WGoE

What is Women Gamers of EVE?

Women Gamers of EVE [WGoE] is a chat channel in EVE open to in-real-life female players. The reason the channel is restricted is that sometimes women playing MMORPG's enjoy taking a pause from the testosterone and "Once I caught a fish that was I--------I big" attitudes. As EVE is still predominately populated by male players, a channel like WGoE can be seen like a haven for some.

"The WGoE channel is where I can get away from all the shit that goes on being an EXEC member of a corp... It is where I can bitch about my husband.. or about my day.. or hell.. if I feel like being emotional, I can... No strings attached. Being around an entire corp of guys most of the time, it is nice to get away from that at times!" - Malindah

Common feedback from new members is: "Until I found the WGoE channel I wasn't sure there WERE any other chicks playing."

Just so we're clear most of our members don't have any problems interacting with male players, on the contrary actually. Most ladies really enjoy talking with the guys in their corporation/alliance etc. Some play EVE with their male partner or friends. From time to time though it is nice to be able to chat with other girls in game.

So there you have it, it is not a corporation or an alliance. It is just a chat channel, created for the women of EVE.

How do you contact WGoE?

WGoE has a public chat channel ingame where people can come and find out more about WGoE. It is “Women Gamers public”. Anyone (male or female) can join us there. If you are interested in joining the private chat channel you can request an interview from there.

History

In 2003, a woman named Aminida created WGoE. In the beginning it was mainly for fun and laughs. Aminida knew a few women in EVE and wanted to bring them closer. Aminida started placing cans all over the EVE universe where she advertised the channel. Very slowly, the channel started to grow as lady players found their way to Aminida.

Finding women in EVE was not easy due to the fact many female players were creating male characters, EVE is big and getting the word out was difficult. The girls in the channel at that time all helped to try and spread the word to other girls playing EVE. We would start a conversation with those who had female characters and a biography that resembled something a female might write. As you can understand, that was not always an easy thing to do. A few times we got lucky but most of the times we did not. What made our work easy was the fact that guys were honest about being, well, guys.

After a few months the channel evolved from being just a channel for friends to a channel for all women in EVE. Aminida had to leave EVE and handed control over to Ada Lovelace. Ada took over and pushed the channel up a notch. More women were invited as we now had an "interview" procedure.

After a while Ada Lovelace left the game and Zajo took over the reins of WGoE.

With the help from Feline Ferocity, WGoE grew bigger each week. Feline sorted out a TS server for WGoE that allowed us to make the interview process foolproof. Feline also created a forum which was open to the public. That gave WGoE both a private section and a public one. Unfortunately this forum had to be closed down.

Sometime later, Zajo left the game and Malindah was left in charge. During this time Phuze, Arancia Detto and Leandra Anor were all moderators and greatly helped in the growth and upkeep of the channel.

In February of 2011, Malindah indefinitely left EVE as well. Following that, Arancia Detto, then Laedy, and then Athena Olympia were in charge as both Administrators and Moderators of the channel. Currently the old system of a admin and assistants has been replaced by a management committee. The current chairwoman is Crompton Aberforth.

Today WGoE is known by many people in EVE. It has been mentioned in magazines, blogs, talked about on EVE Radio and several times been the subject of gossip for EVE players.

In the past we have also held some events just for the ladies in the channel, such as “all-girl” pvp roams, which have been a lot of fun. Once you join the private WGoE channel, you will also be invited to join a mailing list which sends info out on these ops.

There are a large amount of women registered in the channel, but not all are in there at the same time, so it can sometimes be a bit quiet. It is important that ladies know the channel is there for them if they want it, but we all know the vast amount of chat channels you can have open and many of us have a lot of responsibilities ingame that makes it hard to devote our time in the channel. So feel free to come and go. Those not in are always welcome back!!!

Some interesting info:

Since the beginning, we have had an estimated number of 200 ladies join the WGoE channel. Many have left the game (or the channel) since.

The ingame channel records for ladies online at the same time are as follows:

2005 record: 20 chix on 21/08

2007 record: 19 chix on 19/09

2008 record: 12 chix on 08/03

2009: record 11 chix on 26/01

2010: record 20 chix on 20/09

2011: record 40 chix on 20/06

2013: record 29 chix on 02/03

2014: record 29 chix on 05/04

2015: record 23 chix on 15/3

WGoE Interview Series

In 2011, Arydanika (co-host of Voices from the Void podcast and a WGoE) started an interview series exclusively featuring other women players. The interview series focuses on the achievements and experiences of this elite 4% of the EVE Online population and can be found at the WGoE Interview Series Page.

So far the series includes interviews with:
•Diana Dial of EVEtimecode.com
•Laedy of Hydra Reloaded. and current admin of WGoE
•PinkKnife of Eve University
•Eelis Kiy of Shadows of the Federation (Faction Warfare) and Blogger of Where the Frack is My Space Ship
•Literia of Damination Angles [DOUMA], Role-Player and blogger of Literia's walk

This article was originally created by Zajo at [1], and has been edited and updated by Laedy, with further edits by Crompton Aberforth.

(Banner art done by Winterblink)