Joni Evans | 04/14/2008 10:52 am

Comment Watch, 'Change the World' Growth and wOw on Charlie Rose

Dear Friends of wOw:

This week promises many new features. Your comments and posts have been so amazing and smart. We are going to feature the best of them on Fridays, as we introduce the wOw Comment of the Week.

CHANGE THE WORLD: We have been listening to your needs — big and small, collecting your suggestions and recommendations, and now want to take the next step in defining what CHANGE THE WORLD is (title of section still to be discovered — all suggestions are welcome). The key to its effectiveness is your continued exchange of experiences and anecdotes. We will be asking you to help us review and prioritize a new architecture later this week.

Some wOw women were on the Charlie Rose show last week and we thought you might enjoy seeing the clip. Click here to watch!

XOXOX,
Joni

Read more about: Change the World, Charlie Rose, Comment of the Week

176 Reader Comments (so far…) Sign In or Register to comment

Oh. Wow. I am so glad to see you all again with Charlie Rose. The envy of our nation, just standin’ up beggin’ for the pot shots to fly! And Leslie Stahl…you are just as cute as you can be, tough gal. I wanna know what happened after the taping…and I wanna know if Mr. Rose is persnickity about punctuation. He strikes me as the kind of man who would be…on the grounds that he has to read it out loud. Besides, it’s always fun to think you might have something in common with a celebrity…I love that word. Those whom we celebrate. And I agree with you about Joan Buck’s “undifferentiated fear with which we are not allowed to take exception.” I may be paraphrasing, but I think this would be a good conversation to have… Let’s differentiate that “fear” in our own minds and talk about it. And then let others take exception and say…”wait a minute, that is not a valid reason for you to fear…” or “well, if that’s how you feel, we just need to agree to disagree…” but talk. A treasured friend used to tell me, “Y’gotta learn to call a spade a spade, girl.” Can we ever get to the root of it?

By Ms. Dee on 04/14/2008 12:38 pm

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Ms Dee…..I cannot imagine that Charlie Rose is anything but a total dear!! Never thought about loving the word ‘celebrate’ but now that you say it ‘those we celebrate’ sounds great. Just wish we did it more for real laudables like Sergio Vieria de Mello instead of…well, you know… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sérgio_Vieira_de_Mello

By Buh-Bye Hillary Hillary Buh-Bye on 04/14/2008 12:55 pm

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Well, I think it’s very dear when a man cares about punctuation. I celebrate good punctuation. One gal’s laudables are another gal’s laughables, sometimes. But I’ll check out de Mello. Thanks.

By Ms. Dee on 04/15/2008 11:48 am

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JONI! I interrupt this conversation to tell you that Kathleen Battle just held the Pope and the President in the palm of her hand. It was truly a trenscendant moment. Can we hear from her on wowOwow. I can’t think of a greater challenge for any singer than to be asked to pull that little gig. Whew! And she was true to it. And her Harpist! The Pope was transfixed. Truly.

By Ms. Dee on 04/16/2008 9:46 am

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Ms Dee, Here is Kathleen Battle http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M959EKqr_N8

By Buh-Bye Hillary Hillary Buh-Bye on 04/17/2008 6:50 pm

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Sometimes the page one women insert postings on the secondary pages. The feeling of hierarchy might be diluted if the page one women were to interact with the other women by having a reply button with those postings.

By A B on 04/14/2008 12:43 pm

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Wonderful clip. You all looked terrific! BTW Liz…Drudge is #37 of Top 100 sites on http://www.technorati.com Huffington Post is one of the tops (see right hand upper corner blogger for Top 100 Blogs. For women with blogs lots of terrific ideas on SEO marketing/how to monetize etc see Problogger esp) FYI WoW is also the acronym for World of Warcraft with 10M viewers and $$ equal to the GNP of countries like Sweden…..sites are creating alternative worlds. I’ve been on the web since inception….though have never been technical but artistic, outdoorsy, and sporty…very fortunate that found WoW when shattered my foot. Am limited to working in bed 80% of the time until healed…and WOW has made it more enjoyable, educational, entertaining. Looking forward to what is new….a blog-roll on another page, or bottom format as on Buzzflash.com would be neat….fashion, sustainable living, arts, giving back/volunteering. etc. Top universities are going on line with classes like Stanford etc….and microenterprise groups: local ones that are models like http://www.womensinitiative.org/index.htm global models like http://www.grameen-info.org/ And exceptional individuals ones like: http://www.worldonfire.ca/ I’m all for making $$$ as Mary said….because then perhaps there could eventually be grants like PEN. Always exciting to watch things grow! Even Ogilvy tells its clients must cultivate influential bloggers….as David Ogilvy said…stagnation is the death knell. Thanks again!

By Buh-Bye Hillary Hillary Buh-Bye on 04/14/2008 12:49 pm

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Suzanne I love reading your posts becuase they create enough curiosity for me to further educate myself. What type of work do you do? I was glad to see you bring up the topic of Grameen Bank. I just read Banker to the Poor by Muhammad Yunus (founder of the Grameen Bank) and really am intrigued by his model. I was going to mention it today in a post as well. Thanks for always referencing your facts and for your links!

By Wrong Way on 04/15/2008 10:53 am

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I, too, was thinking about the Grameen bank when I was in the shower this morning. How easy would it be to start a virtual piggy-bank that would be invested, quarterly, in the Grameen bank. AND…I’m with you, Claudia. Suzanne gives us a lot to think about.

By Ms. Dee on 04/15/2008 11:55 am

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Ms. Dee - I like your idea about the virual piggy-bank to fund the Grameen bank. What about a sponsor who would agree to donate to a U.S. Grameen Bank fund for each post on this blog?

By Wrong Way on 04/15/2008 1:49 pm

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The thing that makes me think you guys need to rethink your perspective/orientation has been bumped up against more than once, but okay, here it goes. You are five wealthy women who have made your money being a part of the male new york establishment, essentially. You beat the boys at their own game. But you are oriented toward paying attention to them. You write about Norman Mailer and reprint an article written by a man about Sen. Obama’s wife. You assume women over 45 are married, and organize their lives around men. Your website has a man head tech person. You used a male photographer. Your outlike is very white. Whoopi seems like tacked on as an afterthought. There are no Asian women on the site. Lily and Jane, Candice, Marlo Thomas, Ms. Manners — we have them dangled up there, but essentially, they aren’t contributing in any meaningful way. We don’t really want men to come in and comment — they’ve got the whole rest of the world to run their mouths and mostly, women over 45 are pretty fed up with listening to them. We want a place where we can speak. That’s what we need. We don’t mind making you guys filthy rich all over again, but we aren’t really interested in women on your level of success still focusing on the white male establishment. There are fascinating, intelligent, talented women all over this country who are not rich, blond or, for that matter, straight. Who are not heard from. Who are not read. The “naysayers” you are quoting are men, right? This is not where women are today. The thing that is most like American women over 45 that you guys have in common is this: You are trying to make some more money for your older years, and you want to have your voices heard and make an inpact. There is a whole continuum between male-oriented woman and separatist lesbian, ladies, and 80% of the women in this country are not comfortable with being called “girls,” and don’t really want to read what some man tells us we are, and we’re totally fed up with seeing ourselves through their lens. I woudl be willing to act as a consultant for you on issues of gender, race, etc., and you’d be smart to hire me. As long as there is some serious attempt made to have a cosmopolitan, really diverse panel to monitor the site for the stuff that is actually depressing (as in never mind, they didn’t mean me) and harmful (women over 40 are anything but girls) to the demographic you are targeting. This is a wonderful opportunity, and could be a serious step forward in women’s empowerment, so please don’t blow it.

By Mugsy Peabody on 04/14/2008 12:53 pm

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Mugsy….You are so brilliant…but really….as Lucy said, “If the world is divided into boys and girls I’m a girl!” I’m girly and hope to be if I’m fortunate enough to see 95! Girl is a pejorative depending on who says it and the context. People create the site they create…I wince to see Citigroup as a sponsor…but hey, it’s not my site (Tiffany=best perfume!) and I can say….think credit unions! These women are as empowered as can be! Empowered doesn’t have to mean completely shut out the other half of the world. I am not a lesbian, nor all that male oriented, but evolved men are not the enemy. If this site doesn’t have some glamour it won’t be marketable, and hence won’t have clout. You admire Dede Wilsey…my god, she’s 63 and there’s no more girly, glammy, rich, effective, man-eating woman going in SF. We have a great new museum 99% due to her! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dede_Wilsey To me Wow is inclusive..and will naturally be more so as it grows and evolves. It happened to be started by women who happen to be mostly white, have made money, and are NYC centric. That isn’t a crime! Entreprenuer is my favorite word! If you put it on the line you deserve to make the dough. Who cares if the tech director happens to be a guy! Tom’s great, and obviously this site at the very inception it running terrifically! Most have many more kinks to work out. I do agree that there are already some nasty men here [don’t mean the nice ones]…and that is a huge turn-off to have to endure them here. I’m not sick of men….just the sickening ones…and I let it fly at them. Since the Web is democratic there’s no fence to keep them out…but certainly can make it unpleasant for the unpleasant ones. The demographic of women 40+ takes in a lot of territory. No one place is ever all things to all people but can be a lot to most. And with the addition of a blog-roll that will automatically increase the diversity and synergy. I’m very interested in microenterprise and sustainability and believe by being conscious of where we spend money we can bend capital towards a better world. So this weekend Queen Noor and Ashley Judd announcing a new development group for the world’s poor women…was very good news http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080414/en_afp/uspovertydevelopmentunwomen And Queen Rania is one of the most fabulous women on earth…from Palestine, very well educated, articulate and outspoken…and is out in front on the issues in the Middle-East. There is a world of wonderful women doing incredible things and imagine we’ll be seeing lots of them…it’s very Web 2-Oh!! here so we can slant things a bit to what we think might interest. This election cycle has certainly revealed to me just how misogynistic the world still is. Developing a woman centric, if not totally female exclusive, site is another big tilt in the right direction…especially on the web. Like you I love the San Francisco Bay Area because of the diversity…..and I feel it is diverse here….we have ladies in rural and urban settings, some affluent, some by their own admission on the financial edge, some literate some pop, and from what I read reflecting many cultures. I do not have in the slightest sense that any voice is more or less…am learning from everyone…even those with who I do not agree. Have faith….it’ll grow. And especially because there is women like you here. Just a thought…..

By Buh-Bye Hillary Hillary Buh-Bye on 04/14/2008 2:28 pm