Hello, world!

It’s been a while since I last wrote. Between finals and spending about eight days at home, while trying to see about 25 people who I miss tremendously while I’m at school, things got a little bit crazy.

Happily, the summer is now here which means I have time to ponder and write once again.

And what better place to do it than the foot of Capitol Hill?

I’m spending the next two months working in the Office of Educational Technology at the Department of Education, located right off the National Mall. Specifically, I’m working largely on the social media strategy of the office and exploring the ways that the department can work with education technology startup founders, developers, and others involved in the startup ecosystem (and of course, making my fair share of copies and data entries). It’s a pretty incredible experience and I’m so excited to share the journey...

The non-technical co-founder got a lot of press this week. First, Jessica Livingston spoke about the role of the non-technical founder at YC’s Female Founders conference. The non-technical co-founder, she opined in her keynote, is responsible for all things non-technical—including tasks like grocery shopping and errand running.

Of course, no comment goes unanalyzed when related to the topic of women leaders in the technology sector. So Marianne Bellotti, co-founder of Exversion, wrote a rather comprehensive critique of the conference, highlighting Ms. Livingston’s focus on the non-technical founder and the gender biases associated.

“To get a male founder to admit he doesn’t write the code his startup depends on you have to twist his arm. With a female founder it’s the second sentence out of her mouth.”

Alexis Ohanian, co-founder of Reddit and now coding evangelist/angel investor, also...

On December 27, tech blog Valleywag released an article titled “Paul Graham Says ‘Women Haven’t Been Hacking for the Past 10 Years.’” In it, writer Nitasha Tiku analyzes an interview between The Information and Paul Graham, co-founder of Y-Combinator, a Silicon Valley accelerator known for its high success rate. She insinuates that Graham is an ignorant sexist, full of nostalgia for the days of the hardcore nerd’s reign over startups.

Tiku is wrong. Graham’s comments don’t indict him as some ignorant sexist. He never says anything directly misogynistic nor is YC more gender-biased than other Silicon Valley companies or accelerators. He’s pointing out a long-existing issue in the technology sector. It’s the national lack of female participation in the tech world that’s a problem, not comments made during an interview. Rather than creating flame wars over questionable statements, Silicon...