Brotown, USA (Photo: Twitter/Jack)
On Twitter, judgement is swift–and vociferous. Minutes after Jack Dorsey tweeted out a photo of lunch with Square’s summer interns, users (of the service he cofounded) notice a glaring absence of any XX chromosomes at the table. “Looks more like a sausage party, than a ham & cheese party,” quipped designer Jody Ferry.
Lunch with the @Square interns. Featuring little sandwiches with the crust cut off. #aw #summerbreak #backtosquare
— Jack Dorsey (@jack) July 3, 2012
“no female interns @Square? We like mobile payment, too!,” chided Charlotte Han, a community manager at SAP Community Network. Activate founder Anil Dash also chimed in, “none of your interns are women?” An anonymous user who tweets under the handle @rrocckstarr added more of the same, “@jack @square Where are the females?! Don’t see a lot of diversity in that pic…”
Mr. Dorsey quickly admitted that there were no female interns “in this batch,” adding, “We’d love to find some.” But that offhand expression of interest failed to appease techies who have been actively trying to right the ratio. “@jack what were obstacles to hiring female interns this time around? no qualified? no interested female candidates?,” asked HuffPo’s executive tech editor Bianca Bosker.
Mr. Dash, as he is wont to do, offered up a practical solution, suggesting Square take a look at Etsy’s partnership with Hacker School to offer $5,000 grants to train more women into the engineering. “We will research,” Mr. Dorsey promised in return. Mr. Dash then delicately invoked Mr. Dorsey’s much-admired leadership skills. (The serial cofounder recently sat down with Wired to discuss how Square, “hopes to infuse financial transactions with a dose of human intimacy,” in which case it never hurts to include half the population.
@jack @square please do. So many admire that you’re detail-oriented & care about culture — and this is much bigger than a small detail.
— Anil Dash (@anildash) July 3, 2012
So do you think @Jack regrets sending out this tweet or regrets inventing Twitter? Our money is on the sandwiches–if only those crusts hadn’t been so #awww.
Follow Nitasha Tiku on Twitter or via RSS. ntiku@observer.com
