What women want: A crack at the Web3 glass ceiling

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Pratim Bhosale, a 23-year-old Web3 content creator and aspiring developer, is often amused when she meets new people in the Web3 ecosystem.

“Their usual reaction is ‘Aww!’ when I tell them I am a developer on Web3,” she says.

Unlike men, she says, Bhosale has to repeat things aloud 30 times to make herself heard.

Well, she’s not alone and her situation is more or less reflective of what prevails in India’s technology landscape. Added to this is the fact that there are only a handful of women in the space.

Moneycontrol spoke to over half a dozen of women about what it’s like to be a woman in Web3. Are they taken seriously in communities or in closed groups and is there is a need to spread more awareness?

Simply put, Web3 is the next version of the internet where services run on blockchain and are decentralised.

Women—from entrepreneurs to developers—spoke about concerns over their representation in this space and how initiatives are being taken to make it more inclusive.

Anonymity factor

Most Web3 communications are on Telegram, Discord and Twitter and allow anonymity, which can be an advantage for women.

“In offline meet-ups, you will hardly see two-three women. So you obviously feel alienated,” says Bhosale. However, the anonymity factor on these channels becomes an advantage for these women and conversations are easier.

Anubha Maneshwar runs an NGO called Girlscript Foundation, which helps people connect with the Web3 community and organises Web3 camps.

“Until the middle of last year, it was mostly male-dominated and was more about crypto trading. There were many groups that I was part of, but there were hardly two-three active women as compared to hundreds of men who were trading crypto,” Maneshwar says.

Given the prevalence of this trend, women-focused groups such as Web3 Baddies and Surge Women were created in the US and other countries.

“In India, we started this Web3 camp where we reserve like 50 percent of the seats for women participants,” says Maneshwar.

Even on the jobs front, the anonymity factor plays a key role for these women. While they face typical questions about being married and having children, the anonymity factor has helped to a large extent.

Unlike Web2, where hiring processes typically involve several rounds of interviews, on Web3, only the quality of work matters. As the community grows, people get connected on Twitter, Discord or Telegram and if they hit it off, they get jobs, giving less room for gender bias.

“On Web3, if you are active in the community, you can easily initiate a conversation. And then you can say that you’re interested in applying or looking for a change or something and you can get an opportunity even without a proper schedule for a line-up of interviews or anything like that,” says Maneshwar.

But yes, unlike the representation of women on Web3 in the west, in India this is yet to grow, these women say.

Also Read: Web3 spawns a new generation of angel investors in India

Fewer women

Radhika, a marketing professional and a Web3 enthusiast based in Chicago, tweeted that there are very few women on Web3 in India. This is so on Discord channels such as JugaadGrant, which, she pointed out, does not have women in the core team.

“More grants for women/increase in access is important, but so is a fundamental change in tech culture once we enter these spaces,” she said.

Former Flipkart employee Neha Kumari founded a Web3 startup Carret, a cryptocurrency trading platform, last year.

“I started trading in crypto and tried multiple platforms. Seeing the existing gaps in the market, I founded Carret,” Kumari says.

Being new into this ecosystem, Kumari says the Telegram and Twitter communities helped her pave the way into this new world but there is an evident cultural shift moving from Web2 to Web3 and it takes time to adapt.

“But since this is something that is 24x7, you will always find someone responding to you, so it’s quite collaborative and cohesive,” she says.

Sneha Mishra, an active Web3 community member, transitioned from Web2 to Web3 late last year and is doing multiple projects. She highlights a different concern.

“I don’t see new people coming in. It is the same women I see everywhere,” Mishra says.

According to her, while this could also be said for the women in tech, what makes a difference is the understanding of the technology. The challenge in Web2 is majorly to do with the change in mindset rather than the technology, says Mishra.

“But the problem with Web3 is the technology itself, and not many people are aware of that. One needs to build awareness to get more women on Web3. For that to happen, it is important to have more women founders,” Mishra says.

Many women also say the future of Web3 is still unclear and that’s also a major reason they are reluctant to leave their cushy jobs and jump into this space.

NFTs

The women also say that non-fungible tokens (NFTs) give a fair idea of how fewer women are present in the space at this juncture. NFTs are digital representations of physical objects like art, music, in-game items and videos. They are stored on blockchain and can be bought and sold online, often with cryptocurrency.

“A few months ago, I was trying to buy an NFT for my profile picture. And there was not a single NFT that represented a woman,” says Bhosle. Despite making a special request, she couldn’t buy one as she was told it would not be available any time soon.

“I also think that NFTs played a major role in the movement,” adds Maneshwar.

One project, the crypto coven, which has NFTs of witches and has crossed $20 million in trading volumes, actually changed the perspective.

“Many men were putting these NFT profile pictures on. So it kind of changed perspectives. So many women, who are digital artists or creators, were able to get a voice here through these projects,” says Maheshwari.

Organisational effort
But what organisations like Maneshwar’s NGO are doing is a stepping stone.

“In one of our first bootcamps, there were no women and when the pictures went up, we got trolled because there were no women attendees. But now we get a good number of women to participate when we organise these camps. In our recent camps, close to 4,000-5,000 attendees were women,” she says.

However, there are conscious efforts being made to ensure Web3 is more inclusive, these women say. Many women-focused groups are created on Telegram and WhatsApp to help women entrepreneurs enter the ecosystem.

Various organisations are also launching initiatives. Devfolio, host of India’s largest community hackathon, has started an ETHWMN Fellowship, an eight-week mentor-led programme exclusively to upskill women Web2 developers and help them make the transition to Web3 using Ethereum. The fellowship offers a $1,000 stipend and will be mentored by leading women in the ecosystem.

Polygon offers grants to support women entrepreneurs in the Web3 ecosystem. Paradigm Shift Capital, a VC fund, is looking to invest in women-led projects.