Monday, September 8, 2014

Former Facebook Employee Launches Women.Com, The Internet’s First Women-Only Social Network by Carolyn Cox

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Recent events have shown that the Internet is a safe and inclusive space for all women (JK, LOL, AHOO-HOO-HAH-HAH). Thankfully, former Facebook employee Susan Johnson has launched Women.com, a question-driven social media site that may make that dream as close to a reality as possible—and considering her aspirations for the platform, I couldn’t be more excited.

Women.com is still in an invite-only beta stage (you can request to join via Twitter. I’m hoping to check out the party soon), and, much like Yahoo Answers, is a forum where users can pose questions and then upvote results. However, unlike the anonymous respondents on Yahoo, a Women.Com account links back to the user’s Facebook. This way members have some accountability even when accessing a more private platform than Facebook to pose tricky questions. (Slate’s article on Women.com lists a sample question as “Friend’s husband is cheating. Do I say something?” Not necessarily a question you want on your wall, unless the answer is definitely “yes.”)

Read more here.

Sunday, September 7, 2014

Article about Book Destigmatizing Breasts Filtered Out for Showing… Breasts By Soraya Chemaly

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The piece below was published in The Guardian today by Ruth Lewy. Facebook is barring shares using the Guardian links. They are reviewing the problem, but until then I’m posting this here for Laura, the creator of the project, as an alternative link so that it can be shared.

These interviews are edited excerpts from Laura Dodsworth’s project Bare Reality. She is fundraising for a book of the project; visit kickstarter.com and search for Bare Reality.

Read more here.