Oxygen.com--All Things for Women?

A homeless woman sits under a bridge “not far from Silicon Valley, the heart and soul of America’s info-tech boom.” After singing “Que Sera Sera,” she asks her companion if he thinks she’s pretty and if he thinks they’re going to get anything out of this dot-com frenzy and e-business mania. This tale is told in cartoon format at Oxygen.com, the new Oprah-infused gyno-centric Web entity--an online companion to the new cable network.

In another cartoon, a having-it-all power-female admits that a great job, a killer wardrobe and diversified portfolio don’t quite add up to happiness. True happiness, she says, “is what you come home to,” which, in her case means an excitable pet pooch who meets her at the front door.

Are these the new century’s answer to the image of the octopus-armed woman proto-multi-tasking on the cover of the 1971 inaugural issue of Ms. magazine? Certainly, these images paint a less than exhilarating picture of the modern woman.

Also somewhat disheartening is the fact that Geraldine Laybourne, CEO and chair of Oxygen Media, has been called chairman in more than a hundred articles including Fortune’s recent cover story, “Fortune’s 50 Most Powerful Women.”

But even though umpteen women can’t quite have it all and falter at acquiring due respect, Oprah Winfrey has more than her share of It All. And surely, if the queen of all media can get reluctant literates to read, no doubt she can get technophobes to surf. Oxygen is in the atmosphere.

Oxygen offers girls’ culture (Trackers), sports (We Sweat) and e-commerce (Womenshands, a showcase for crafts made by women). And of course, the Oprah-ific site offers gads of self-help (Thriveonline, Moms Online, Oprah.com and ka-Ching--the latter about managing money). Along with nourishing the soul, Oxygen hopes to nourish the funny bone and the cranium and the procrastinator in you with games and ‘zines and cartoons and chats and reviews and lots and lots of promotion for the hard-to-find TV network.

While every other Web site lets you chat and post till you’ve strained all your “sharing” muscles, one unique feature at Oxygen.com is Our Stories, little multimedia slide shows. Viewers submit and narrate their stories and the site’s geekettes bring them to life, fusing photo collage, flash animation and audio. One tale includes memories of a childhood sleepover at a haunted house, animated with whimsical drawings. In another, a woman recalls a blind date who took her to a funeral, told in eye-catching still photos embellished with animation. Along with submissions from viewers, this section includes segments starring Oxygen network hosts such as Katie Puckrik (of “Pajama Party”), who talks about pigging out in Hollywood, a town where she says “eating with pleasure is shocking.”

Visitors can also peruse the Read, a mini-zine of opinion and observation, written by notable contributors such as novelist Emily Prager and Pulitzer-winning writer Liz Balmaseda. A recent essay discusses our culture’s penchant to “adorabilize” the grandparent. The article examines the press coverage of Elian Gonzalez’s grandmothers.

Advice-tainment can be found in the form of Breakup Girl, Lynn Harris’ droll animated alter ego superhero, who is now part of e-Oprah Inc. Harris has been mending broken hearts online since 1997 with an interactive advice column, humorous essays, practical tips and a serialized comic strip of the everyday adventures of a heroine bent on fighting crimes of the heart (coming soon to the Oxygen channel). Her new digs provide high-tech color forms, a magic beach ball and downloadable audio maxims such as “Don’t sleep with someone in order to get over someone. Especially if it’s that person.”

Also moving on up from indie-site to the fold of e-Oprah is Girls On, featuring reviews of film, TV, music and books. With an intensely personal style of journalist-as-best friend reportage, the site offers reviews, interviews and essays and a roundup of classic films sorted into categories such as “Rhymes With Witch.” But gone are the amusing frivolous features “Kitty Litter,” “Diagnosis Neurosis” and “Bad Hair,” a review of the good, the bad and the so-bad-it’s-good in celebrity coiffures.

But, on a discouraging note, the Girls On review of “Ally McBeal” reads like a high-schooler’s diary dishing about which boys and girls might get together. There’s gappingly no discussion of the show’s widespread female-bashing. (The grrl movement is fine for girls. But what about women?)

To borrow from Helen Reddy, one does indeed hear Oprah roar in numbers too big to ignore (Nielsen ratings, Web hits, assets), but Oxygen.com is not exactly Our Website, Ourselves.

*

Erika Milvy writes about arts, entertainment and whatnot from her home in San Francisco. She can be reached at erika@well.com