Christen Rochon: Queen of Divas and Dorks

From the time she was a little girl, Christen Rochon was obsessed with how technology operates. She would disassemble transistor radios, flashlights, computers — whatever she could get her hands on. At the same time, she also dreamed of a career in advertising, just like Angela Bower’s character from the 1980s sitcom Who’s the Boss? Because of this dream, Rochon chose to study advertising at Michigan State University and went into radio advertising sales, where she worked for 10 years.

However, her passion for technology soon re-emerged in conjunction with an enthusiasm for fashion. “I’ve always had an interest in science and technology, and I’ve always been a little bit of a girly-girl — for a while I would search online for your typical sites that talk about technology, social media, that area of information, and then I would be on another round of sites that were strictly fashion, strictly style,” she said in an exclusive interview with Potential of Us.

Rochon realized there was a void that needed to be filled. “I thought, if there was a site that had a little bit of both [technology and fashion], that would cut my surfing time online in half. But I looked around and couldn’t find anything. There was no site that was focused on women of color and technology, or women of color who enjoy style and technology,” she said. “Then I thought, ‘I’m going to create it myself. Not really for anybody else, but just for me.’”

Divas and Dorks is Born

Rochon pursued her idea, and Divas And Dorks was created, a site that embraces the union and intersection of Rochon’s biggest interests: technology and fashion. After many sleepless nights, she officially launched the site in September 2009.

Rochon never saw herself as a blogger or publisher — she thought her career was firmly planted in advertising. But over the years, as media and technology progressed, so too did her views on her career path. “If anything, I thought I would be an entrepreneur [and] have an ad agency. I always thought [my career would be] corporate, but to have the opportunity to have my own site just based on the invention of the blog and the online community is amazing. Just that evolution itself has definitely opened doors for me, and that was something I never dreamed about as a child.”

The aim of Divas and Dorks is to create a space where readers will get the important information about a tech product without all the jargon and heavy terminology. The site also largely caters to women. “The typical Divas and Dorks reader is female — some of them are moms, college graduates. They love fashion, they love style, they love technology. They want to know how a product’s going to make their lives easier, how much it costs, is it stylish, is it going to enhance the way that they live,” Rochon said.

Read more of the story here.

Written by Tara Mahadevan SOURCE: verizonwireless.com

• Tags:
• Christen Rochon
• Diversity in Technology
• Women in Technology

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