Miriam,

I can assure you that the lack of women on the panels was not intentional.

We actively pursued female panelists. We chased after a prominent female Israeli blogger, who we assumed would be on the panel, but never got back to
us. For the few minutes where there was a chance Tamar would come in, either through Barry or Avi, we were ecstatic. In general, this is primarily an Israeli show. Avi is flying in and the show was initially planned around Barry’s visit to Israel, not vice versa.

Most of our speakers were chosen from those who applied to speak, and only two of those applications were sent from women, one of which came late. We are unfortunately not able to accommodate everyone who applies, even when they had interesting topic on which to speak.

Many of the panelists were provided to us by major Israeli companies and sponsors or hosts. We didn’t ask specific people from those companies to speak; they sent us speakers. In many instances, they sent us their best English speakers (some companies didn’t send a speaker at all for that reason). I’m fairly certain that Tzvika is speaking instead of Orly on behalf of TAGADAM because of his English skills.

As I wrote, we didn’t get many speaking applications from women. Hopefully, as this show gains popularity, we’ll get a lot more applications for the full SMX
show–as well as many more topics on which to speak.

I’m also working on bringing other search and internet marketing shows to Israel, and I hope to continue to hear from you about them.

-Eli

By: Miriam Schwab

Miriam Schwab — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 15:46:00 +0000

Tamar – I’m also sorry that you won’t be here. You have to make Barry send you next year, and I’ll be happy to remind him about this too!

By: Tamar Weinberg

Tamar Weinberg — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 23:31:29 +0000

Sorry I am not in Israel this week

Next time I’ll make Barry send me!

By: Barry Schwartz

Barry Schwartz — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 11:07:27 +0000

Just landed in Israel… But I just want to say, I did not even think there wasn’t a woman on the panel. Thanks for bringing this to my attention. 2009, we wont make this mistake.