IT Geeks Wear Heavy Metal T-Shirts:

An oldie post, but a goodie...
IT people “twice as likely” to wear heavy metal t-shirt as other people

NEW YORK (September 13, 2006) - According to new research, IT staff are twice as likely to wear a heavy metal t-shirt as their non-IT counterparts. The study of 1000 office workers, by Intermedia, the leading Microsoft Exchange host, also found IT types 34% more likely to sport a ponytail. Other key findings:


* Black jeans are 63% more popular among IT types than other workers
* IT workers are 32% less likely to wear clean clothes every day of the week than business managers
* Business and IT people are equally likely to wear a cellphone belt clip

The survey also found that despite unhelpful stereotyping such as Apple’s ‘Mac and PC’ commercials, IT and business people are equally likely – at 5% each – to wear dated 1990s spectacles.

Confirming one stereotype, however, was the finding that IT workers were almost twice as likely to carry a Maglite and a Leatherman. Both businesspeople and IT people prefer a Leatherman over a MagLite, and are 20% more likely to carry one.

“Our research provides an interesting insight into the life of IT people,” said Rurik Bradbury, VP marketing for Intermedia. “Our large Microsoft Gold Certified team of engineers was comforted that IT people are twice as likely to wear Megadeth and similar t-shirts, and that black jeans and ponytails are still hot items. However, they were distraught to find that the cellphone belt clip has gone ‘mainstream’ and lost its identification with the IT subculture.”