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I don't disagree with the article in general but I was surprised by the women and people of color comments -- how does anyone know someone's gender or race on SO?

Of all the sites on the Internet, SO seems to be particularly well suited to the anonymity of posters -- even more so than HN because HN is more free form and conversational.

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> how does anyone know someone's gender or race on SO?

SO allows people to use an avatar image. I think for some time they were using images from Gravatar. So people were putting images of themselves in posts; or they didn't realise their gravatar image would be used.

Maybe women and people of color just perceived SO as a more hostile place because they imagined the person on the other side of the keyboard as a white male (true or not) and took it as an attack on their gender/race, forgetting that they are anonymous.

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