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A L S O__T O D A Y 21st Log New York Times falls for old Net gag - - - - - - - - - - T A B L E__T A L K In the market for a notebook computer? Exchange information and advice on brands and features in the Digital Culture area of Table Talk - - - - - - - - - - R E C E N T L Y The father of Mario and Zelda By Moira Muldoon Nintendo's Shigeru Miyamoto creates the world's most popular video games (12/02/98) Let's Get This Straight By Scott Rosenberg Block those pundits: AOL-Netscape isn't like an NBC of the Web -- and can't be (12/01/98) "We Were Burning" Reviewed by Andrew Leonard A new book tells us to forget about Japan Inc. -- Japanese entrepreneurs led the high-tech consumer electronic revolution (11/30/98) The 21st Challenge No. 16: Misdirected love notes By Charlie Varon and Jim Rosenau Answer the mystery e-mail -- win a prize (11/25/98) The Net never forgets By J.D. Lasica Everything you've ever posted online could come back to haunt you someday (11/25/98) - - - - - - - - - - BROWSE THE 21ST FEATURES ARCHIVES - - - - - - - - - -   S A L O N E M P O R I U M FREE! 12-ounce bag of Salon Blend with a purchase of $30 or more. While supplies last.

spin sisters - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ______WHY IS PR THE ONLY HIGH-TECH ______FIELD THAT WOMEN RUN? BY JANELLE BROWN | Last month, Upside released its annual 100 Digital Elite list. Disappointingly, but perhaps not surprisingly, only eight women were included on this list of Silicon Valley muckety-mucks, with another five straggling in via a group of around 50 "honorable mentions." That women are vastly underrepresented in the upper ranks of the high-tech industry is nothing new -- even the more eclectic Wired 25 list the same month included only three women (none, incidentally, actually in technology). But what was notable about Upside's Digital Elite feature was exactly where the women appeared in its 17 categories: Of the eight women listed, three were listed in the "PR Pros" category, as were two of the five honorable mentions. By comparison, of the 92 men on the list, only one was a public relations exec. The debate about the underrepresentation of women in the technology industry has raged for years, with some feminists arguing that the geeky engineering focus of the industry excludes women, and other women maintaining that the industry's youth and lack of conventionality provides more of an opening for women to advance. There are certainly some women leaders in technology businesses -- CEOs like Kim Polese of Marimba, Katrina Garnett of CrossWorlds and Carol Bartz of Autodesk, or chief technology officer Judy Estrin of Cisco, venture capitalist Ann Winblad, Palm co-founder Donna Dubinsky and ubiquitous pundit Esther Dyson. But within the technology industry, public relations is already a stronghold of female executives; it's the only area, actually, where the plaudits go more often to women than men. Thanks to public relations, women are not only entering the executive boardrooms of Silicon Valley, but also are often credited with wielding powerful industry-wide influence. Women like Pam Edstrom (executive vice president of Microsoft's PR firm Waggener Edstrom), Pam Alexander (president of Alexander Ogilvie) and Andy Cunningham (Cunningham Communications) now have recognized names and high-powered clients in every corner of the technology industry. As Jody Peake, co-founder and executive vice president of Waggener Edstrom, puts it, "I get so intellectually stimulated when I get to sit next to senior-level people making changes in how the world operates, and go vicariously through all the things you do at a very high executive level in business." But are women merely participating in the industry, as Peake put it, "vicariously"? Public relations may be the first visible stronghold of women in the technology industry, but does it mean that they are getting a seat at the table? Or is it, as some are concerned, becoming a pink-collar ghetto -- the default career for women in the digital world because they aren't given the opportunity to do anything else? N E X T_ P A G E .|. PR -- It's not just a job, it's a profession!   ILLUSTRATION BY KATHERINE STREETER - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Become a Salon member. Click here.