'Gorgeous geeks' get some exposure

Computer women defy nerd stereotype, pose for calendar

Joyzelle Davis, Rocky Mountain News

Published December 19, 2005 at midnight

Text size

More Tech & Telecom

After working for more than a decade as a software programmer, Lilac Mohr was tired of being the only woman in the office other than the receptionist.

"Whenever I worked with other female software engineers, I found them to be more receptive to ideas and more collaborative" than the men, Mohr said. "The world could really use a lot more women in the field."

So she donned a miniskirt and decided to do something about it.

It's well-known that engineers and computer scientists typically earn more than workers in other fields. But along with that comes the long-standing stereotype that tech types are dorky, pasty-faced drones.

Mohr, 26, of Denver, put out a call on the Craig's List online classifieds site for Colorado women who worked in computers or engineering who would be willing pose for a calendar of "gorgeous geeks," with proceeds to go to a scholarship for girls interested in studying computer science.

Contrary to assertions by her male co-workers and husband, -Mohr had no problem finding "12 attractive women" working in computers - and she even found a bona fide rocket scientist.

"I thought Lilac's idea of showing the meaning of the word geek is being redefined in today's society was a great idea," said Lynn Lauritsen, a software engineer who posed for October wearing a roller-girl outfit and carrying a plate of iPods.

A few of the women are indeed scantily clad in calendar-girl style, but the only thing that's laid truly bare is the models' inner nerd. Miss August says she'd rather stay home and play online computer games than go out to movies, Miss September reads textbooks for fun, and Miss April cops to attending sci-fi conventions (though not in costume . . . or at least she won't admit it).

Mohr, who began working as a computer programmer at age 16 and left Carnegie Mellon at 19 to take a job at a Colorado startup during the dot-com boom, poses in a miniskirt sporting vintage Nintendo toy guns. In her bio, she describes herself as a "numbers girl" who is working on using data mining and statistical analysis of econometric data for real estate applications.

Alongside the photos are geeky dates in history, such as June 23, 1971, the day Documents RFC 172 established the File Transfer protocol; and April 18, 1965, the day Gordon Moore, one of the founders of Intel, observed the principle that computing power - or more specifically, transistor density - doubles every 18 months.

Mohr spent $10,000 of her own money. She doesn't plan to make another calendar because it costs too much and "the novelty will wear off," she said. About 400 calendars have been purchased from the www.geekgorgeous.com Web site since it launched in November, though more than 90,000 people have visited the site.

Tracy Marx, a Colorado Springs software engineer who posed for April wearing a belly-bearing "I Heart Nerds" T-shirt, said that while she likes working in a largely male work atmosphere, a lot of women are afraid to show too much personality.

As to whether the calendar objectifies women, Mohr said it wasn't her original intent for the models to show quite so much skin. But many of them wanted to in order to poke fun at their nerdy images, she said.

"They obviously don't show up to work dressed up like that," Mohr said.

davisj@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-892-2514

Subscribe to the Rocky Mountain News