World Pulse Presents Recommendations From Women Worldwide on how Technology Companies can Bridge ‘Digital Gender Divide’
Portland, Oregon (PRWEB) September 29, 2014 -- Portland-based World Pulse, a global digital network, has just completed its most powerful international initiative yet, Women Weave the Web. The crowd-sourcing initiative gathered the wisdom of hundreds of grassroots women from more than 70 countries in an effort to accelerate transformation in the technology industry. World Pulse is the only online platform for grassroots communities of women to mobilize around issues that matter to them and their communities—cross-borders, cross-language, cross-cultural.
The mission of the World Pulse Women Weave the Web Campaign is to generate recommendations on improving digital access, literacy and empowerment for women worldwide. World Pulse empowers women by giving them a platform on which to network and express themselves.
Partnering with Twitter and the global nonprofit business network BSR (Business for Social Responsibility), World Pulse’s powerful data will be showcased at Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters in “A Conversation on Women and Tech: Digital Access and Inclusion” on Tuesday, September 30th. World Pulse leaders from New York, Nigeria and Tibet will engage with decision-makers from technology companies to discuss the realities women face and how their products and services can better serve, include and engage women. BSR will then facilitate a discussion on how to integrate the recommendations into products and operations to advance progress in women’s digital inclusion and empowerment.
“The Women Weave the Web campaign has generated invaluable on-the-ground discoveries that tech companies, policy makers, government officials and others can tap to really understand how to better serve women and communities around the world,” says Leana Mayzlina, Digital Action Campaigns Manager for World Pulse. “In this globalized world, as we accelerate the digital inclusion of women, that in turn creates social and economic gain for all.”
Among the recommendations for technology companies are:
1. Develop web sites, mobile apps, and software that make use of non-English and native languages.
2. Bring together female IT professionals to better represent the technology needs of women and girls.
3. Include disabled populations in the design of technology and related training.
4. Implement the use of website safety and security ratings.
5. Monitor and police online harassment that prevents women from fully expressing themselves in open forums.
The seven-month-long Women Weave the Web campaign focused on three issue areas:
1. Digital access—uncover the challenges women have in accessing the Internet as well as the solutions women and their communities are developing to overcome the infrastructural and cultural barriers needed to achieve greater connection.
2. Digital literacy—identify the challenges women face while learning to use the Internet—such as violence, bullying and online harassment—as well as the tools and services that women wish to have to feel more comfortable online.
3. Digital empowerment—World Pulse’s niche, once women know how to use these tools, how do they use the Internet to empower themselves to achieve their goals; how does online empowerment contribute to offline empowerment.
The Lynn Syms Prize
World Pulse seeks to recognize an outstanding community leader whose visionary voice using digital tools has effected change and advanced her community work. The inaugural Lynn Syms Prize, in partnership with sculptor and philanthropist Lynn Syms, will be given to a relatively unknown grassroots woman leader. She will receive a $20,000 prize to support her community-based work, a feature profile on WorldPulse.com and an all-expense paid trip to spread her message in New York City.
The World Pulse network is influencing decision-makers
Recognized internationally for their influential campaigns to accelerate digital inclusion and empower women, World Pulse has been invited to present research and findings at venues around the world:
• World Pulse CEO, Jensine Larsen shared campaign testimonies at RightsCon in Silicon Valley;
• Preliminary campaign results were shared at the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS+10) in Geneva;
• Community members presented recommendations on digital inclusion at Social Media Week in Nigeria;
• Four World Pulse community members joined the Alliance for Affordable Internet’s multi-stakeholder forums in Abuja, Nigeria;
• The Internet Governance Forum included World Pulse in their ninth annual meeting as presenters to generate solution-based dialogue with key leaders in the technology field.
World Pulse leaders also spoke last week at the Clinton Global Initiative and the UN Foundation-sponsored Social Good Summit.
About World Pulse
World Pulse is the leading network using the power of digital communication to connect women worldwide and bring them a global voice. Its mission is to lift and unite women’s voices to accelerate their impact for the world. Through a growing web-based platform, women and their allies from more than 190 countries are speaking out and connecting to create solutions from the frontlines of today’s most pressing issues. With a focus on grassroots women change leaders, World Pulse programs nurture community, provide digital empowerment training, and channel rising voices to influential forums.
Claudia Johnson, Claudia Johnson, http://www.claudiajohnson.com, +1 (503) 799-2220, [email protected]
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