Abstract
This study explains how the characteristics of a public electronic networking system (PEN) contributed to an unusually high rate of female early adoption. A survey of 303 PEN registrants indicated that PEN'S female adoption rate was attributable to the anticipated accessibility of PEN'S public terminals, as well as PEN'S compatibility with political participation norms. Qualitative interviews also revealed that female users took advantage of an opportunity for user input into PEN's design and reinvented the system to tailor it to their needs.