Naughty nurses at CeBIT. Urgh.
Naughty nurses draw fire at CeBIT Australia.
I’m taking time out from the Twitter for n00bs series to laugh at a particular event exhibitor at the IT industry trade show CeBIT which I know many of my Twitter mates attended, journalist Ben Grubb included.
So it appears that promotional models at the event caused a stir, particularly among the marginalised female IT crowd, after they wore novelty doctor and nurses uniforms, plugging into a stereotypical porn fantasy. They were part of a marketing ploy by web hosting company NetRegistry playing on those cheesy sexual impotence ads and accompanied by posters baring the slogan ”Want longer lasting server up-time?”
Not only deemed demeaning to female geeks, the outfits were sort of innappropriate for a professional trade show. Playing on sexual fantasies? Um.. nice way to show that you couldn’t go above the cliched ’sex sells.’ At least it wasn’t as bad as Nando’s latest though, I’ll give NetRegistry that credit.
NetRegistry said the gag was directed by “women and a gay guy,” but what on earth does this have to do with anything? Does this for some unknown reason make it okay? I don’t think so. They offended people and it shouldn’t make it any different who gave the all-clear.
Grubb writes something which amuses me:
Mr Bloch [NetRegistry cheif] admitted the IT industry was challenging for women, but offered no apology for his marketing department’s strategy.
“I think IT is a challenging industry for women… clearly that is a problem,” he said.
But the executive was hesitant to draw conclusions when asked if his company’s actions would deter women from joining the industry.
I’m not hesitant at all to make to those conclusions, Mr Bloch. I am offended, not only by the blantant sexism in yet another marketing campaign, but your serious lack of imagination when marketing at an event. It might have been a bit of lighthearted fun to many, but you might have just kicked a lot of intelligent “chicks” out of the IT industry and back into the kitchen. And no, I am not collecting your latte!
May 15th, 2009 at 12:08 pm
I think it’s inappropriate in this day and age and that Net Registry should be ashamed of themselves. It’s of zero consequence the sex, or sexuality, of the marketing team responsible for putting this ‘gag’ together.. It’s just poor form no matter what.
May 15th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
Oh, I don’t know. I personally don’t see what the whole uproar about it. When it comes to these sorts of outfits it’s usually the nurse union that are in an uproar (occupation specific).
Well, if it was in a boss-secretary thing it might be a whole new response.
May 15th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
Hi Nicole,
Thanks for taking an interest in our CeBIT stand and marketing concept.
Firstly, my comment to Ben Grubb you quote above was actually that “the male dominance of the ITC industry is challenging for women” as in I recognise there is an ingrained culture that is not always female friendly – and not because of misogyny, rather because the male predominance means geeky guys may lack the experience – and therefore the skills to consistently work harmoniously with women.
I think the stand and the outfits were 100% OK. We rejected a number of outfits because they were more of the bedroom variety – we wanted a medical theme and the outfits you can see in our video at http://www.netregistry.com.au/ are a long way from sexy or suggestive.
The overwhelming response has been positive. I appreciate that some people may be incensed from taking the matter out of context. Some people will be incensed whatever you do.
Netregistry sought to have a little fun with an otherwise boring tech show (and they can be boring). So we did things a little differently and we tried (and I believe succeeded) in bringing a bit of entertainment to a dry event.
If our activity kicked any intelligent chicks out of the IT industry into the kitchen, I respectfully put it to you that they are not so intelligent. And I’d be happy to get you a latte.
Lastly, I’ll make the point that Netregistry is Australia’s largest regisrtar of .AU Domain names and its leading hosting company because we approach the needs of our 100,000’s of small business customers with the innovation and creativity on display at CeBIT. Our business customers care about results and (just as we did for ourselves at CeBIT) Netregistry delivers!
Larry Bloch
CEO
Netregistry
May 18th, 2009 at 7:20 pm
“If our activity kicked any intelligent chicks out of the IT industry into the kitchen, I respectfully put it to you that they are not so intelligent. ”
Damage control: Yer doin’ it wrong. That was just embarrassing.
May 18th, 2009 at 8:29 pm
Dude, no.
May 18th, 2009 at 8:45 pm
Ooh, Larry just showed what a contemptuous attitude he has for women in IT.
It’s about time companies like these realised that we’re now the ones with the money, and who control where the money in our industry is spent. I certainly do. And I know where I won’t be spending it.
May 19th, 2009 at 12:37 pm
Well for me, this is entirely unsurprising, and just more of the same from NetRegistry.
The campaign lacks class, and is certainly inappropriate for a professional event. That said, there have certainly been other vendors that have crossed the line even more significantly–but precedence is no excuse.
The first I heard of NetRegistry was many years ago when they started marketing “.au.com” domain names. All they’d done was to register “au.com” and were offering sub-domains to naïve consumers, and marketing it as the next .com.au! Shady tactics at best, and I want nothing to do with them.
Once again, NetRegistry fail. NetRegistry is to domains as Optus is to telecoms: Better than Melbourne IT/Telstra, but not by much.