Infotropism Kirrily Robert’s blog

Web2Expo: I believe a small rant is required

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Yesterday I attended Web 2.0 Expo SF, an O’Reilly conference at the Moscone Center. In fact I was mostly there to chair a panel on Troll Whispering with three prominent women in the field of Web 2.0 community management: Christy Canida from Instructables, Teresa Nielsen Hayden from Boing Boing, and Amy Muller from Get Satisfaction.

The four of us arranged to meet downstairs in the foyer beforehand.

“I’m easy to spot,” I told them. “I’ve got bright red hair.”

“I’ll be wearing a fuzzy orange and leopard print coat,” said Christy.

“I’ve got a cane,” said Teresa.

“I’m the one with the baby,” said Amy.

I spotted Amy easily; she was, indeed, the one with the baby. Her daughter, Tesla, is 4 months old, and Amy’s been juggling her work as Chief Community Officer at Get Satisfaction with childcare. Her husband, Thor, is supportive and helps look after the kid when necessary; he’s the CEO of Get Satisfaction. Get Satisfaction, by the way, is one of the most clued in Web 2.0 companies around, and a bit of an O’Reilly favourite. They even help O’Reilly with their customer support.

Anyway, it’s a good thing Thor was there yesterday to mind the baby. It turns out that babes in arms are not permitted on the expo floor or in the conference area of Web2Expo. “Sorry ma’am, we can’t allow anyone under eighteen years of age,” is what the security guard told Amy.

Back in the first dotcom boom (and probably still today), company founders and executives were sometimes under 18. I’ve heard stories about them having to get special exemptions to attend or speak at conferences. So I guess I’m not surprised to hear that Web2Expo is an 18+ event. But I can’t find anything on the website that says so. Perhaps it’s in some kind of T&C that I didn’t read, but I don’t think so.

So, Amy Muller, co-founder and Chief Community Officer of a company that really gets the spirit of Web 2.0, and an invited speaker at the conference, had to ask her husband, co-founder and CEO of the company, to hold the baby and hang out down in the lobby while she attended her panel.

Could they have got a sitter instead? Probably, though I imagine it’s hard to find someone to look after a baby that little. And why should they have to? The baby’s well behaved, and so are the parents; they know that if the baby’s making a fuss, they need to take her outside til she chills out. That’s what Amy did at SXSW, including during her panels. And that would’ve been absolutely fine in an informal round-table session like the Troll Whispering one. I for one would’ve welcomed the little critter, and I’m not actually that into babies. (Does it show?)

Christy, our co-panelist, went and kicked some ass and found out what was what. O’Reilly people directed her to Moscone customer service, who told her that it was an insurance thing. Really? Really? Does the presence of a baby in a conference centre raise the premiums that much? Does this also apply to hotels, sporting venues, and airports? They’re all private property, technically, and can exclude whoever the hell they like, but in my experience they don’t tend to exclude babies or their mothers. They’d get hell for it if they did.

I’d love to see technical conferences providing childcare. Chances of that are slim, I realise, but in the meantime it’d be nice to see a little helpfulness and sympathy around the issues that women attending such a conference might face. Would it have killed them to put something on the website saying, “Sorry, Moscone insist that they won’t allow children in the venue, but here are some links to reputable nearby childcare providers.”

I was going to write some kind of sanctimonious conclusion, but I couldn’t get it to come out right. Luckily the Yarn Harlot just posted something that more or less expresses my feelings on the matter (except that I like babies a whole lot less than she does).

There might even be an unhappy kid who was predicted to do well and doesn’t, and instead uses the time to finely hone their impression of demon spawn, and those kids are going to be a pain in the arse….Just like some other people we are all going to meet in our day (I am keeping a list) that are a pain in the arse that we don’t have the right to get rid of either.

Yeah. If given a choice between a crying kid who can be taken outside and out of the way, let alone a well behaved kid, and that bearded guy in the second row who’s always interrupting speakers to ask tangential, rambling questions (which, in fact, are actually statements), I know who I’d rather have at my tech conference.

No argument here, obviously. We should keep pushing Moscone on this. “Insurance,” pah. Weak.

I created a thingy for them on getsatisfaction.com but haven’t actually registered a complaint yet. It seemed fitting, though

I doubt it has much to do with babies. Probably more about teenagers and it is easier to just say 18+, no exceptions, rather than expecting security guards to make reasonable, rational decisions about who can be admitted.

Not that that makes it ok, or fair, but I can at least understand it.

I have an eight-year-old and have dreamed about an OSCON Kids for those of us with little geeks.

I’ve found ‘insurance reasons’ to be the catch-all phrase for ‘we don’t want to explain why you can’t; you just can’t’. It’s convenient for them, because if you tried to find out more, you’d be blocked by not having access to their insurance contract.

My personal way with dealing with these things, when it’s worth it, is to take their objections with a grain of salt and to do what I want anyhow. This almost never gets me into trouble, and I think that would have been entirely appropriate in this case. I’d be surprised if a venue hosting a Web 2.0 con would enforce an antisocial rule like that, given all the strife the Web 2.0 world has already gotten itself into with mothers. (FaceBook breastfeeding fiasco, etc.)

But although it was a women’s panel, I’m surprised to see you labelling this as specifically as a women’s issue, especially in this town. The only similar story I’ve heard was about a keynote speaker ditching a (non-geek) conference because he and his male partner’s childcare fell through, and the conference organisers didn’t allow them to bring their daughter because they thought she’d create a fuss. I never met her, but I’m told that it’s unlikely that she would’ve. (Then again, I’m also surprised that you’ve adopted the local spelling of ‘arse’, even when the North American you quoted didn’t. )

sigh 8 months pregnant and missing OSCON this summer - I’ve been dreaming of speaking again there next year with a baby in a sling, if necessary. Here’s to hoping that will be possible. :-/