It’s hard to think of something to write about espnW. There’s just so much that ranges from vaguely troubling to outright wrong about the site, and I don’t want to mess up by missing something important. Fortunately, Julie DiCaro pretty much nails most of my concerns, so please read her take on the issue.
Julie said:
There’s no way to take a group as broad as “women” and create a sports blog just for us.
THIS. For a few years, I had the joy of being paid to blog for a now-mostly-defunt women’s network. The paychecks were awesome, but the only instruction I ever got was: “Your topic is sports. Your audience is women.” I pleaded with my various bosses for a little direction. Female sports fans are…what? There are so many types of us.
Am I supposed to feel grateful that ESPN is reaching out to my XX chromosomes to give me sporting insight that my little woman-brain can easily process? Are the bright colors supposed to speak to me more than the daunting reds and maroons of the real ESPN? A single playpen for the gals to sit in while the men play on the real ESPN jungle gym is not going to cut it.
Why not just acknowledge that female sports fans are sports fans, and producing a sideshow of a site “just for us” is not going to accomplish whatever the heck it is ESPN is looking to accomplish? Why stash talented writers (like Amanda Rykoff) at the W instead of giving deserving women a real shot at sports media equality?
And: How is this happening in 2010?
Like DiCaro said in her piece (seriously, read it), it would be great if my early skepticism was not the direction the site would end up going. At this point, I’m not going to bother with the W… but you might find me over at my dad’s ESPN.
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1 comment
Kathleen
December 20, 2010 at 4:48 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment
I still think if ESPN wants to grow their audience, they should do more quality regional stuff, instead of focusing so heavily on NY/Boston/SF. But of course that would involve extra work instead of just repackaging what they already have. Maybe all us “small markets” aren’t much on our own, but all of us being under-served adds up to a huge potential market.
Maybe when ESPNW falls on it’s face (I hope), they’ll explore that option next.