by Jez
I interrupt the peace and quiet with this tidbit that's been flung my way.
Basically, there's a new girl gaming organisation on the block:
GirlsofCS is an online gaming community and nude pinup gallery. We are out to empower female gamers by eliminating the negative online stereotypes towards them. Online gaming has typically been dominated by men, but that is changing. By keeping our community mature, we hope to encourage more female gamers to enjoy their games with us.
GirlsofCS members will have access to our private VoIP server, Counter-Strike Source Game Servers, and exclusive content through our website. We plan on providing the no-bull gaming community that gamers have dreamed of since the internet began.
You read it right. Nude pinups of female gamers hoping to "eliminate negative online stereotypes"? Does anyone really subscribe to the "all girls who play games are fat and ugly" belief any more?
Sadly, the site's not launched -- must be in the hype phase -- so no nuddy pictures to ogle just yet.
Oh wow, that's just... wow. I'm assuming there's some money hungry corporation or at least a douchebag in a suit behind this?
On a different note - where are these female gamers? Are they all playing WoW and The Sims Online? I'm yet to come across any - at least, I haven't heard a female voice in a single voice chat supported game.
Posted by: Matt Brett | April 11, 2006 at 14:10
Go female empowerment!!!111!!!!1
Posted by: Magnakai | April 11, 2006 at 14:12
That's a different issue, Matt. What are you playing?
I play a lot of Halo 2 and several 360 titles on Live; I'm also on teamspeak for the PC games I play. However, I rarely speak in random matches on Live. From experience I know it just leads to trouble. First the "are you a girl?" comments, then the insults, then the propositions. It's just not worth the hassle when it's easily avoided by keeping your mouth shut...
Posted by: Jez | April 11, 2006 at 14:15
A lot of them are playing DDO and by a lot I mean more than anywhere else I have played. There are four women in our guild and they are active high level players. Not certain I want to see all of them nude though....I guess I will have to see them nude first and base my opinion on the objective facts.
D
Posted by: dnagrim | April 11, 2006 at 14:57
Does anyone really subscribe to the "all girls who play games are nude pinup girls"?
Posted by: | April 11, 2006 at 15:01
I have been playing Medal of Honor Allied Assault: Spearhead for over 5 years. In my clan we have 6 active female members, and we are currently only recruiting females. It came as a suprise that women even game, let alone would want to pose nude.....
btw, the chicks in my clan pwn.
Posted by: vash | April 11, 2006 at 15:02
Does anyone else remember Killcreek (AKA Stevie Case)? She had her 15 minutes of fame by being quite good at Quake, dating John Romero, and oh yeah, getting a boob job and dropping her panties for Playboy. Female empowerment...heh.
Posted by: Stickman | April 11, 2006 at 15:06
Oh yeah - this'll help creat the 'no bull' gaming community everybody dreams of. OR just set them up for way more drooling and slavering than they already get.
I am obviously missing something - aside from the obvious entertainment factor (better than watching a night elf pole dance) how is this making ANY point other than 'we're shallow and proud'? If you're a slightly less attractive gamer are you not allowed in their little 'tits and tan' club?
Posted by: WandringSoul | April 11, 2006 at 15:16
Laugh my asian ass off
Posted by: Trojan | April 11, 2006 at 15:18
Haha im loving in!!
Posted by: WWusi | April 11, 2006 at 15:31
Fantastic news :P
Posted by: web design london | April 11, 2006 at 15:33
Actually, if it were pictures of real girl gamers that would be ground breaking. But somehow I am thinking most of the girls have probably, maybe, looked at an xbox once so that makes them a gamer.
Posted by: Beckie | April 11, 2006 at 16:56
Insipid. Preposterously so.
Posted by: LeoPetr | April 11, 2006 at 16:59
I went to have a look at the page source and noticed that the Input field for the beta code doesn't actually DO anything. It's just an empty text field.
Posted by: Dave Woodwater | April 11, 2006 at 17:08
That bird at the site splash needs to iron her shirt. Bloody women 'eh?
Posted by: RoninPredator | April 11, 2006 at 17:24
Oh dear. More to the point, as ever, does anyone believe the old "by getting naked and fawning to the male gaze we are actually empowering ourselves" line? I mean, really. There's a difference between "naked" and "pin-up", and whilst you might argue that the former could work (because we are presenting a nude form), the latter is never going to be a tool for empowerment because, you know, it's subject to a male gaze, a particular idealised view of women that must be lived up to.
Grr, just thinking about this makes my brain crash.
Posted by: tom armitage | April 11, 2006 at 17:27
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4898484.stm
World - Hell - Hand Basket..
Posted by: Shard | April 11, 2006 at 17:42
>Does anyone really subscribe to the "all girls who play games are fat and ugly" belief any more?
Proudly upholding that there stereotype since 1981, thank you very much.
Posted by: k | April 11, 2006 at 18:18
Sigh. So, anybody check out the referenced website? Is it a commercial endeavour? Are the myspace pages shams, or are they real people? The mypsace pages look real, but faking that sort of stuff is something advertisers are doing these days so who can tell...
Yeah, I'm not seeing how it eliminates negative stereotypes. I'm pretty sure nobody actually believes the all gamer girls are unattractive thing anymore.
Posted by: Cormac Russell | April 11, 2006 at 19:54
Jez and Alice in the nuddy!
Woohoo!
Posted by: Abalieno | April 11, 2006 at 20:56
Great, we get to replace the current view of "girl" gamers with the notion that they're sex objects that exist for the gratification of male gamers. Oh wait, that IS the current view...
Posted by: bob | April 11, 2006 at 21:16
If i put up photos of myself in the nude and associated it with my gaming choices, how do you think that would come across seeing as i'm a guy?
I don't feel this is a positive thing, because AFAIK there is already way too much sexual harrisment towards girls in online gaming when guys find out ("send pic" "prove you're a girl" etc...) and this would only fuel that...
I'm not blogging about this on my own site because i don't want to give it any publicity as i don't think it's a positive move towards gaming equality.
No, i'm not gay :P
Posted by: Cris | April 11, 2006 at 21:43
Sounds like the 'female empowerment' thing is just a lure to get us to enter their porn site...
Posted by: cibby | April 11, 2006 at 23:01
I dunno. The fact they have 1532 friends or so on their myspace page, and at least the first page all seem to be relatively attractive girls, it COULD actually have some sort of impact. If a decent portion of those 1532 friends are attractive girls who play games, then the main website would have plenty of different 'models' to show, possibly persuading some closeminded people that there are more girl gamers than they previously thought.
Even so, though, they're only replacing the stereotype that no girls play games, with the stereotype that girls DO play games but they're shallow camwhores. Hooray for progress!
Posted by: Dom | April 12, 2006 at 00:44
(Caution - amateur detective at work)
Seems suspicious. Very much like it's just some sleazy guy trying to prime the pump for another "watchusgame" type of site.
A whois of the domain shows that it's registered to Lanfusion LLC, a company out of NJ that has an online gaming community (some forum software on a server? Not sure how much more there is to it. Anyone know?)
A look at the address provided for the consulting business
http://www.lanfusion.com/version21.business/mainmenu.html
when looked at with google maps looks like it's a residential address - not that this means anything in this web 2.0 age.
Still, you'd think there'd be more of an official press release, names (i.e. surnames) of those proud to stand for such a thing.
IT all seems a little fishy!
Posted by: Kim | April 12, 2006 at 00:47