Printed from www.pcpro.co.uk
Posted on May 14th, 2009 by Barry Collins
Dell’s sex change goes horribly wrong
Dell’s ham-fisted attempt to reach out to women appears to have gone, well, tits up.
A couple of days ago the company launched a site called (if you’re eating your dinner, you may want to look away from the screen now) Della. This mine of patronising twaddle included a section called “Tech Tips” in which Dell delivered advice on what the fair womenfolk might choose to use their netbook for, including pearls of wisdom such as:
3. Eat better: Find recipes online, store and organize them, and watch cooking videos.
4. Get organized: ‘Remember the Milk’ is a free, tweakable online task manager that’s easy to use.
It seems a number of women took exception to Dell’s 1950s-tinted view of their lifestyle and (after they’d finished the hoovering and ironing their husbands’ shirts) fired off angry emails to Dell HQ, reminding the PC maker that modern life doesn’t actually reflect an episode of Happy Days.
Clearly bruised by the criticism, Dell has made a number of judicious edits to its Tech Tips page, which now encourages women to consider much more neutral activities such as reading eBooks and adding storage with memory cards.
Indeed, an “editor’s note” at the top of the page reads: “Some of you have read this article over the last several days and will notice a few modifications. You spoke; we listened. Thank you for your ongoing feedback.”
They listened? Bang goes our theory the site editor was a man.
(Nicole Kobie, from our sister-site (no pun intended) also has an excellent summary of the Della fiasco)
12 Responses to “ Dell’s sex change goes horribly wrong ”
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May 14th, 2009 at 7:28 pm
I think that with the e books comment you are still a few marks wide of a woman’s life today (and for many years) and use of IT. Still patronising. What on earth made you Dell to make any type of such comments from the original to latest. You are back in time which is not good for such a company and success.
I think it should be, not that you put your foot further into your mouth, but simply, sincerely apologise to us. And then do retraining.
May 15th, 2009 at 1:35 pm
Just missing ebooks on How to make the Man in your life happy and the brand new Kitchen GPS application, because where else would a woman need to go?
May 17th, 2009 at 5:47 pm
And what about us hermaphrodites?
May 18th, 2009 at 7:48 pm
Who wants a Dell anyway? If you take crap and paint it pretty colors, it’s still crap.
May 18th, 2009 at 8:19 pm
“They listened? Bang goes our theory the site editor was a man. ”
You complain about their sexist bigotry and then do it yourself? Hippocrites.
May 19th, 2009 at 5:51 am
a male is completely correct. Hypocritical.
When I read about Dells gaff it made me cringe, but instead of going spastic over their misguided attitude, maybe some constructive criticism will help them realize what women really want.
Though, going by the mobile phone applications “is he a match for me?” and “what will my babies sex/name be?” I suspect that there is no one homogeneous woman’s view on this. I really suspect that some women will love what Dell was offering, while some women would rather know how to test for a dead laptop motherboard.
In fact the women who are angry over this and who are demanding a more techie Della site are actually being hypocrites. They are behaving just like Dell. Assuming that ALL women want what they want, just like Dell assumed all women want girly girl content/tools.
May 19th, 2009 at 8:22 am
a male – the line about the site editor being a man was a joke. I’m sure it’s not about to win me the Perrier Award, but I think most people will acknowledge that it was written in jest.
Bunny – I find it a little difficult to swallow lectures on “constructive criticism” from someone who bandies about the term “Spastic” as a form of abuse.
May 19th, 2009 at 9:22 am
Trying to adequately target an ad to a group as large and as vague as ‘women’ is impossible. Women are not a homogeneous group with the same likes and needs. Neither are all ‘men’ the same. When companies try to pull something like this off, it fails every time. It is impossible. Just like how not every man finds Maxim magazine applicable to their lives, not all women care about the same stuff. Even the old reliables like child care and breast feeding miss the mark with many many women.
May 19th, 2009 at 9:41 pm
“It seems a number of women took exception to Dell?s 1950s-tinted view of their lifestyle and (after they?d finished the hoovering and ironing their husbands? shirts) fired off angry emails to Dell HQ…” Oh COME ON! Why do you continue the stupid stereotype????????
May 21st, 2009 at 8:42 am
For every bloke who watches Men and Motors, there’s a woman watching QVC. Neither are the highest pinnacle of achievement – but neither are short of an audience. Beware the intellectual’s game of starting every thought with the unspoken preface “if only everyone was as smart as me, then…”
I expect Dell watched the guy on Ebay who takes ex-corporate dell Laptops and runs their cases through his spraybooth. He couldn’t keep up with demand for pink laptops.
May 21st, 2009 at 8:47 am
Della is for girly women, of which there are a lot. I know, I’ve met some of them! Other women can use the main Dell site or wherever they want. I think Della is a good site for the girly women. The fact is that there are people like this who want this kind of thing. My ideal site would feature high-tech stuff, naked women, motorbikes, etc. Not all men are like me. There should be sites for different types of people and we should not scorn the other sites because they do not attract us. Dell made a mistake in not announcing that the Della site is for the more traditionally feminine type of woman and hoping that it would appeal to anyone with breasts – which is quite obviously impossible.
Apple’s site seems to be attractive to most types though…
May 21st, 2009 at 8:58 am
SayBlade: Its a JOKE for heaven’s sake!