Women browse the Web better than men?

March 22, 2002 5:12 PM

Women browse the Web better than men?
posted by Kevin Sanders (22 comments total)

They are too narrowminded. They don't see the point in important things like metafilter or ratemypoo.com or all those wonderful perl or tcl scripts or applets and flash animations and clever little html hacks and ascii artwork and oh god I just love them all.
posted by Settle at 5:20 PM on March 22, 2002

"Generally men are more interested in browsing, reading content and downloading software."

"Women use their time online more purposefully - shopping, organising travel, banking and sending e-greeting cards."

I must have gotten my genes crossed up somewhere along the line.
posted by bjgeiger at 5:22 PM on March 22, 2002

have they forgotten the role of pr0n in mens browsing habits? Men do in ten minutes, what is takes a women 2 hours to do. Then hit the pr0n for 3 hours and 50 minutes.
posted by patrickje at 5:25 PM on March 22, 2002

sending e-cards has a purpose? I just thought it was a sneaky way to collect valid e-mails for spammers.
posted by mcsweetie at 5:39 PM on March 22, 2002

It's a generalization, but I've seen this dichotomy in my own household. Lisa tends to go online to do something, whereas I just go online and follow links blindly until I've wound up at the homepage for Tasmanian Amputee Astrologists for Jesus.
Of course, this could also be traditional male pissing-contest behavior as well, I've actually been in boasting sessions where I was proud that I had the longest Bookmark list in the room. Then again I've met women who as big net geeks as me, so nothing's always true.
posted by jonmc at 6:02 PM on March 22, 2002

Of course women spend much less time browsing the web! They have to get their asses over to the studio for the shoot so we have pr0n to surf...that's a no brainer!
posted by RevGreg at 6:05 PM on March 22, 2002

could someone e-mail me to explain what pr0n means....
posted by ParisParamus at 6:10 PM on March 22, 2002

jonmc, I'll bet my bookmark list is bigger than yours!

Sooooo...what's the URL for Tasmanian Amputee Astrologists for Jesus?

Jen
posted by NsJen at 6:19 PM on March 22, 2002

yeah what's pr0n....what are you guys on about...what's up with you and your slang...
posted by Settle at 6:28 PM on March 22, 2002

pr0n=pornography
posted by patrickje at 6:39 PM on March 22, 2002

NSJen

Well, I was kidding around, but there is a "Tasmanian Amputee Society" mentioned on this page(scroll down) and this site purports to be about Christian Astrology(it's in Japanese, so I really can't be sure). Perhaps we could introduce them?
posted by jonmc at 6:40 PM on March 22, 2002

jonmc...wonder what kind of traffic one could generate with a Tasmanian Amputee Astrologists for Jesus pr0n site?

Okay, back to random brows...ermm...homework...
posted by NsJen at 7:18 PM on March 22, 2002

After an comprehensive and exhaustive study of a thoroughly representive sample group of two (NsJen & me), I can categorically report that women definitely have longer and far more interesting bookmark lists than men.
posted by normy at 7:19 PM on March 22, 2002

7 hours vs. 10 hours....a month?!

I am bettin' I'm not the only one here skewing that curve. A month?! Jesus. I'm browsed up until about 2219, according to my rough, first-generation calculations.
posted by umberto at 7:34 PM on March 22, 2002

jonmc...wonder what kind of traffic one could generate with a Tasmanian Amputee Astrologists for Jesus pr0n site?

Gimme a plane ticket, web hosting and a machete and we'll find out....just kidding.

Actually, back in my early web-sufing days(circa 1995)I somehow(I dont remember the link trail for the life of me)wound up at the home page of an Australian high school student who had made the page for a class. I looked at his hit counter and it read "0000006". I sent him an email saying "Hey dude, I'm the hit you cant account for and I'm a bookstore clerk from America, blah-blah-blah" and got a nice note back. I never heard from the kid again but I imagine he had interesting story to tell in class the next day.
So aimless surfing does have its rewards.
posted by jonmc at 7:37 PM on March 22, 2002

kitties and pr0n...why would you want to shop when you can have kitties and pr0n?
posted by adampsyche at 8:16 PM on March 22, 2002

I'm a woman and I love aimless surfing. Maybe they were only interviewing highly efficient women, in which case they would never bother with me. I get things done but I usually take the scenic route.

Surely SOME women prefer prOn over on-line shopping, and surely there are women who love MeFi more than sending e-cards. Statistics and studies never show the full story, alas.
posted by gutenberg at 10:17 PM on March 22, 2002

Women spend an average of seven hours online compared with male surfers who clocked up 10 hours per month, its study found.

What? Seven hours? per month? If thats the average, then this Tasmanian better get some help for MeFi addiction.

Jon, no machetes required, well unless ofcourse, you happen to run into a Tassie Devil
posted by Tarrama at 1:50 AM on March 23, 2002

Was this study made by the same people who said that men only take 10 minutes to buy pants while women take 3 hours (because of the stopovers at makeup counters, etc)? Feh.
posted by lillitot at 2:18 AM on March 23, 2002

This study seems to assume that the internet is a tool, that you use in order to get things done or help you out in the rest of your life, which it often is. But it assumes people don't see it as more than that, as an end in itself, or the start of a journey the final destination of which, is often unknown (deep stuff, huh?)

Women have less spare time on average, so that would be a factor in how they use the net.
posted by lucien at 7:03 AM on March 23, 2002

Oh god you're *seriously* choking me
posted by Settle at 10:42 AM on March 23, 2002

<misogynist status="jerk">
It's because women are so nosy. They have to get into everything.
</misogynist>
posted by Down10 at 12:28 PM on March 23, 2002