Computing appealed to women far more in the seventies when I did my degree and the emphasis was on programming and not on networks, hardware, games or similar aspects of IT which appeal to the men. We see computers are a tool to do a task, whether that is creating a program to run the business, or one to enable us to communicate with friends. It's like a car - we can drive it without knowing in detail how the engine works.

Then men went on to design the computing courses and they became the study of "the engine" - hardware/networks etc and that made them appealing to men and girls derided computing as a geeky boys thing.

I work in a team of six in application development and four of us are women of that seventies computing era. We don't do hardware and networks, that is "the other side" - of the room and somehow a great divide. No women there.

Maybe the rise of social networking and its appeal to women as a communication tool will change matters.