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Interview with SexyChyck
By Dan Wilchins
Perhaps Lizz Sommerfield, PC '96, is not the first person you would want
to see in leopard-skin print underwear.
But if you'd like to, you can; just visit her personal website.
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courtesy Yale Banner
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Lizz Sommerfield, PC '96
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Sommerfield describes her site as a playground for her alter ego,
Sexychyck, for whom the site is named. The site also features an online
portfolio, pictures of Sommerfield in her underwear, as well as links to
pornographic websites.
Sexychyck.com has recently turned Sommerfield into a minor media
celebrity: The
New York Times and the Associated Press
Newswire have both written about her website, and in particular,
her employer's disapproving reactions to SexyChyck. Sommerfield recently
described the imbroglio to The Yale Herald from her home in Fairfax, Vir.
The Yale Herald: When did you
first put SexyChyck on the web?
Lizz Sommerfield: It probably started in December '95 or
January '96, when I was a senior [at Yale] and I was working on my web
page. At first it was just a name, but it became more like an alter ego. I
was bored being Lizz all the time, and I figured I couldn't reduce my whole
personality to fit a web page, so I put a part of myself that was
interesting on there. SexyChyck isn't all of me, but she's a part of me.
YH: Characterize SexyChyck.
LS: She's sexy and smart, attractive and witty. She's a
little bitter, but she's still someone who could do anything, with nothing
holding her back.
YH: Bitter?
LS: Yeah, bitter. Maybe jaded is a better word. Dating at
Yale can do that to you. I mean, you know how it is: either you meet
someone your freshman year and date them for all four years, or you never
date anyone your whole time there.
YH: Why the "y" in
"chyck?"
LS: It stands for Yale. Some people think it's also like the
way some people spell "woman" with a y, so there's no
"man" in it, but that wasn't my original intention.
YH: When did you first put
pictures of yourself in your underwear on your site?
LS: About a year ago. There's a lot of stuff to read on my
site, so I thought I'd give people something to look at, too. It kind of
draws people in. I don't know why anyone would actually want to see me in
my underwear, but if they do, more power to them. I'm definitely not a
model. But if people get drawn in by the pictures, and then find out that
I'm also an intelligent and witty woman, then I've done well. The point is,
I can be both: I'm intelligent, and I'm in my underwear.
YH: You're a feminist.
LS: Absolutely.
YH: But your employers don't
always see it that way.
LS: Yeah, at my last job, I was really harassed a lot because
of my site. My co-workers would always say stuff to me like: "Hey,
you're the webmistress, where're your whips and chains?" There was
this traveling salesman with the company who kept calling me up and
threatening to get me fired. He said that this wasn't the image the company
should be projecting...
YH:...because you mentioned the
company name on your website...
LS: ...he felt that having a link on my resume to the
company's web page was unacceptable. Now I'm at a new job, and I don't
mention the company at all on my webpage. But yeah, the old job was a
terrible work environment, and it was in Fredricksburg, Vir., which is a
pretty boring place anyway, so I figured I'd just get a new job, which I
did. This was last July.
YH: And you were up-front with
your current employer about the content of your website.
LS: Yeah, and they said that it was fine, as long as I didn't
mention the company name on the site. I have two opinions about that: on
the one hand, if I were the CEO of the company, I might worry about what
people have to say about the company in public. And if you work for a
company, it's really your obligation not to insult them in public. But on
the other hand, it would be nice if I could mention my employer on my site.
Since I freelance, it would help me get clients if they knew who I worked
for.
YH: How many people visit your
site a day?
LS: On average, about 1,000. I have a lot of repeat visitors,
a bit of a fan club. I have a page that I update daily, where I talk about
how my day is going. If I have a bad day, people send me supportive emails.
I try to give a personal response to every email I get.
YH: How do people find out about
your site?
LS: Usually from links. A lot of porn site listings link to
my page, because of my domain name. They link to my page without ever
looking at it, which is fine with me.
YH: You link to some racy content
yourself.
LS: I do. I have links to porn sites. Porn sites make up
about 40% of the web. I'm not opposed to porn. I'm not offended by it. If
people are, they can hit their back buttons.
I try to deliver a website that touches on all aspects of the web. I have a
tutorial that teaches you how to hire a web designer, I have a
Shakespearean insult generator, all kinds of stuff. Porn is a big part of
the web, and about 90% of the people who come to my site are looking for
porn. I'm not above pointing them in the right direction to make a few
bucks.
YH: So how much money do you make
from your website per month?
LS: Enough to pay for the site: about $50 to $60 a month. I
have to pay for the site and the traffic and so forth, but the banners [ads
for pornographic sites] cover the costs.
YH: Why do you put pictures of
yourself in your underwear on your website?
LS: A lot of people want to know why I put pictures of myself
on the web. First of all, only about five of the pictures on the site are
of me in my underwear, and there are about 100 pictures of me on the site.
I won't deny that I get a big kick out of the attention: it's a lot of fun
being your own little cyber-celebrity. It's a taste of fame. It's nice to
be able to interact with your fans via email, instead of having to face
them in person. And it makes me realize that I never want to be too famous,
because I value my privacy.
YH:What parts of your life will
you not put on the web?
LS: I don't hide much. People that meet me in real life hear
my life story in about ten minutes anyway. But there are some things I
won't talk about. I whine about work, but I don't mention specifically where
I work, or my company name, or else they'd fire me. I don't mention people
that don't want to be mentioned; some people just want to keep their lives
private, and I respect that. I may say whether or not I'm dating, but I
won't say who I'm dating, and I'm not one of those women who have ten web
pages devoted to their boyfriends. I do talk a lot about things I see and
do, like when friends come to visit.
YH: Do you have a valentine?
LS: No. I'll probably spend Valentine's Day with my friends,
complaining about how much I hate the holiday.
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