First Computer Programmers Inspire Documentary

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

________________________________________
From: Brad Templeton [btm () templetons com]
Sent: Wednesday, December 05, 2007 9:36 PM
To: David Farber
Cc: ip
Subject: Re: [IP] First Computer Programmers Inspire Documentary

On Wed, Dec 05, 2007 at 12:39:00PM -0500, Dave Farber wrote:
> First Computer Programmers Inspire Documentary
> Decline in Numbers of Women in Computer Science Threatens U.S.
> Competitiveness, Say Experts
> By SUSAN DONALDSON JAMES
>
> Dec. 4, 2007 (ABCNews)
>
> During World War II the Army ran out of male mathematicians and
> turned to six women to program the world's first computer - ENIAC.
> Historian Kathy Kleiman (left) has recorded oral histories of these
> women - now in their 80s - in her upcoming documentary film,
> "Invisible Computers."  ...

Dave, I would like to point out that while it talks about this
"upcoming" documentary film, a good deal of funding has to be
raised before this happens.   Kathy Kleiman, who is a good friend
of mine, may be known to some of you for her legal work on domain
names and hounding ICANN.   However, some years ago she learned
the story of these programmers, met some of them and raised a
more modest amount of money to do the basic groundwork -- sitting
these women down to tell their stories to a camera in rough form
while they still could.  (And indeed, 3 of them are now dead.)

However, going from raw footage to a compelling documentary is
no minor project, and she needs to raise a bunch to make that
happen.  She's recruited an Oscar-winning documentary producer and
other team members, but all of these are not quite as philanthropic as Kathy
and money must be raised to pay for their services.

This story is worth doing because they were the first in our
field.  That they happened to be women in a field that became
dominated by men certainly adds a nice kicker to it.

She'll be doing a fundraising dinner in January with Jean Bartik,
one of this team of the world's first professional programmers,
but if any list members would like to help Kathy out, either with
old-fashioned money or help in raising it from others, let me
know and I'll get you in touch.   Or mail her yourself as
KathrynKL at the aol.com domain.


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