Women - Making Society Better with the help of Technology
We live in a world which is led by the male gender and they
dominate the society by their will, power and have the authority to make
majority of the decisions necessary for the mankind. But, out of all these, we
humans are given birth by someone we call “women”. They not only carry a fetus
for 9 long months in her womb, but also feed the baby once he gets born,
nurture him and becomes the first teacher to that child.
With the passage of time, the person keep finding the
support of a girl or a lady in his life in one way or another which helps him
in moving forward in the life and the women remains the strongest force
throughout the journey of life. That is why one famous quote was quoted once,
“Behind every successful man, there exists a woman”.
But when it comes to the women’s counterpart, the situation
isn't the same. The support, the care, and the strength which the males get
easily, it is not in the case of females. They are bounded by restrictions. But
they have never allowed it to become an excuse for their failure and they walk
that extra mile to get the success and recognition which every person craves
for.
Since ages, it has been considered that women are best in
homemaking and they better should be left there. Lots of restrictions are
imposed on them in many parts of the world. But as the time has passed, women
have shown the world that they are better managers, best teachers, amazing
politicians and they have the hidden geek in them as well. They have achieved
heights of success with their passion, hard work and never to give up attitude.
Even if we look at all the different sections, we find women
with amazing potential and are making their marks. Be it sports, politics,
entertainment industry and others too.
However, technology has been something which was always
considered that it is something which is not the cup of tea for women. The
contribution made by the women in the arena of technology has not been at par
according to some of the tech legends. The majority section is dominated by the
nerds, also known as the geeks or the menfolk.
But when we look at the other side of the coin, we realize
that even though the contribution of women is under par, the technical life
which we are living today, it would have been so incomplete without their
contributions. The contribution made by the women; or we better call them the
women pioneer’s is simply amazing and it has made the life of millions of people
so easy and stress free. The sad part is, we never realized that these
contributions have come from such part.
When we look at such contributions from women, we realize
that women not only turn up as better partners, but they also turn up into
better programmers and inventors too.
Some of the significant work ever done by women in the field
of technology includes the name of Ada Lovelace. Everyone knows that Charles
Babbage is the father of computer and Ada was one of the closest friend to
Charles and also the world’s first ever computer programmer. Although she left
the world only at the age of 36, but what she left behind is a legacy which
empower women in multiple ways and she herself has a day on her name, just 2
days post the IEEE day.
Grace Hopper, a pioneer computer scientist and her passion
for technology never got old no matter how old she was. She is the brain behind
COBOL, the first ever computing language. She is a worldwide recognized persona
and has won many accolades around the globe.
We cannot afford to miss the name of Radia Perlman in this
list. She has over 70 software patents with her name and is better known as “The
Mother of the Internet”.
Sheryl Sandburg, a name which needs no introduction. The COO
at Facebook, she is an inspiration to the women who afraid to step up their
career in the domain of technology. Krithiga Reddy, Facebook India Head, has
inspired hundreds of thousands of Indian girls to break the barriers and listen
to their hearts.
Women have also left a mark in the gaming industry as well.
Zoe Quinn is the lady who developed the game, “Depression Quest” for the web
and the game is simply amazing.
Mitchell Baker, the executive chairwoman of Mozilla Foundation
was inducted in “Internet Hall of Fame” in the previous leap year.
Google, the search engine giant has 17% of its employees as
women and Marissa Mayer was their first female engineer. The VP of location and
local services, she is the youngest member of Google’s executive operating
committee.
And when we are mentioning all the pioneer in women, how can
we forget to introduce Ruchi Sanghvi. An Indian born girl, she is the first
female engineer at Facebook. She created the most amazing thing which allowed
Facebook to serve more than 200 million news posts to almost 1.5 billion people
every single day – the Newsfeeds. She is also the developer of Facebook
Connect.
Karen Jones is one of those wonderful lady to whom we should
always be thankful. She developed the IR (information retrieval) technique
which allowed the users to use computer with simple and ordinary words instead
of the codes and the equations. This breakthrough was extremely significant as
it allowed the growth of search engines and the same technique is used by
Google as well.
Anita Borg is one of the sweetest lady who not only received her
Ph.D in Computer Science back in 1980’s but also started an institute
especially for women to attract them towards technology. The institute’s name
was then put with her name in 2003 after her sad demise and today the institute
is better known as Anita Borg Institute of Women in Technology.
Susan Kare, she is better known with the title of “the Betsy
Ross of Personal Computer”. Worked with Late Steve Jobs, she was the designer
who did the wonders for Apple with her amazing typography and graphic skills.
However, as Jobs left apple in mid 1980’s, Susan also had to leave and she went
on to join Microsoft.
There are uncountable names present that have done something
significant at some level. Shraddha Sharma from Your Story, she has started a
small revolution on her own and helping people to showcase their stories.
Biotech is being led by Kiran Majumdar Shaw.
At present, almost 22% women are working in the field of
technology in one way or another. Although the number is not great, but as the
time is progressing, it is increasing at an exponential rate.
It is not about the doing something big at a large scale,
but it is about filling those voids which if left empty can cause lot of harm
than we can never imagine and apparently, our special ladies are behind in
filling up those voids. Quite often we forget to appreciate the efforts of the
women especially in the professional work and there are times when their work memories
get erased. But it is the time when we should give them the proper value and
position which they deserve. Because women pioneers have done a lot in
technology than we can ever imagine.
Happy IEEE day.!!!
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