She also mentions "exposure", but people are exposed to software all the time. My interest started with being curious of how things were built and how I could d

She also mentions "exposure", but people are exposed to software all the time. My interest started with being curious of how things were built and how I could do so myself. I didn't know anyone who was a coder either. I got lucky and found someone who was willing to help teach me web development, but I learned a lot of basic concepts and had written scripts on my own. I knew I was interested in building things that made people's lives better. Maybe it was implicit but I never thought "I've seen white guys on TV coding, so I can do it!" My parents actively discouraged me from spending time on the computer and worked against me to do so. My friends would make fun of me when I'd show them a little thing I made. I had essentially no encouragement until I actually got a job doing it, but I had spent hundreds (if not thousands) of hours on it before that point. I have no problem with women being programmers, I work with a few on a daily basis. Women in the west have tremendous choice in how they want to live their lives. Your examples of India and Pakistan just illustrates that point. Women are fully capable, but how many would still have gone into programming if it weren't economically necessary for them to do so? The simple truth is, most women simply aren't interested in it. That's okay too, people should stop trying to impose how they would like the world to be. Recognize how it is and work inside those parameters. All that said, I definitely appreciate the proactive approach with all the linked resources. I see way too many "women in tech" articles that say we should encourage women, and don't do something so basic as helping give women (or anyone for that matter) a starting point. I'll probably bookmark this article and send those links to people when they tell me they are potentially interested in learning.