It's a pipeline issue but there are ways to cater to certain groups (see affirmative action). The question is, why is there a need to cater to certain groups? Incongruity is present in every field, every job, every company, everywhere.
As long as opportunity is sufficiently available for everyone (which it is, one can learn to program, get input on their code and collaborate with other people on the internet without disclosing their gender/age/race), that's good enough.
> The question is, why is there a need to cater to certain groups?
Have you ever used software or website that was written entirely by an offshore team and felt that it was a bit "off"? The translations were a bit wonky and the interactions felt somewhat unintuitive?
Most people have and we're more than willing to attribute it to a lower skill level, but it's also the case that clear and intuitive aren't universal concepts. White men make software that's intuitive for white men and less so for other groups. The more than you can blend different perspectives into the product development process, the more the finished product will appeal to those represented perspectives.
There's a reason all the big tech companies are trying to address their lack of minority representation, and it's only partly PR. It's also the case that these companies have largely saturated the tech-savvy market where the demographics look similar to the demographics of their employees. And in a world where high valuations require growth, reaching those under-represented groups of consumers is critical to achieving that growth.
> Have you ever used software or website that was written entirely by an offshore team and felt that it was a bit "off"? The translations were a bit wonky and the interactions felt somewhat unintuitive?
Translations off? Sure. Unintuitive? I don't know, but let's say I'll give you that. The offshore team lives in their own cultural bubble, where English is used in a particular way(incongruent with what I/you are used to), and maybe they like to place their menu on the left instead of on the right. I can see, intuitively, the link between "local differences" like language proficiency and cultural preference, and producing a different product.
You then cite "white men" making software that's intuitive for "themselves". I don't see any intuitive characteristics that would encompass "white men" in any meaningful way. There's white men in the US, there's white men in Russia. The white men in Russia don't build applications the same way the white men in the US do.
I can instinctively tell the difference between a german developer and a US developer(visible language differences). What are the common factors attributable to "white males" that lead them to create software that is intuitive for them?
As long as opportunity is sufficiently available for everyone (which it is, one can learn to program, get input on their code and collaborate with other people on the internet without disclosing their gender/age/race), that's good enough.