Wired, She Wrote

“Somebody call the twelve-year old!” cried my mother as the screen on the boxy home computer I was using to write my first high school term paper went inexplicably dark. I was ready to pound the offending instrument with my fist. That 12-year old, a neighbor, was my lifeline. An aspiring writer, I depended on him like I depended on air. He was my ticket to the continued magic of word processing—the marvel and the promise. Now I’m 38 and a published author. I no longer depend on the brain trust of a testosterone-filled adolescent. I’ve become increasingly comfortable with computers and technology—as have others of my sex.

In the early years of the Web, women were slower than men to get online. But we’ve caught up. According to the Pew Internet American Life Project’s most recent data (February-March 2007), 70% of adult women now use the Internet, as do 71% of adult men. Yet studies continue to show men adopting new Internet technologies somewhat faster. For an author living in the cyberage, the consequences are profound. Did Tipping Point author Malcolm Gladwell say, “I’m too old for a blog!”? Did the Freakonomics authors think, “No time to learn new tricks!”? Time to get over any residual technophobia, ladies, and embrace our collective presence online! Authors willing to venture into the increasingly user-friendly world of do-it-yourself high tech are rewarded. Interviews published online generate invitations to do podcasts, guest posts, and interviews on XM radio. Blogs become communities and engender blog tours.

Online audiences lead to sales. I know that it’s not easy, but rest assured: the learning curve is not steep. Unsure of the actual meaning and usage of “blog,” I sensed I needed one when an anthology I co-edited came out this past January. The Authors Guild made me a free website that I could update myself through an easy interface, and a twenty-something friend told me about Google’s free blog-managing program, Blogger. I created a blog I called Girl with Pen as a place to post updates from the book tour for family and friends. By the time my second book came out this June, the blog had developed a mission—to bridge feminist research, popular reality, and the public. I had linked to other feminist bloggers and was generously linked around. Though it is difficult to measure cause and effect, Sisterhood, Interrupted is in its second printing, and I can’t help but believe that much has to do with the way word among women spreads online.

Wired women talk. There is something radically utopian about the blogosphere, young and in process as it is. It works its magic. “Link love” (I’ll link to you, you link to me) and hypertext govern the realm. The romance is self-perpetuating. After years spent writing alone, the communal high of new media networking becomes addictive. Along with nearly 800 other women bloggers, I attended BlogHer in July and learned new tricks. Updates from the road sent to my inner circle morphed into Constant Contact e-newsletters. I’m learning to video blog. There is seemingly no end.

When peers voice their skepticism about online social networking as a worthy endeavor for a published writer, I smile, shrug, and move on. The blogosphere is still in its infancy. Though current tools may morph into the next new thing, Web 2.0, heading into its fourth annual summit, is not going away so soon. Sardonic articles about the silliness of MySpace (take Pagan Kennedy’s hilarious treatment in the New York Times Book Review) do little to quell cynicism about that which we do not yet fully understand. As with all things overwhelming, what’s happening online is often easier to ignore. But the keyboard is our pen and the Internet our tool. I urge other women writers to join me in exploring this brave new media world.

Younger women are leading the way. Pew’s ongoing research confirms that the majority of bloggers are under 30, evenly split between men and women, and racially diverse. Virginia Woolf wrote that a woman writing thinks back through her mothers. In today’s cyber-era, women writing would be wise to think ahead alongside our younger sisters, nieces, and daughters as well. Younger women have much to teach us if we open ourselves to learn.

My role models in this new media journey are a good decade younger than I am. The Ann Friedmans, Courtney Martins, and Jessica Valentis of this world are my reverse mentors. They create fresh, political, and often book-related content daily, combining feminism, authorship, platform, and technology in breathtakingly innovative ways. I hope that many more women who write in public will learn from them, and take a page from their screen. Their fearlessness speaks volumes. May we join them in being unafraid.